A snippet that covers what Hynes wants this team to be:
"What’s the Wild’s identity?
“Everyone talks about being hard to play against, but I define that for us, we play a north-south game,” Hynes said. “We’re up and out of our zone playing north and direct. We put the other team under duress. We’re strong on the forecheck, strong and heavy in the offensive zone. We get to the net. We’re good at both net fronts, offensively and defensively.
“When we’re on the defensive side, we’re stingy defensively as well.”
How many games have you seen the Wild play that way? The Rangers game. The season opener had long stretches of it. But it’s been hit or miss otherwise."
Kind of a doomer article, really. Other things touched on include Faber and Spurgeon both being off (Spurgeon covering for Buium impacting his play), possible trade targets (Tuch/Panarin/Kadri/Chinakov), Kaprizov needing to produce more, the power play cooling off, Ek being MIA, no help coming from Iowa.
Boldy is mentioned as the bright spot along with the goalies.
5 comments
Unfortunately I don’t think Spurge is good enough anymore to be able to cover up for a partner’s defensive deficiencies. Faber is the puzzling one to me
Hynes is off his gourde. This team has done none of those things
I’ll never claim to be a great hockey mind, but I don’t see enough consistency to point toward a game plan or play style.
Unless you’re going to consistently put Chinakhov on your top line you will run into the same problem as Columbus is having.
The inconsistency is maddening. There have been times in every game except maybe the Caps game where this team is stifling in the o-zone. Sustaining their forecheck, cycling effectively, excellent retrievals, great battles but it’s not consistent at all.
Wild HAVE to get back to a simple formula. It’s the most cliche statement in hockey but they have to get pucks at the net in volume. Seems like they’re falling back into that “pretty pass” that’s always one too many. 3rd and 4ths lines need to start getting those greasy goals and creating havoc in front of the net.
Faber will be fine, he’s putting way too much pressure on himself to carry the load and it’s just too much. If we start getting at least a smidgen of defensive scoring this team will be in much better shape.