Power-less Power Play

Let’s just say thank God the Wild have been so dominant during 5 on 5 play. Mikko Koivu, Zach Parise, Thomas Vanek, Jason Pominville and Ryan Suter all on the ice, at the same time, sounds like a lethal unit. Well, it should be lethal, but as we have come to find out, that is just not the case this season. 0 for …. how many now 28, 30? Whatever the actual number is, the PP% is at a 0% efficiency rate. Only the dull Buffalo Sabres are worse and that’s solely because their number of opportunities is higher than Minnesota’s. Buffalo stands at 0-32 on the year.

Before the Wild’s matchup with San Jose tonight, someone please pass this on to Coach Yeo, or Bruno (the latter of whom fans are beginning to question). When your forward lines have arguably outplayed every single opponent thus far during the season, why split them up when you have a man advantage? They’ve been playing at even strength like they were on the power play to begin with! Catch my drift? The units have been split into two obvious groups, the vets, and youngsters. The vets seem stressed, anxious out there even, and are forgetting the little, simple things about a power play. They simply aren’t moving their feet enough. We all saw it against the Rangers Monday night. When you are on a 5 on 3 pp, you have to attack the net, shorten the opposing team’s perimeter of defense. Back them up to their goalie. Don’t let a 3 man penalty kill dictate to you, how close you can get to the net minder before you need to pass the puck. Suter is the worst offender of this. He rarely leaves the blue line on the power play. That being said, watch him tonight now get down low on the man advantage and tally their first PPG of the year, right after I open my big mouth about it. Something’s got to give eventually, especially with the Wild leading the league in avg SOG during the PP.

When a team’s power play unit starts to slide, or in this case hasn’t even begun yet, the wannabe coach inside every fan starts to come out. While this strategy may sound too “obvious” to some, I’m beginning to wonder if Yeo and Brunette have even thought of this.

Keep Parise, Mikael Granlund and Pommer on the ice together as the top unit with a pairing of Suter/Jared Spurgeon or Suter/Jonas Brodin. They are easily one of the most exciting lines to watch in hockey right now so why change it when there are LESS MEN ON THE ICE FOR THE OPPOSING TEAM?

Secondly, If Yeo absolutely has to have Koivu and Vanek out there during the PP, then throw out Coyle or Nino with them for the second forward unit. Logic behind it being another big body. But, if it was my decision, then it would look like this.

PP1 : Parise-Granlund-Pominville    Suter-Matt Dumba

PP2 : Jason Zucker–Charlie Coyle–Nino Niederreiter   Spurgeon-Marco Scandella

With how our Top-4 D have played and scored through 8 games, there really is no reason why they can’t play on the man advantage right now. It couldn’t hurt anyway. Granted I only have Dumba in there because Brodin will not be in the lineup tonight, and Dumba provides another right handed shot. Zucker has been extremely impressive while taking advantage of all situations he’s been given. Give him more chances! Nino and Coyle in my opinion, have thoroughly outplayed the Captain and Vanek through the first few weeks of the year. They deserve to be out there right now.

We will see how it plays out and if any changes are made prior to or during the Sharks visit to XCel Energy tonight. Tune in to Gone Puck Wild for Tremblay’s Take after the game for a complete recap of all the action. Do you think we end the drought tonight? If the power play lines don’t look like the ones above by game time, I don’t…