Oh, wait, maybe I do, a little bit.
Sportsnet colour man Garry Galley praised The Hawks' confidence in their ability to nail the stretch pass, pointing out how the Hawks forwards would bolt out of the zone as soon as their D gained possession, looking for the long bomb. Yeah, sometimes that works but tonight, and on many other nights, the D found themselves with no one to pass to, forcing them to backpedal, regroup and, IF they aren't checked off the puck or have a desperation pass intercepted, start all over again. Do that a dozen or more times each game and you're spending way too much time doing nothing, really. Do they all have to run to the endzone every time? Could one guy not hang back for a short, safe pass if the lanes to the other two forwards are covered? I'm just sayin'...
Shooting was a problem, too, with many Hawks falling into indiscriminate chucking mode, again. "Pucks to the net", Edzo always says, and it's a nice idea, but let's try to look for a play if there's no one around the net for tip-ins or rebounds. I expect and can accept the less skilled guys to fall back on a shoot-first-and-see-what-happens dealio, but the good guys have to strive for more than that, because they can actually pull it off a lot of the time.
Scott Darling was fine; both goals against were tough, tough ones to stop. No blame there.
Hey, Jordin Tootoo, thanks for showing up, ya used up goof. 20% Corsi and punched out, again. Hey, at least Thorburn didn't score.
The Defense pairings didn't seem as slick as they were, lately. I quite liked Campbell and Seabrook together and was disappointed that Coach Q chose to pair up Soupy and Keith, once again. I mentioned before that Campbell and Keith often look hesitant when they're together and that appeared to be true tonight. That said, Campbell made a few nice defensive plays.
Is Kempny hurt or was it just short-bench-time late in the game? He hardly played in the third period.
Nick Schmaltz wasn't mentioned here yesterday as a candidate for demotion because I felt that any of the other fellas I did cover were more deserving of a time out, AHL-style. The move kind of makes sense, though, as Schmaltz did go straight from college hockey to The Show, so perhaps some time in Rockford will allow him a greater opportunity to do the things that worked for him as a student-athlete and, hopefully, find a way to apply that at the NHL level. At this time, Schmaltz isn't quick or confident enough to pull off whatever his schtick is.
Finally, there's less than three seconds left in regulation and you've got a faceoff in enemy territory: you're gonna want your best available faceoff man out there, right? Apparently not...
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