EDMONTON — Everybody’s frustrated.
Head coach Ryan Warsofsky was after the Sharks’ 5-3 loss to the Edmonton Oilers on Tuesday.
Surely, so are the players, who came up without a point in back-to-back winnable games, in the middle of a tight playoff race.
No doubt, the fanbase, after lineup decisions today that perplexed them.
What’s my takeaway from Warsofsky’s personnel calls?
To name a few, inserting a cold Nick Leddy into the lineup for Shakir Mukhamadullin, rotating three wingers around Macklin Celebrini for two periods, yanking Michael Misa from the middle to be one of those aforementioned wingers, and leaving Will Smith and Tyler Toffoli on the bench during a late-game 6-on-5?
Big picture, I think this is a head coach who doesn’t have a lot of high-end options at his disposal. Basically, his roster isn’t very deep. So if it felt like an exasperated Warsofsky was throwing some things at the wall to see what would stick … well, I think there’s a reason for that.
Leddy, as it turns out, was far from the problem tonight, but the truth that needs to be faced is that Mukhamadullin isn’t seizing a job on the blueline that is right there for the taking.
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