McBain talks puck movement, avoiding forechecks

Jamie McBain’s role is to get the puck in the hands of his forwards as quickly as possible.

“That’s supposed to be a strength of his game,” Darryl Sutter said, and it has been since his return to the lineup. Armed with a heavy shot and the ability to advance the puck up the ice quickly, McBain has been able to make little plays to protect and distribute the puck on breakouts, a strong asset for a team that enters tonight’s game as one of the league’s top possession teams and a squad that favors quick puck movement and quick practice habits.

“Overall, I’ve felt pretty good,” McBain said. “All these teams are coming with such heavy forechecks nowadays. It’s close support and it’s a triangle game between partners and center and really all over the ice with winger support. I think our forwards have done a great job helping us D out to make sure that they’re there for us and we’ve been able to make some plays.”

After the Kings’ morning skate on Monday, McBain shared with LA Kings Insider his responsibilities, how he gauges his performance, and what we should expect from tonight’s game, in which both teams are dealing with personnel challenges (though Los Angeles’ issues aren’t as severe as Columbus’):

On what he is looking for when he’s trying to get the puck out of the defensive zone:
Again, it’s just kind of that close support. Every team is kind of forechecking the same way. So it’s understanding where the center is going to be, where your partner is going to be, reading off of each other and talking. I think that’s the most important thing – talking. Letting each other know where the play is going to happen. Like I said, I think overall our forwards have done a great job of helping us D out with the low center and giving us an outlet that’s making plays a lot easier on us getting out of the zone.

On what he expects from Columbus:
That’s exactly it, they’re a hard working team. All four of their lines, they’re going to come at you. They’re all aggressive. There are not too many guys that are going to dangle or stick handle around you. They’re all going to put the puck in and go to work and drive hard to the net. So we know that’s what they’re going to bring. We’ve got to make sure that match that intensity, especially being the road team.

On whether there is an added focus to keep this game tight defensively:
I think in general you don’t want to play a track meet-type game. I think you always want to control play and making sure that you’re not getting into odd-man situations against. So in order to do that, it comes back to playing as a five-man unit, playing underneath the puck. We know as long as we’re doing that, we’re going to get our offensive chances because we’ve got the guys that are skilled enough.

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