This year, we've been pretty bad, to be honest. i don't know if we deserve to be this far in playoffs considering our inability to score goals. We've probably played one solid game this whole playoffs, but today's game was even worse than how we normally played. I don't recall us turning the puck over so much in one game. It is quite obvious that everytime the hawks get the puck in our zone, they're a major threat. Any advantage I thought we would have by being "more physical" seemed to have been nullified. You guys hit as hard as we do with more speed and top end skill. i think it all comes down to Kopitar's line being so damn ineffective and that's killing us. If ranked by efficiency, I would say Kopitar's line is our 3rd most effective line and that's just not goign to work from here on out. I don't know what's going on, but Kopitar has become the Penner of the regular season.
We have overachieved this year, without a doubt, largely thanks to Quick. Our defensive unit is obviously not as strong as last year, and our forwards, despite the names being largely the same, have not played with the same kind of intensity, even audacity, that we saw last year. In part, I think it's injuries and fatigue; that has to be considered.
However, I think it's partly also attitude. This season, we've been hearing this story about being patient, and staying calm, and keeping an even keel emotionally, and all that. In addition, after nearly every game, we hear things like "We didn't play our best," or "We know we have to do better," even when we win. I think these two attitudes are complementary, and might be counter-productive at times, because nor have we seen the Kings play really intense, emotionally invested hockey. They're robots out there, going through the motions at three-quarters speed. The only guy who has shown much fire at all is Quick. Last season, as the audacious upstart underdogs, our guys were not afraid to go right at the other team, to get in their faces, to crash the net. This year, it seems like our players have too much respect for other teams. We're tentative in everything we do, rarely taking the aggressive play in favor of a "safe" play. Let me give a couple of examples.
For one thing, the physical game is just not there consistently. We saw it a few times against the Sharks (games 5-7), and it's remarkably effective when it's used. When our forecheckers finish every check for a few shifts in a row, they begin to gain possession. Yet, last night, they seemed to be miming a physical game, but never really making solid contact. Credit the Hawks' players with spinning away from our checkers, but still, as I was watching all I could think was that the Kings needed to hit
harder. They needed to make hit that had an effect, not just cursory contact. This is one of the reasons that I (unlike many others) don't have a problem with Clifford taking shifts on the top line. At least the guy consistently tries to make solid contact. That cannot be said for Brown or Kopitar.
For another thing, the forwards are not as effective in their cycling, and I think part of this is the lack of killer instinct, and the constant caution exhibited when they cycle for a little while, and then back off for a line change. When they have a bit of pressure, this year's Kings don't follow it up. They don't keep pressing. Nor do they go to the net very effectively. It's one thing to play a grinding cycle game in which going straight to the net is not the first priority, but that is only effective when you can keep that cycle going all game and suffocate the other team that way. Our guys this year are possessing the puck a lot less, but their cycle still operates as though they are trying to grind the other team down instead of maximize offensive opportunities. The result is that the occasional possession shift (usually with the King-Stoll-Lewis line) plays with the puck in the corner for a few second, goes for a change, and then we're back to playing defense.
I think this can partly be attributed to a third issue, that our defensemen are not playing as aggressively this year. There are stretches when they contribute to the offense by pinching down the boards, but their default play this year has been to back off through the neutral zone. Our forwards are consistently outnumbered on attack, and thus it's not really surprising that they don't sustain pressure much. Our defensemen are too cautious this year; perhaps it's the lack of footspeed that's doing it. Certainly we miss Mitchell a great deal, but there's nothing to be done about it. Still, modern NHL hockey requires defensemen that are active players in all three zones. Our guys play behind their own red line for the most part, and it's killing us. It allows the other team to gain entry to our zone virtually at will, and all three opponents have done that.
The Kings need an attitude adjustment. They need to get angry and aggressive. (Side note: the penalties on Penner were unfortunate last night because he was one of the few players trying to really get things going. Those penalties I thought really neutered the physical play of the whole team. This is not a complaint about the refs; they call they game as they do, and good or bad calls even out. I just think we were unlucky in that regard, but still, the team needs to adjust to how the refs are calling things. You can't abandon your game plan because of a couple calls.) They need to get emotionally invested, and they need to leave it all on the ice.
