Following on the power-play/penalty-kill discussion, it’s worth noting that while the Kings aren’t scoring power-play goals, they’re also not getting a lot of chances to score them. In their last three games, the Kings have had three, one and two power-play chances, respectively. For the season, the Kings are essentially average — they rank 18th — in total power-play chances, so Terry Murray was asked today whether the Kings are doing a good enough job of getting to the hard areas of the ice and playing the right way in order to draw enough penalties…
MURRAY: “I go back over these games, and I’m seeing the hard driving to the net, middle-lane drive, getting right to the blue paint. I think the great example is the goals that we scored in Washington, and Simmonds, the play he makes in Philadelphia. Strong, gets the puck recovered and now gets to the net. The goalie has no chance. He doesn’t see it. So that’s there. We might get a little cute at times, but overall, I feel pretty comfortable that we’re doing the right stuff to get to the net and having a net-presence mentality.”
IMHO, we are so bad on the pp that the fewer we get the better our 5 on 5 momentum stays throughout the game. The current streak will attest to that. Would love to see a couple pp goals to really fire up the offense and NOT kill our momentum.
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xeropoint Reply:
February 15th, 2011 at 6:33 pm
@HappyLappy, Luckily the officiating in Philly was terrible. Have noticed the momentum die a swift death after a PP almost all season.
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KC23 Reply:
February 15th, 2011 at 9:19 pm
@HappyLappy, I think one of the reasons we look better on the road than at home is how the fans react to the PP. Fans get frustrated with poor PP in a hurry. In road games we’ve had their fans booing their PP several times giving us the momentum. At Staples it is the other way around.
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Kings Fan In Temecula Reply:
February 16th, 2011 at 2:43 am
@KC23, its simpleKC23, they just dont drive, they dont shoot on the powerplay or in general lol, always content to play perimeter play, overworking the D, and being utterly predictable, not the last few games but just in general, it ends up with me yelling at the tv mostly cuz its such a simple thing to shoot and drive but never seems to happen. i look at this objectively thats all, someones gotta do it
wish the best tho gkg
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I like the Coach but I can see why so many people give Murray crap. It sounds like he really has a short memory and forgot what caused the losing streak.
It was doing exactly the opposite and NOT driving with the puck to those areas and getting traffic in front established. But, we’ve done it three games in a row pretty well and suddenly it becomes a non-issue and the Kings standard of play on the ice. EhhhHhHhhhhhhhhh…
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HappyLappy Reply:
February 15th, 2011 at 5:53 pm
@Gary Livingston, yeah, the funny thing is, our best play is doughty driving the middle and the trailer getting a good look or rebound. Any way to visualize that with all the centers TM?
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Token Reply:
February 15th, 2011 at 6:03 pm
@HappyLappy, It’s a subtle difference, crashing the net down the middle is much more effective than down the wings. Problem with that is you usually get clobbered by a defenseman so it takes a special kind if tough to play that consistently.
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It also doesn’t seem that we have been cycling the puck as much, eating up time in the offensive zone, applying pressure and drawing penalties. I sort of agree with HappyLappy reference the 5 on 5. During the last game, we got that PP late in the game and my first thought was “Philly has us right where they want us.”
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HappyLappy Reply:
February 15th, 2011 at 6:19 pm
I think Lotki’s speed is showing up more at center, as well as creating more space. You’re right about the D laying you out, that’s an issue Lotki will have to work on (adding a little more bulk the his body in the off-season.
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Dilapidus Reply:
February 15th, 2011 at 7:34 pm
@DesertKing is right. You draw penalties by keeping the puck in the other teams zone and wearing them out. It’s a tale of two teams again, with the early season kings doing that so well that no defenses had any energy by the middle of the third. I think that the early season kings were chasing pucks and cycling much better and it was paying off
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@ Rich Hammond, in the article “Avoiding the Trap”, you list Drewiske, Harrold, and Westgarth as healthy scratches for tomorrow’s game. Will that be Westgarth or Richardson? I was under the impression no lineup changes would occur, but maybe I am missing something?
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Token Reply:
February 15th, 2011 at 6:43 pm
@mcsorleyfan, Interesting.
Since Dorsett is concussed, and Cliffy can likely handle Boll, might make sense to speed up the fourth line.
I’m sure we will find out soon enough.
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56 games in and no adjustments other than personnel. Is it the players failing to execute the strategy or a failure of the strategy to work? Over this large a sample size I would lean towards a flaw in the coaching staff.
Having said that, it could be that this is all a symptom of young guys “learning” and one day (hopefully soon) everything will click.
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Michael J. Reply:
February 16th, 2011 at 8:32 am
@xeropoint,
I would argue the opposite. When the players execute, the Kings a re nearly unbeatable. When the Kings lose ther are usually glaring mistakes that lead to opposition goals.
Your final point is correct-the Kings are very young, and it is their young players that seem to be making most of the mistakes (I am not blaming anyone, but we very rarely see Zeus, Scuds, or Mitchell making costly mistakes).
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Michael J. Reply:
February 16th, 2011 at 8:33 am
@Michael J.,
Rich, we really need a spellcheck.
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The power play is all about rhythm
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I think TM is doing some double-speak here all of a sudden. We’ve been calling on people all along to DRIVE the net either with the puck or looking for the pass. Not just park people in front (sorry Smitty) creating 6 or bodies in front and trying to blast it from the points through all of that traffic looking for slop (if they don;t get blocked. Get people to cycle not just along the boards but from the points to down low. This get the Defense out of sync creating those good high percentage breakdowns. 5on5 and especially on the PPP. We need a big win tonight. GKG!!!
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