More familiar Doughty returns

The question of “What’s wrong with Drew Doughty?” had begun to grow legs, particularly after last Monday’s game at Anaheim, but Doughty rebounded with perhaps his two strongest all-around games of the season, including the game against Detroit in which Doughty played a season-high 30 minutes, 41 seconds. Terry Murray said Doughty was “very good the last two games, and talked about the fine line that can separate world-class play from merely average play…

MURRAY: “When it comes to the world-class players, the top players in the game, sure the skating is a big part of it for those guys, especially when you’re a defenseman, to be moving and to be adjusting your positioning and availability all the time. But the mental game is the key to the success of any player. I feel that Drew, I mean, here we are, the first (part) of December and there’s a heavy part of the schedule coming up in front of us, and he is putting it in his mind, at this time, to step it up and to be that player every night. I think that just carries over to his skating, his mobility and he has the puck on his stick a lot more.

“There’s no question, when you play him with Scuderi on a consistent basis, there is good chemistry there. The puck does end up on his stick much more often, and that’s the kind of look that he wants, and that’s the kind of look we want, is for him to have it, making plays, attacking, doing the right things with it. So I think that’s part of the reason why we’re seeing a player attacking more, because simply the puck is put on his hands more often.”