Young Guns Streaky Play Continues
January 18, 2007
To call this team a streaky club would be an understatement. After reeling off 11 straight victories, and moving from 11th to 6th in the Eastern Conference, the Ottawa Young Guns have hit a skid and lost 5 in a row. "We're losing games at the wrong time now," said coach Bobby Hull, "everything that could go wrong is right now." With the teams' leading scorer, Nikolai Zherdev out, every line must now focus on team defence which will take the pressure off Jose Theodore. Speciality teams has also been an area of concern lately for the club- the team is ranked dead last in both Power Play and Penalty Killing percentage. "When we were winning games we were putting the puck in the net with a man up and keeping the puck out when a man down, now it seems the exact opposite is happening," said exhausted team captain Adrian Aucoin after a two hour long "bag-skate" type practice. As the trade deadline came and went, the Young Guns addressed the lack of leadership issues in their lineup- the additions of Ryan Smyth and Radek Bonk (along with Shane Doan ealier in the season) will help to guide this young lineup and teach them the ways of winning. Assuming the Young Guns can lock down a playoff spot as the seasons' end draws near, they have to be considered a threat for the same reason they are being crticized right now- an 11 game win streak in the playoffs puts the team one win away from being a conference champion.
Ottawa Free Press
No comments:
Post a Comment