Clifford’s season a work in progress

In discussing, earlier, the play of the third line this season, Kyle Clifford is not a player to be forgotten. Clifford made a big splash last season as a rookie, when he played a fantastic physical game and also showed some potential on offense. By the playoffs, Clifford had even moved into a first-line role (by necessity, mostly) with Brad Richardson and Wayne Simmonds. Clifford made himself a coaching-staff favorite because of his hard work and willingness to learn, but Clifford’s sophomore season has been up and down. He started on the third line, then got moved to the fourth line early in the season when Terry Murray indicated that Clifford wasn’t quite ready to handle the increased responsibilities. Now, Clifford is back with the third line, but has totaled only one goal and two assists this season. Murray was asked for his opinion about the differences in Clifford’s game this season, compared to last season…

MURRAY: “A player with more awareness. He’s an effective player in that he has established himself as a pretty hard guy to play against, when it comes to physicality. He’s improved in puck recoveries in the offensive zone, because of his speed and quickness and his attitude of, `I’m going to go get it and come up with it.’ And his awareness on the checking part of it, it gets better all the time. He knows the structure and the game that we play, the philosophy that we have, and he’s got great awareness to it.’’

Question: But scoring some goals would help his confidence a little too, right?

MURRAY: “Sure it would, absolutely. He’s in a situation, on a line with Stoll and Hunter right now, that demands some offensive play. It doesn’t have to be the highlight kind of goal. It’s just to get pucks to the blue paint and get in the goaltender’s eyes, and now look for those loose pucks, rebounds and pound away, push it into the net sometimes. I hope that starts.’’

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