I was just talking about this another thread and I wanted to give it more space for discussion and detail my thoughts a bit more.
I think one of the big things Berube needs to do behind the scenes this year is ensure the players beyond the core 4-5 players don’t feel like second class citizens on this team. Carving out well defined roles for every player to take ownership of and help everyone feel like they are integral to the team’s success.
I see 3 primary opportunities to change this culture in the direction we want:
1) go back to split powerplay units to get more people involved.
2) take the star players off the penalty kill
3) split the star talent across 3 forward lines, ensuring 3/4s of forwards play on legit scoring lines and can contribute. 4th line should be primarily defensive/checking
Most every D and F should have a primary special teams role. For example:
Defense:
PP - Rielly, OEL, Liljegren
PK - Tanev, McCabe, Benoit, Hakanpaa
Forward:
PP - Matthews, Marner, Nylander, Tavares, Domi, Knies, Robertson
PK - Kampf, Holmberg, McMann, plus I think we need 2 others to be added.
Edit: lmao nevermind it was this thread
Edit2: don’t get too hung on names and configurations here as I didn’t put a ton of thought into them, but we could something like:
Matthews, Robertson, Knies, Domi & OEL
Tavares, Marner, Nylander, Rielly & Liljegren