Lucic still has an impact on games, Hitch says
He’s not scoring, obviously, but is big winger still making an impact?
While we’ve worked the Will Toby Ever Score storyline to death, not just with sentences but with whole paragraphs in chapter and verse, wondering if Tobias Rieder will beat a goalie this NHL season, we’ve ignored the Milan Lucic Saga.
Or maybe we plowed that hard ground last season, so why go over it again this year when Rieder’s 63 games without a goal is a corollary to the Connor McDavid-Leon Draisaitl heroics every night.
We’ve given Lucic his space even though he can’t seem to find comfortable scoring territory. It’s like, why beat a proud horse? He knows his hands are stone cold; he’s said so. He’s a standup guy who knows the net may as well be radioactive. He’s on a 27-game run without a goal after 41 games earlier in the season.
Lucic whistled one past New Jersey goaltender Keith Kincaid in Sweden in Game 1, then didn’t score again until Jan. 8 against San Jose. He then added two against Buffalo and one against Calgary for four goals over a sixgame stretch from Jan. 8-19.
Then, just when it looked like he was finding the range and people were pulling for him to get out of his slide, nothing.
He has 69 shots in 75 games, which obviously isn’t enough. He’s had 28 games with no shots and 60 with one or fewer.
Lucic is only 30 and has played just 804 games. It can’t be over, can it?
There’s been far too much talk about Lucic’s feet in a racehorse NHL game, but where did Looch’s hands go? After 23 goals in 2016-17, he went to 10 last season and now five. He had 175 shots his first Oilers season with a 13.1 shooting percentage. Last year it was 10 in 147 shots for a 6.8 percentage. This year five in 69 for 7.1 per cent.
Part of that is not playing on the power play, part of that is playing farther down the lineup with Colby Cave or Kyle Brodziak as his centre. But it’s the old story: Play better and you’ll play with better offensive people.
His $6 million salary is his concern and Daryl Katz’s problem. They aren’t going to buy him out with four years left on his $42 million deal. There’s been speculation of Lucic back to Los Angeles for an unhappy Ilya Kovalchuk, but unless the Oilers threw in a good prospect because Lucic has four years left on his deal and Kovalchuk two, that wouldn’t work. The Kings are looking to get younger and way faster anyway.
Lucic left the Oilers dressing room before an optional practice was winding down Friday afternoon so wasn’t available to talk, but his coach Ken Hitchcock did, So did two longtime pro scouts — outside eyes from other organizations.
So what about the lack of goals? “Milan’s too impatient and doesn’t hang around the scoring area long enough; we’ve talked to him about that,” said Hitchcock. “He’s got too much of a conscience. He’s spent too much time being worried about being scored on so he gets back on defence too quickly. We want him hanging around the red-zone, blue-paint area longer.”
Lucic was the net-front presence on the first power play unit for the first two years but Alex Chiasson is now because he shoots right and the Oilers are using four lefties — McDavid, Draisaitl, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and either Darnell Nurse or Oscar Klefbom.
Lucic is on the second group. “We’re only getting one power play a game. I think Milan would score more if we got more (second unit). He plays 11-12 minutes and it’s all five on five. He’s a good net-front presence, he gets his stick on pucks and he’s more than willing to screen the goalie but we don’t give him any time there. Because of the way our (first) power play runs through the left shots we need a right-shot (net presence),” Hitchcock said.
Lucic has always been a presence with his banging, his ability to protect people. He still hits, nobody wants to fight him but for the odd kid like Kurtis Gabriel, and he cares. But he can’t score.
“Obviously he’s not worth what he’s paid and skating has never been his strength, but I think he can still get around the ice,” said a Western pro scout. “He’s a proud guy, if he’s put in a third-line role, a Top 9 role, there’s more there … his hockey sense and skills are fine. But I think there’s so much noise around him and the message gets confusing.”
The scout added: “Milan’s an interesting guy for me. He’s tough but I’m not sure how self-assured he is. I don’t think he’s a confident person.”
Another scout isn’t so sure there’s much left to his game.
“He’s fallen off the face of the earth, there’s not much that excites me. It’s not so much his speed, as processing the game quickly enough,” said the other Western Conference scout. “He’s a step behind … and he’s had the opportunity to play with Connor and Leon, with the stars. That’s a red flag for me.”
Hitchcock likes Lucic with “big-body guys because he bangs … against Dallas every shift he had with his line they controlled the boards in the second and third periods. He seems to play better with people like (Kyle) Brodziak or (Zack) Kassian.
“He’s got lots of game left. I know five or six similar style players who are effective, like (David) Backes, like (Andrew)
Ladd when healthy. They don’t have the numbers they once had but they have a major effect on games. I guarantee you opposing teams still circle Milan’s name,” Hitchcock said.