ALL EYES ON AUSTON’S POWERS
Ahead of tonight’s home opener, many say NHL rule enforcement will help the high-flying Leafs. The big question: can Matthews bag 50?
We’ve been hearing hockey people express awe at the masterful work of Connor McDavid for years. But there was an especially ear-grabbing kind of awe oozing from the mouth of Jaromir Jagr, the second-most prolific scorer in NHL history next to Wayne Gretzky.
Jagr said this week he wouldn’t be surprised if McDavid “someday scored 100 goals” in an NHL season. Never mind that McDavid, 20, has entered the league at a moment when league-wide scoring totals have been closer to historic lows than Gretzky-era highs. Given that Jagr, 45, is playing deep into his fourth decade as a pro, it was worth hearing him out.
“I’ve never seen anything like that in my life, somebody dominate like that with his speed,” Jagr said, speaking of McDavid’s opening-night hat trick against the Flames.
Jagr wasn’t the only longtime observer to offer bignumbered projections for McDavid’s not-so-distant future. Pierre McGuire, NBC’s between-the-benches colour guy, told TSN radio that he could imagine McDavid scoring 82 goals in 82 games.
Split the difference between Jagr’s and McGuire’s projection and you’ve got a future scenario in which McDavid flirts with the single-season record of 92 goals set by a 21-year-old Wayne Gretzky back in 198182.
Precisely what kind of alternate universe have we entered? A season ago, McDavid scored exactly 30 goals in 82 games, while playing the third-most minutes among NHL forwards. So the idea that McDavid is suddenly going to latch on to goal-a-game pace, or better, seems rash.
So as we arrived at the first Saturday night of the season — with the Maple Leafs and their own scoring star, sophomore Auston Matthews, entertaining the Rangers in the most hotly anticipated home opener in recent memory — it was worth asking, “What gives?”
“Right now, those rules are perfect for (McDavid),” Jagr said.
Ah, yes — those rules. McGuire is convinced the league’s emphasis on various rules — most notably a crackdown on slashing to the hands of the puck carrier — has suddenly made the NHL more hospitable to the skilled.
How much more hospitable? The results of the opening couple of nights — the Blackhawks’ 10-1 win over Pittsburgh and the Leafs’ converted touchdown in Winnipeg — suggest the changes to the game, if they’re sustained, could be significant.
“That slash we’re trying to get rid of — the one on the hands — if they call it consistently it’ll give you that extra split second to maybe make a play or carry the puck a bit more,” said James van Riemsdyk, the veteran Leafs forward. “I mean, it’s only been two days, but so far it seems like there’s been a lot of goals.”
Some grain-of-salt context is required here. We’re talking, to be clear, about the National Hockey League, formerly known as the National Hooking League, more recently recognized as the National Hacking League. This is an organization that has aided and abetted in the snuffing out of offence for years. It got so bad that last season Sidney Crosby led the league in goals with 44 — the lowest total to win the Rocket Richard Trophy since before the 2004-05 lockout.
Still, there’s a feeling among players that the league means business. So far power-play opportunities are way up. And Eric Fehr, the veteran Maple Leafs forward, said the current season already reminds him of the first season after the 2004-05 lockout, when a summit led by now-Leafs president Brendan Shanahan birthed a rethinking of the game that re-valued skill, penalized obstruction and boosted scoring.
Except, some say this is different. Some say the current crackdown on slashing has the potential to open up the sport in a new and exciting way.
“I’ve talked to a bunch of elite shutdown defencemen in the league, and this is a much more difficult thing to overcome than the 2005-06 obstruction crackdown,” McGuire said. “It’s going to be very, very difficult for matchup defencemen to neutralize the better offensive players . . . Coaches used to call the stick the equalizer, the defensive equalizer. Well, the stick is basically gone now.”
“It’s certainly harder to check guys and limit their opportunities when you can’t use your stick as much up on the gloves,” Leafs defenceman Morgan Rielly said in a pre-season interview. “But that’s a rule. So we’ve just got to get used to it.”
Toronto coach Mike Babcock begged to differ on Friday: “I don’t think it makes it one bit tougher. I think it makes it easier. Because instead of having your stick in the air, you can actually put it on the puck where it’s doing some good.”
Still, some defensive hiccups have to be expected. McGuire likened this rejig to the NFL’s years-ago crackdown on contact between defensive backs and receivers, which led to an explosion in high-flying passing attacks. And maybe it mirrors the NBA’s outlawing of hand-checking, which allowed smaller, quicker guards like Steph Curry to flourish and offence to rule.
Leafs defenceman Connor Carrick said the NHL’s push toward a more offensive game isn’t simply a function of the officials’ whistle. There’s an aggregation of small things piling up, including rosters stocked with younger (and more defensively raw) players, plus an ongoing trend that favours offensive-minded defencemen over the stay-at-home type.
“(Defencemen are) more mobile, they’re faster, there’s more talk about being able to create in transition,” Carrick said. “It’s good for the game.”
Will the resultant outburst of offence be so good that McDavid flirts with a 100-goal season?
“We’re definitely getting ahead of ourselves. The kid’s special. But 100 goals? That ain’t happening,” said Leafs centre Nazem Kadri. “Guys barely score 45 now. Imagine trying to double that and then some. That’s absolutely insane.”
Indeed, history tells us it’d be wise to wait a few months — or maybe a couple of years — before we announce that the “H” in this allegedly new NHL stands for Hundred. As it is, with 81 games remaining Edmonton’s No. 97 has a mere 97 goals to go.
“I could see (McDavid) breaking the 50, 60 mark, but 100?” Kadri said. “Maybe if we take the goalies out of the net.”