Woodcroft mum on lineup tinkering ahead of Game 2
With the playoffs a chess match between the top two lines in most cases, third lines become vital but the Ryan Nugent-hopkins third unit didn't get much done against Los Angeles Monday in Game 1.
They have to be better in Game 2 on Wednesday.
Nugent-hopkins was strong on special teams as usual, but he and Derek Ryan were on for the first two L.A. goals even strength by Trevor Moore and Alex Iafallo, and Warren Foegele for the opening Moore goal in the high slot. Nugent-hopkins only won three of nine faceoffs. Ryan won six of seven as the only righty faceoff guy but only got 6:47 of five-on-five time and Foegele 8:43 with a run of eight penalties.
“I thought Nuge made some plays on our power play, a big factor in our power play going twofor-four and he was a mainstay on our penalty kill (all four killed),” said coach Jay Woodcroft. “There's some areas we can clean up defensively as a team but he's (Nugent-hopkins) going to be a good player for us as we go through the playoffs.”
The Kings used Anze Kopitar against Leon Draisaitl and Philip Danault against Connor Mcdavid. Kopitar played 25:41, 17:50 even strength. Danault played 22:45, 15:04 five-on-five. Kopitar played eight more seconds than Mcdavid.
“With 16 minutes of power play time combined, we're talking minute distribution (for bottom-six people),” said Woodcroft.
Does Nugent-hopkins perhaps need Jesse Puljujarvi on right wing to give the third line more offensive juice? Or does Woodcroft need Ryan on the line to balance out the faceoff responsibilities with Nugent-hopkins at 40.7 per cent on 350 regular-season draws and Ryan 55.9 per cent on 393?
If Woodcroft is making changes for Game 2, he wasn't sharing them Tuesday.
“Nuge's line has been a factor in our record (over 82 games). When Ryan Nugent-hopkins is in our lineup, he makes us that much better and the numbers bear that out,” said Woodcroft.
ME AND MY SHADOW
A few hours before Game 1, Danault admitted you have to sacrifice some offence when you're checking the best player in the world in Connor Mcdavid.
True enough for one of the game's best two-way centres who should always be in the conversation for the Selke Trophy. But Danault's words about putting offence in the drawer when trying to worry about the Edmonton Oilers captain and NHL scoring champion looked like a giant misdirection in the 4-3 win Monday.
Danault had the game-winner (tip of Sean Durzi shot) and assisted on goals by linemates Alex Iafallo and Trevor Moore. He played 22:45 as Kings coach Todd Mclellan rode him hard along with fellow centre and Kings captain Anze Kopitar (25:41) as they took turns against Mcdavid and Draisaitl.
While Kopitar actually got more even-strength time against Mcdavid (7:52) than Danault's 3:21, they were both busy taking 50 of the 66 draws in the game.
BAD STUFF HAPPENS
The Mike Smith mistake that gave the Kings the Game 1 win has been dissected, but give Iafallo credit. Playing in place of Viktor Arvidsson with Danault, Iafallo read the play perfectly after his initial dump in. Rather than peel off and go to the boards, he stopped and stayed in the middle of the ice about 20 feet away and knocked down Smith's pass that appeared to be intended for Draisaitl.
“I was just trying to forecheck and I thought he was going to rim it,” said Iafallo. “Luckily I grabbed it. He made a good save (diving).”
“One puck-handling error and Mike made a heckuva save off that error. The puck handling is a real skill of Mike's. As a team we could have done more off the initial (Iafallo) save to help in that situation,” said Woodcroft.
It was chaos after the giveaway and the Oilers had ample opportunity to get the puck out, but didn't as Moore worked to get the puck back to Durzi for the winning shot and tip by Danault.
Smith, who faced 35 shots, will likely get the call again for Game 2, but Woodcroft wasn't offering that up Tuesday.
“Yes, I do know who's starting but we'll share that tomorrow. We've got time, we'll use it,” he said.