The Hockey PDOcast - Basking in the Afterglow of the Hughes Bowl

Episode Date: December 6, 2023

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by Thomas Drance to share their excitement about last night's Hughes Bowl in Vancouver while breaking down all of the exciting and potentially concerning stuff they saw from both teams involved.If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84This podcast is produced by Dominic SramatyThe views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate. If you'd like to gain access to the two extra shows we're doing each week this season, you can subscribe to our Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/thehockeypdocast/membership If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

mean since 2015. It's the Hockey Pediocast with your host, Dmitri Filippovin. Welcome to the Hockey Pediocast. My name's Demetri Filippovich and joining me here in studio with a smile on his face coming off of last night's extravagance at Rodgers. That's my good buddy, Thomas Transt. Tom. What's going on, man? From ear to ear. I've never seen you walk into the studio here so happy. Usually you come in talking fantasy football. You walked in with a purpose today saying, let's talk hockey. That was such a fun game. That was such a fun game. game and you know I went to the rink thinking like okay this is an interesting game you know you've got noted Canucks killer Tyler to Foley back in the house you've got Curtis Lazars returned to Vancouver

Travis Green yeah those were the main talking points in last night's and then the three Hughes brothers it's like an interesting game but I you know I was coming off watching like that pacer's Celtics game and sort of bemoaning the fact that the NHL doesn't have in season stakes over the course of a long 82 game grind especially from the perspective of a of a beatwriter and And instead, like, that was one of the best, that was the most entertaining game that I saw live, that I've seen live this season, by a lot, just like incredible action, incredible pace. The Devils are a warp speed hockey team, and we'll get into it more, but they don't really play, or they don't really right now use that speed in the service of like a blanket defensive solidity like they did last season. Especially in that Ranger series in round one, right, where they kind of just suffocated. them and we and we praised them for it.

It hasn't been a lot of that this year. Well, and I think we saw a lot of it all season, and then it showed up when it really mattered, like when their back was against the wall in that series, and it felt like an arrival. And to this point, they haven't got that part of their game going. I don't think their goalies are helping them. Like, I think partly you need some confidence that you can actually prevent goals to play like that with team level discipline.

But, you know, spotty goaltending, a big comeback to tie at 5-0, Rogers Arena. sounded unlike anything I've heard in that building in 12 years. Okay, can I ask you something? But just while you're on that, because I'm going to let you keep going, someone in the Discord came with a theory where I guess they were at a Ducks game at Honda Center or whatever it's called these days. And then they watched the game afterwards. It was the one over the weekend against the Aves where Leo Carlson scores the shootout

winner, right? And they were saying that by the time that had happened, most of the rink had emptied out, and it was actually very quiet in the rink. but then when you watched it, it almost sounded like they were piping in artificial crowd noise. Right. To make it sound like everyone just went nuts

when in reality, it was pretty calm. Interesting. That's sad. There's a conspiracy theory about how teams are piping in stuff, kind of like the WWE does, right? Yeah, it was a big talking point. Or kind of like the NHL did during the bubble, right?

That like ghostly cheer sound that you'd hear that was like always a little bit delayed. Right. The worst part about that ghostly cheer sound, by the way, is that it didn't have a disappointment. You know, like one of the... fun. Like a groan.

Yeah. Oh. Or a shoot. They didn't do a shoot, right? Like during PowerPoint. They have some robot banging on the glass. Like, look what AI can do. No, the, uh, that was the thing.

Like the decibel level at Rogers Arena crescendoed throughout the night as the Canucks mounted this comeback, really hitting this sort of fever pitch when Nealz Hoaglander, you know, whacked in a rebound that, I mean, Vitech Vanichek was just kicking out rebounds like it was his job. And all of a sudden, this breakdown happens in the last minute, and we got to get into that play because it's one of the weirdest plays you'll see all year. And just like the silence, the stunned silence. And it was just the, you know, you don't love the gut punch from the perspective of someone

who wants good things for hockey fans in this market, but you love the emotional roller coaster. You know, and it's just that was a quality of game, a quality of entertainment that, you know, I haven't been fortunate enough to cover frequently enough. Even this season, as the Canucks have been, you know, somewhat regularly picking their teeth with opponents. Well, if you can tell, we're both just basking right now in this afterglow of last night's highly anticipated Hughes Bowl. And initially, I'd booked you for the show.

I was like, all right, come on. It's, uh, they're doing the board of governors meetings, right, this week. And I was like, there's a lot of NHL business stuff for us to discuss. I want to get into all that with you. And I'm sure we'll have some, some time to do so towards. the end of the show, but this event last night in Vancouver just took the entire league by storm, right? I felt like everyone was watching and talking about it.

And so timely, you know, I think we're just going to focus on that now and see how far. We can go there. It was just, you kind of nailed all the reasons why, but it was such a delightful viewing experience because I feel like these types of games very rarely live up to the hype, right? I'm so used to, especially as like you and I just spend so much time watching and talking about fantasy football and these football games, and you always get so excited about these primetime games in particular, and then you actually get to the game when you watch it, and it's usually a blowout or a stinker. Rarely do both teams show up and actually deliver on the excitement factor.

And in this case, not only do you get the 6-5 score, the dramatic ending, which you described there, but you also get the top players involved, all kind of showcasing the cool individual traits in their games that actually make them top players, right? It was like each one of the guys, and we can talk more about them, did exactly what makes them so special. And so even if you hadn't really watched either of these teams very closely this year, you got a really good crash course in terms of like what makes Quinn Hughes

so cool, what makes Jack Hughes so effective, even the last petters. And like all this stuff was kind of in the ether, right? And so it was really fun to watch. Then you get the crowd, you get the Canucks wearing their best jerseys. Out of nowhere, by the way, that wasn't one of the pre-scheduled.

That was a surprise, Canucks flying skate jersey, which I'm not a big fan of, by the way. No, I'm not a big fan of, by the way. No, I'm not. That's That's hopefully going to be the worst take you have today, but we'll see. You get Ray Ferraro in the call. I know you were in the building watching it live, of course, but we're just, we've talked about this. We're so spoiled by not only their chemistry, but also like Ray Ferraro just being,

with all due respect to all, like, local color commentators just so overqualified for that role for these Canucks broadcasts. And so. I've been so Ferraro-pilled for like 10 years, but I mean, he's brilliant. I mean, he was just so all over it. Like he, we'll talk more about Vanichek later on when we get to the devil's portion of this, but, like, he was just so all over a mall game. Every time he's like, oh, my God, this guy just has no confidence right now. Look at that rebound.

Like, and you rarely, I'm so programmed to all color commentators just like playing it's so safe and, like, coddling everyone and being like, oh, like, let's focus on the positive. And in this case, he was just calling it for what it was. And I was like, it was so refreshing to hear that. Okay, can we, can we, I just want to talk really quickly before we move on from Ferraro about one of the all-time great industry flexes I've ever seen, which was Ray Ferraro's first game because he's only doing about 20 Canucks. games this season was a game that Canucks played in Ottawa and 35 seconds into the game,

Brock Besser shoots on a rush and the puck is saved apparently by, I think it was Anton Forsberg, but it might have been their other goalie. And the puck is in the net, but by like a half millimeter, right? And just enough for the camera to actually catch it. And Ferraro on the broadcast, 35 seconds into his first Canucks broadcast is the only guy in the planet who calls it a goal on live broadcast and then is right when the NHL war room stops play 30 seconds later. I mean, that's like an all-time flex for one of the giants in our business. Yeah. Well, he's watched a few games from that advantage point.

Yeah. He knows what he's talking about. Yeah. Okay, so let's start with the Connacht's perspective here because I actually haven't really had a chance to talk about the Nikita Zero Outrade on this podcast since it happened late last week. We can get into the dynamics of it a little bit and kind of like the calculus of the move. I mean, I think you and I were generally both and we'll get into the actual usage last night and maybe some of the concerning parts of it in terms of like what it's

emboldening the coaching staff to do. But I think just from an acquisition cost perspective, right, you and I are both in the hundredth percentile of Nikita Zedorov enjoys. Yeah, yeah. We have a, we have a society. We have a, we have a WhatsApp group. And so not only does that boost the Canucks Entertainment value, but also just like what a future third and fifth like down the road i just think everyone was kind of programmed to this is the type of player who profiles as someone that someone's going to talk themselves into and become desperate for size on the back end and then give up an asset which is like whoa i can't believe they did that and maybe that would have happened if the flames had slow played this till

the deadline and built on that desperation but they clearly just i'm kind of curious here i take did they do it because they were like listen we had this offer and we just want to get them out of the room like we're so traumatized by how toxic last year's work environment was that we can't afford to let this play out for two more months or was it what I've seen people talking about which kind of strikes me as more puzzling was like well the connects are one of the few teams that could just take on his full contract and so we don't have to retain and we view that as a positive because that would be a baffling reason for this move from the flames perspective for me well I think I think it's a more baffling reason for this move in four months at the

deadline. Like at the deadline, retaining half is a much lower financial hit than it is now to retain half, given that you're paying these guys daily. Um, so, you know, I think the, I think that's part of it. Like, I think that's part of it. I think the flames valued the cap flexibility aspect. I think they valued the turn the page aspect of it. But like fundamentally, four or five defensemen, Luke Shen, you know, Ilya Lubechkin, like go down the list. Guys who profile pretty similarly to Zedore of they get a third. They get a third at the deadline. The flames got a third and.

They got a third plus. So I don't know. I didn't find the return. I actually thought Conroy and company got ground a little too hard over what they netted here. Given how public that trade request was, you know, given everything around them. Like I think they at least got fair market value and created full cap flexibility for themselves as they look to, you know, sort of see which way the wind blows over the next two weeks and calibrate their approach. Well, look to do what?

I guess that's my question, right? No, but if you're selling, now you have additional money to take back, you know, at the deadline, you can problem solve for teams with that cap space. I mean, there's, I'm not guaranteeing that they will creatively use it, but I think there are at least creative things. There are options that open up for you with this. That said, like I still like the acquisition price for Vancouver. I was pretty critical of the club trading Tanner Pearson in a second for Casey DeSmith,

for example. I stand by that one. I was pretty critical of them trading a fifth for Sam Lafferty, who's the hottest guy in the NHL right now, by the way, scores another deflection goal against the devils. And I stand by that one, too. But for me, Zedorov's a different sort of caliber of guy. Like, it's not easy to find a six-foot-five super entertaining defensive guy who, you know, I see as sort of a four-five type.

Like, I don't think he's going to kill you on a second pair if he's got the right partner. I don't know that Tyler Myers is the right partner. We'll talk about that, I'm sure. But yeah, I mean, I thought this was just like sensible from the Canucks perspective, a good deal. And from Calgary's, you know, I thought it was at least fair market. I just think that they've been, it's been suggested or like talked about like they got robbed. And I just don't see that in this return. Yeah.

We just put a ball on it from the Flames perspective because I don't think it's egregious by any means. And you're right. It's like within the ballpark of what these types of players go for. I guess just like if the logic is, all right, we, we wanted to get as much money off of our books as we could here so that we could turn around and then add a player who helps us. First off, they're like, what, 10, 12 and some and four or whatever their record is with like a minus 11 goal differential. They're going to, I assume, trade both Chris Hannev and Noah Hanif in at some point here. And in doing so, yeah, they certainly should. And so it's like, what player are you going to be adding that's going to soak up such a meaningful part of your cap?

Yeah. And it's also both guys are expiring. So when you see Elliot Freeman go on Hockington and Canada and say that there was talks of a Leafs deal where it was like, oh, we're going to give you Zedorov and Tanna, but you have to retain a meaningful amount and then we'll make it work. And I'm sure the Leafs would have paid a pretty penny to facilitate that. I don't understand how this would be viewed as a better alternative. So that was just why I found it strange.

Well, I think it's fair. But I also think the like the sticker reality. The reaction of the sticker price on Zedorov's instructive. Like if you have surplus picks and cap space, the players you're able to add will shock you in terms of the price that they go for. And, you know, it's not ideal, but the flames have at least set themselves up to potentially be in that market as the trade sort of talks grind into gear in the Monset. Okay. Well, so the player, you mentioned kind of the fit in the team for the Canucks and the partner, right? And we've seen him now with Myers and speaking.

of puzzling. I mean, Rick Tocket, who has pushed most of the right buttons this season. Yeah, he's been exceptional. Deciding to hard match them against the Quinn, Jack Hughes line was very strange. I've now covered him, what, for 50, like almost 60 games. It's 26 plus 36, so yeah, 52 games. I've covered 52 games of Rick Tocotaki. I've been really impressed. He has always leapt over with ease, the, are the right guys on the ice at the right times bar, by which I mostly evaluate coaches. This was the first time that I was really puzzled by a decision, like that I couldn't make sense of it.

Yeah, I'm not sure, you know, at the start of the year, with the start the Canucks jumped out, do it seem like a foregone conclusion that he had like cemented his Jack Adams status, right? Because that award is so much predicated on like exceeding expectations. And so with the Canucks start, it was like, all right, well, like every awards article we see right now is going to have him front and center. And he's been the gambling favorite by like a fair bit.

for almost a month now. And I'm not sure if I'd go that far because I think whether it's Todd McClellan, who obviously has better personnel to work with or a Palm Reese, like I think there's coaches that might be tactically doing a better job. But the point that I was making to you was like, I do think that for all the talk of their PDO and the start Hughes is off to and Demco and everything, like there's some really interesting trends with the way this Canucks team is choosing

to play that are illustrated by by sport logic stats and maybe more so than some of the public ones that are available to us. And you sort of see this with the way they play where natural statrick has them at 18th, in expected goals against. Sporologic has them at 9th. And the reason for that is because they lead the league in offensive zone possession time.

Now they're not necessarily meaningfully, like leveraging that into creating sustainable 5-1-5 offense, but they're keeping the puck in the offensive zone through like grinding and forechecking and all that kind of like effort, battle stuff that we've talked about. And the trickle-down effect of that is that the puck isn't in their zone very often. And so they're limiting the volume they're facing. And so while Demko's goal save above expected us through the roof and he's been phenomenal for large stretches of the year,

they're also, I think Tocke's doing a really good job of tactically, like, papering over a lot of these issues that we thought this blue line had, even with the Zoroavidition. Now, when you play a team like the Devils or Vegas last week or L.A. when they play them later on in this season. Or Colorado. Or Colorado. You know, some of those kind of faster transition teams, I think a lot of that papering over is going to start seeing through it a little bit more because they stretch you out. They attack so quickly. And all of a sudden now it's tougher to execute that game plan that they've been like, it feels like they need to do everything right and stack together these sequences to make it work. And then all of a sudden, a team like New Jersey, as we saw, all of a sudden the puck comes up the wall.

They bump it into the middle. And it's a two-on-one. And you're like, oh, well, everything we just worked on went out the window. That's going to become an issue. It was a fascinating start to the game tactically from the Devils, in part because they were like one of those hitters where their batting average is low, but if they connect, it's going for power. Right?

Like, I think they had five icings and five on men rushes in the first seven minutes. Like there was no outcome of any breakout pass attempt that wasn't either it's coming back for a draw in the devil's end of the ring. or it's going to be, you know, a loud thwack off the bat and we're going to see Jesper Bratz skate in, you know, with another streaking devil's player against one, one Canucks defenseman. But that has not been Vancouver's M.O., right? Like, Vancouver's usually played this prescribed offensive game.

And I think what you're bringing up is reflective of one thing that's most impressed me about Talkit, which has been this sort of thoughtful approach that I believe is designed, as you said, to protect his defensive issues, right? For most of the season, like J.T. Miller, who, you know, has played exceptionally well, but historically anyway, hasn't been like a lights out matchup option at center, has been effectively, like, self-matched with this Hughes-Heronic pair, and they've sort of sicked those five with extraordinary discipline at home and doing their best on the road against the top of opponent's lineups.

And early in the year, anyway, when this team was really flying, they were, like, winning that matchup on an every night basis. That's sort of shifted over the last month. It's pretty hard to do the Patrice Bergeron, like 55% control of shot attempts. But really, we're sort of at 45%. They're at least breaking even and they're not getting outscored. And for the most part, that's like fair enough. That's job well done.

And then Pedersen, who is probably this team's best two-way driver, plays with Vancouver's other defenders more often than not and helps boost them. You've got, you know, Hughes effectively helping Miller survive against Tufts and actually win that matchup. And Patterson effectively helping to cover for, you know, your minutes with Noah Juleson and Ian Cole on the ice or what have you. It's like this really smart marriage of matchup tactics and sort of a tactical approach. But I did ask talk yesterday. Like I literally took, not explicitly, but I literally took that data to Talk It and was just like you are. crushing it in zone time, but all of the public underlying metrics, say you're middle of the pack,

like, are you doing enough? Or is this a philosophical thing where you're happy to defend 150 feet away from your net? He was like, we have four guys on the outside way too much and it looks pretty, but we're not getting enough done. We need more traffic. We need, you know, a guy at the net front. We need a guy up high looking for, like to clean up the mess and make retrievals. Like, I don't know. He might just be playing hockey guy. Right. You know, he might be playing paw. and not leveling with me about what they're actually trying to do. But he seemed to think that it was not a positive, that they weren't translating the zone time that they're generating

as frequently as they'd like into something a little more productive in the offensive end. I don't know. I don't know if I agree with him there because I still think that as well as Demko's played, like they can't really afford to play the way they did as a team at the start of last year. No. For example. I just don't have the personnel. They don't have the horses, right?

As improved as they are, as fun as some of these games have been, I think they do have to, like, grind out wins. And so it's interesting to, like, how they think of themselves as opposed to what they probably need to be. And I'm sure that, you know, maybe if you took him out for a beer and you were off the record, it might sound a little different than what he's saying to you as a reporter. Like, it's generally the cat and mouse game of coach reporter, right?

But I did check it. I did check it. And he didn't seem to, he didn't even like leave me grounds to think that there was something going on. He's a pretty straight shooter. He is a straight shooter, especially on tactics, which he's open to discussing. Which, by the way, what a huge win. What a huge win, especially in this market where like NHL coaches see the game differently than you or me.

Or like the smartest, most engaged hockey fans. And I guarantee you that matches the description of anyone listening to the PDO cast, right? Like the people who care about what they're watching and like want to understand it better, you know, Talket as a head coach with his experience. Like he's going to see the game differently. He's going to see. And filling in those gaps, you know, like he gave an interview the other day where he was like, this is a big analytics town. And it's like, yeah, that's awesome. Right.

That's awesome. And part of the reason why this is a big analytics town is that the level of hockey knowledge that someone like Talkett has isn't going to be matched by the public or or by the. media, frankly, like, obviously. So, you know, him being able to provide that, I think really helps fans, especially in a market like Vancouver that's just completely obsessed with this team, engage with and understand the sport differently. And I think that's like win, win, that's like Adam Silver would love that, right? That's the, now we don't have to do the, well, the devils came out and wanted it more. Right. We can talk about actually what happened on the ice. The breakdowns and the tactics. And, you know, good for him, man. It's, it's been fun to cover.

Rick Tockeet come on the podcast when you are formally invited. The reason why I brought this up, though, and we'll head on this and then we'll go to break, is I wonder how much of this then is him actually just experimenting, how much of, it's still early in the season, right? How much of it is him actually thinking this is the best usage of his personnel and how much of it is maybe, not a concession, but like some frustration maybe peeking through because when this trip with the door trade happened and it's been a week now so I think it's like not not new everyone's had a chance to think about it but we all joked about how it'd be hilarious to see him and tyler myers on the eyes at the same time i wonder when that happens and then we did and then them just going to that and being

like full blast it's not going to work because like zedorov needs a guy like mackenzie weeger to do a lot of the heavy lifting from a puck movement perspective right like zadora is good sometimes flying up and getting involved and carrying the puck himself but you see it on that on the what was it, the second goal of the devil's score last night, where, you know, Jack Hughes, like, made Tyler Myers looks silly with, like, all right, no, you can take the puck, certainly, and then just sitting back and waiting for him to give it back to him. That was very much alike, like,

these are not the droids you're looking for a moment. But when one of those guys go, like, through so much of today's game is predicated on, the puck is going to go behind your goal line, and one of your defensemen needs to be able to go stop the puck and then either make a play-up to a forward or, like, eat a four-checker and get it to his defense partner so they can skate it out.

And neither of these guys, can do that. No. And so you just can't in today's game play two guys like that together as big as they are and as like, oh, it gives fun having them both in front of the net. Like that's an issue. And so using them against the Jackie's line is alarming. And then using them together is also alarming. And I wonder if we see like I think a guy like Philip Pronick would make a lot of sense, was it or off. But then you get into the issue of, all right, well, the top pair has been so good that do you really want to split them up. Yeah, I do think you need to see it though, given in erronex arbitration status, right?

And given the size of the commitment, you're staring down the barrel of. Like, I do think you want to see what he can do driving his own pair before you make him, you know, not like one of the highest. I'm not going to go that far, but certainly one of the top 20 highest paid defensemen on a long-term deal with his next contract,

if that's what he wants. That play, though, right, is illustrative too, because it's not just about Myers not taking care of the puck. it's Zadorov follows like reads the play in a way where he comes to Myers and you end up with Myers Miller and Zadoro all in the corner something talking himself

called out post game like Eric Hala had time to set up a lemonade stand like draw the sign right be like she teaches at my school when someone stops like you know it's that was one of the worst breakdowns I've seen in any hockey game

all season right and it wasn't the Kinnock's worst breakdown at the game Yeah. Which we'll get into. That said, I do think we saw, like, it was a pretty good sampling of the full Zadoraov experience. Like, he makes a great play on the entry for the Dakota Joshua, the four-two goal. He also had just a brilliant shift where he, like, threw a hit at the blue line to not just prevent the rush, but, like, stop the rush dead and take the puck. And then when the puck went back, Canucks, you know, went down low and went D-to-D.

and he found Niels Hoaglander with this like high-low pass that resulted in a scoring chance that was just absolutely brilliant. And so there were these shifts where you saw Zadurov do wild stuff. He probably should have taken a penalty on Jack Hughes in the games with 70 seconds left in the game. So you saw some of that. But you also have just these moments where he does like genius tier stuff. And that contrast, I mean, it brought a lot to the most entertaining Kinex game of the season. I'm really enjoying Jack Hughes.

going full. I'm going to berate linesmen and officials. It was amazing. And in both instances that I'm referencing, he was correct. Correct. And he should.

Yeah. And because superstars in this league do not get officiated the way they should. But at the same time, I just thought it was really funny. What was crazy, too, is the puck. So he gets tripped by Zedorov. They both end up in the corner.

The referee is right there. Jack Hughes steps up and starts visibly berating the official. But the play was like the puck's kind of tied up in Zodoro skates. So the play actually like stayed in that corner. It was like the whole arena went dark and there was like a spotlight.

Jack Hughes yelling at an official. It was fabulous. It was so good. Game had it all, man. It really did. That's why we're doing a full show. We have to talk, though, about the devil's being accidentally, well, on the other side, on the devil's being accidentally short-handed on the game winner.

Yes. Okay, we'll take a break here. And then when we come back, we'll pick it right back up. We're joined by Thomas Trans. We're talking about the Hughes Bowl and the day after you're listening to the Hockey-Ocast streaming. on the Sportsnet Radio Network. All right, we're back here on the Hockey PDOCast with Thomas Drens. Tom. We focused a lot of this, and I think deservedly so, on the Canucks perspective, right?

And kind of, yeah, last night's game, everything we saw from them, both good and bad. Let's kind of pivot a little bit to their opponent and talk about the devils because you got to see them in person, first time this year. Very exciting team coming in with a ton of expectations. I think they get the win, right? At the same time, though, it sort of reinforced a lot of the concerning stuff we've seen from them this year. And so it's one of those things I think I will say though I don't come away from that particularly concerned like you know what

You know what the devils feel like to me and you're going to hate this So I'm just warning you in advance You know how a battery has like a positive and a negative side Right? The metropolitan division has a has a battery within the division And the negative side of it is the Carolina Hurricanes And the positive side of it is the New Jersey Devils And both of these teams will at some point this season have a six

week run where they go like 15, 2 and 1 with a plus 35 goal differential. For the hurricanes, it's going to be a run of games where the puck starts going in for them. And for the Devils, it's going to be a run of games where they actually get saves. And I'm completely un worried about either team having a more pedestrian start than we anticipated because that team will be for a month and a half at some point in the next four or five months, one of the best teams in the league for a stretch that cements them as, you know, more than a wildcard team in my view. probably because that's how hockey works and especially goal-tending i'm going to have

kevin woodley on next week i'm going to bring them back and we're just going to do a full section on vanichick and the devil's goal-tending i thought vanichick was coughing out rebounds well he was he was he was never going to keep the conucks off the board in my opinion like all game long you could tell it was coming well that's the thing i mean i think if there was another minute on if you added another minute to the clock the conucks would have tied it back up at six like right it was it felt like an inevitability they just ran out of time really and it was a really fascinating dynamic too where that where like it always felt it never felt when the game was close like the devils wouldn't get the next goal but it never felt like

when the devils got the lead that it was over it was over it was a very strange dynamic and there's been a big debate i've seen amongst devils fans and and people on twitter in general about how much of this is at late like should be laid at the feet of the goalies right and how much of which would be laid at the feet of the way the team is playing, this perceived, like, risky style of being offense first and everything. And you look, and, okay, the sharks are the only team that's given up more goals against per minute than them. Last year, that was not the case.

Like, they were, I think they were eighth or something, in terms of few as goals against. They're giving up more than an hour, a goal per hour, more than they did last year. Now, Anichek is, like, minus seven goals of by the expected in 16 games. So that's definitely part of it. That's definitely part of it. And then you watch, and that was, last night,

was not an aberration. Like that has been a recurring theme this year. And so, you know, you have these stats where, contrary to belief, like they're not actually giving up that many odd man rushes against or they're playing style. I think they're actually amongst the league leaders in terms of like limiting them.

The issue is that when they happen, similar to what we talked about with the Oilers at the start of the year, when they do happen, it's like catastrophic. And also when Vanichick's almost playing as if like he's been told that he just needs to make one save and then his work is done for the night. And so he, like, makes the initial save. And then he just kicks it out.

And he's like, all right. He, like, wipes his hands. And he's like, job, well done by me. And then it's like he doesn't care. He's not on the clock anymore. And it's so bizarre to watch. So I don't think there, from what I saw last night and from what I've seen this season, I don't think there's any issues with how the devils are playing defense five on five.

No. I think there are issues with their penalty kill. Right. And I think they were damn fortunate that the Canucks didn't score. The Connux Powerplay is also going to make a lot of penalty kills look like that. 100%. But, like, the Connox, but like, the Connox are. Powerplay wasn't even sharp last night and they yeah I mean there was that sequence where like his share blocked it with his butt or like Vanichick wasn't even in the frame because of the passing it just and then Miller hit a post yeah now they generated some against the grain stuff and they actually had a really cool set play toward as one of their power plays expired where they like did sort of a quick regroup in the in their own zone went D to D fast and then hit I think it was John Marino for a breakway pass it was cool coming out of the box yeah but like I've never seen it

team like really like execute that type of set uh in that position i thought that was uh i thought that was creative and a ton of fun five on five i i mean think about the connects goals right it's like Dakota joshua you know that's kind of a gritty garbage goal like that's going to happen uh i think vandichick could have done better there brock bessor on the backhand lovely finish great pass that was probably a little bit soft by um the devil's defense like that was bad puck management behind the net, an unforced error. I'd say the roots of the Canucks comeback were kind of set there. Lafferty tip, what are you going to do?

Guy shooting 14% on ice, like his on ice shooting percentage. I mean, Pucks are just bouncing in off Lafferty every game. So whatever. I mean, that's a soft one, but it's not a big deal. And then that whole glander rebound. To me, that's the, that's a tough one. Because there wasn't like a, it wasn't like the brat game winner. Right.

Where you've got Heeshire, you know, with Dakota Joshua and he, Andy and Cole kind of draped on him at the net front. And there's so much havoc going on that you understand why Demko couldn't quite control it as well as he needed to. And the guy at the net front is like right in the blue paint and completely uncovered. Like this shot out pretty far. There wasn't a ton of traffic beforehand. Like Vanichick has to do better with that rebound. He does.

And it's always strange to me when, you know, everyone has this idea, I guess, of what, a Stanley Cup contender should look like and the way they're going to need to play in the playoffs, right? And I'm sure there's a little bit of truth to it. But like this devil's team, the bar a goalie needs to clear playing for them is so low because they're just so explosive offensively. And now fully healthy with Hughes and his year back,

like you're seeing it. They're just, they're, when they score less than five goals in a game, I'm, I'm surprised. I'm like, wow, the other goalie must have played really well or they were pretty unlucky. There was plus steam on the over at seven last night. and I don't want to be on the other side of the on the under on that like I don't no plus money on the over at seven and it almost cashed in the first I was like oh my god yeah um and so whenever this happens with the team right there's a certain segment of fans that come to the defense of the goalie and it's like all right the defense in front of them needs to be better and I'm sure there's instances where you can show breakdowns and like oh they could have they could have supported him a little bit better but like the goalie's job is literally to make saves and the way we to talk about sometimes is a bit off to me where you're like you're paid to make the save and

and it's okay for the defense to break down and then the goalie to bail them out right it's not like you're not necessarily paid just to make the saves you're supposed to make your job is to also steal some yeah and so whenever we get into this like all right whose fault it was I just think sometimes it it leads too much in in the defense to say I understand it's like it's very easy sometimes to just point also to the goalie on the other end of it and be like all right well he needs to be better but at the same time I I just, those rebounds like all night, it's just everything is being kicked out to the middle. It's just not good enough right now.

I'd also add that I think it makes like the emotional experience of watching hockey and then assigning blame for breakdowns. Like the problem with that too is we don't assign blame in a weighted way, depending on the outcome of a shot that actually has nothing to do with the breakdown that preceded it, which is why we get fooled by guys having, you know, like by the entire Boston Bruins defense. because the goalies are bailing them out every time there is one of those breakdowns. We don't attach the same resonance to it. Like I actually think that's a really flawed way of evaluating players. Based on the pure result.

Yeah. And a super common one. Look, the devils are not, in my opinion, and certainly did not last night. As the Canucks mounted that comeback, surrender, like an undue number of five alarm chances. In fact, the 5-3 goal, the Brock Besser goal, was the only one that I would say, what are you going to do as a goalie? when a pass goes that quickly from the end boards into the middle, you know, to an above average finisher who's got absolutely no one on him and has the time to just beat you with a perfect shot.

Like you're moving one way quickly. He's making you move the other way quickly. What are you going to do? That was the only one that I would say that's a team breakdown. Everything else, for me anyway, like, you know, especially a deflection goal and an ugly rebound goal. Like those are on Vantageek. The good thing, the good thing, like if you're looking for positives from a

devil's perspective is again, like, you know, we live in a world where the devils went into the season with Vanichick and Akira Schmidt. Yeah. And the Kings went into the year with Cam Talbot and Phoenix Copley. Right. And if you'd had to like bet which team would have better goaltending for the first eight weeks, you probably would have bet on New Jersey. If you were to bet on which team will have better goaltending over the next eight weeks, like you'd probably, you feel like you'd bet on L.A. But you know what? You don't know. You don't know. You don't know and I don't know. LA's so good defensively, though. LA's so good defensively, but also it's Cam Talbot and Phoenix Copley.

Are you going to be surprised if LA has a, you know, 900, say, percentage 5 on 5 over the next 30 or next 15 games and it's still like winning a lot of them? Yeah, I won't be. Well, that's why this is the ultimate like head versus heart thing almost, right? Because like when you, when your goalie's playing this poorly and when you feel as helpless as I'm sure Devils fans felt last night watching that lead evaporate and then feeling like, okay, like we're looking at the clock, please. tick down a zero before they score a six goal here. It can feel so helpless and just feel like you're never going to get out of this hole. But as we talked about with LA a couple weeks ago on the show, it's also the, like, out of all the things that can be wrong with your team, it's the most fixable because even if the goal is bad,

he can just fall into a six-week stretch where he makes a lot of saves and all of a sudden it's no longer an issue. Or you've got some guy who has like failed quote unquote in Utica. Right. who you've never given a shot to who can come up and give you six weeks of good goaltending or just like, oh, right, they were an above average starter we never gave a look at, like a la Jordan Biddington or something, right?

I mean, the one thing I do think is if you get to a point where your season's on the brink and your team starts blaming the goaltenders and slumping when those bad goals go in and not responding the way the devils did last night where it was like, okay, well, they're not going to get another scoring chance on us. We're just going to win this game. you know, and I think Edmonton got to that point a few weeks ago, for example, they seem to have rebounded a bit.

But like, when you get to a point where a team's confidence and play style is impacted by the goaltender, then I think you do need to be proactive in making a change. Right. Not because you need a new goalie, but because you can't have a team. It's having, like, insidious effects on the rest of the team. Because just because you don't want your team. And one thing I would say is like, I do wonder, given how permissive devil's goaltenders have been, does that make it, harder for Lindy and company to sell the let's use our speed as a defensive blanket thing given that if you're a devil's player right now surely you feel like we need six right so you know I do sort of wonder how connected those are for for the devils right now um some just some other

impressions like um I was really excited to watch our guy mercer dogson mercer play last night uh Alexander holz um bit of a project like bit of a project like bit of a project still. I don't think he's able to helpfully contribute to Meyer and Mercer stacking heavy shifts one on top of the other. There were too many plays, possessions that kind of died on Holts's stick in the neutral zone and that if that puck had gotten deep, you know that Meyer and Mercer would have dunked on some Canucks defensemen for like 30,

45 seconds. Right. And I was a little disappointed by that. I liked Holts in his draft year. I liked him in the American League just doesn't look ready for that top nine role yet yeah i will say in his defense i think in the totality of this year like i think that's been fewer and farther between right he started the year his uses was solo they were playing him in the bottom of the lineup he like during that stretch where they're all banged up he was actually one of the few guys contributing and i think he was leading the league in five-on-five and his team yeah five-fow goals at the time like i think it's been a net positive for him i actually think like i want to talk to you about timo mire because

i know you and i are both high on him and devils fans are mad at me now because i was selling them on him so much last year at the deadline where I was like stylistically this is such a good fit the devils need to go out and get him and we were coming up with all these fake trades and then sure enough it happened right and he had a really snake-bidden postseason where he was generating a ton of high danger chances and living around the net none of it was going in takes that massive hit to the head from shiruba right like it was individually it went about as poorly as it could for him and then now this year he's on the third line he's not scoring then he gets hurt and so it's It's tough because I gotta be honest,

like he has not been good enough. At the same time, this was not the player that he had been for the previous, like, five years. And so on the one hand, I don't, I feel bad for like,

selling Devils fans on it, but at the same time, I feel like I've also been duped a little bit. I thought he played fine. Like, I honestly... As an $8.8 million dollar liner? I mean, that line wasn't generative. Like, that's the problem.

That line, I thought that line would come in and at least outdoors, Vancouver's like Teddy Bluger led third line. Now, Teddy Blugger, the Teddy Bluger led third line with Garland and Joshua is probably Vancouver's most consistent 505 line. But I still thought, you know, you have two, you have Meyer, who I rate as a top of the lineup caliber piece. You have Mercer, who's maybe my favorite middle six center in the league.

And you have this Holtz guy who, you know, I haven't seen live in, in a while since he sort of became an NHL player. Like, it was, Holtz was turning the puck over so frequently that I just didn't get to see Meyer operate that much. He didn't make an impression on me one way or the other. Now, that's not what you want for a guy making $8.5 million, but I also don't think he was what was wrong with that line. He's not. He just wasn't around the puck enough, though. He just, he has been ineffectual this year, and especially at that price, right? Like, what you, where you were sold, I guess, as the idea of what it could be and then what it actually has been, it can be frustrating. Now, should note,

on the PTO cast, his PTO is like 927 or something this year. Like, it's been miserable. Now, the shares are all much lower than they should be on a team like the devils. What I will note is, like, the reason why I thought he'd be such a good fit was not only, like, providing that sort of size and living in the slot compared to, like, playing with Jack Hughes. But then when you watch them play, maybe what I underestimate a little bit was, like, I think from Meyer, the reason why he was so effective in San Jose was he got free reign to take the puck and then use his, like, physical gifts to basically bully ball and, like, transition it. and just work downhill.

But when he's playing with either Jack Hughes or Esperabrat, he slows him now. I'd rather, they have the puck. I don't want Timel Meyer out in the puck. And I think the devils have realized that, and that's why he's playing on this third line. And then now you've got an $8.8 million player playing on the third line with as much as I love Dawson Mercer

and as high as I am on Alexander Holtz is a piece for them moving forward. It's not ideal, right? And then you're playing second unit power play, so he's not getting some of those freebies. And so you get him through a spot where you look at his counting stats and you look at the entire package, and it's very disappointing.

And so trying to figure that out, I mean, they're in year one of an eight-year deal. So, like, there's going to be time to figure this out. But, like, on the list of concerns or things the devils need to figure out here quickly, I actually think figuring out the best way to get more out of him should be near the top of the list, even though offense isn't a concern for them. Yeah. No, and fair enough.

I mean, one thing, like, I think that third line needs another transitional piece that's not Holtz. Just that would be my, that would be my quick diagnosis. Andres Palat, by the way, continues to be the best pound for pound battle winner in the league going on a decade. Good for him. Love, love getting to see my guy cook last night. The Yesper Brat thing. So is Yesper Brat, okay, Yesper Brat or Kyle Connor from the perspective of who do you trust to get lost in coverage more?

Because they've got to be the two best in the league. Yeah, yeah. Like, yes, for Brad is, yes, for Brad is like a stealth bomber. Like, he does not show up on anyone's radar. And then it's like, oh, right, he's alone at the side of the net. That play in the last minute, he takes this odd route. Like, he wins a battle against Dakota Joshua, angles him off the puck to sort of make sure that it gets back to Kevin Ball at the point in sort of one of the most crucial sequences. And then because Joshua, who's the winger, is now locked in along the wall,

Pedersen, who's the low forward, goes up high. And Brat doesn't even hesitate for a second. Instead of taking a normal route to the net, realizing that, like, the Canucks low forward is now up high and that there's the opportunity for confusion, he circles the net. Right. And I just thought that is outrageously high-end get-open, get-lost instincts from Yesper Brad. Just absolutely brilliant stuff from a guy who easily could have had like three or four goals last night given the opportunities that he was generating consistently. I mean, what?

So he wound up scoring on the second one. Was that back-to-back two-on-ones within like a 30 seconds ban? Oh, my God, I know. Yeah, the Tuckett brought that one up and sounded exactly. He's like, do we give up two on ones on one shift? It's like, oh, yeah, you did. You sure did. But don't forget there was also a Jack Hughes breakaway in there.

Yeah. Not good. Not good. No, not good. Yeah, I think it was the, you got to see the full scope of everything for both those teams, which is kind of what made us such a fun game, right? It was like super entertaining. I'm sure both coaches are immensely frustrated.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Fans rode the roller coaster of highs and lows throughout the game for both. Both power plays played well. All the Hughes gets, all the Hughes gets, all the Hughes is points. Yeah, you come out, you come away from it, feeling like you need a smoke, you know. Oh, yeah. It was great. I mean, it was a little bit of everything. Every NHL game needs no fewer than three members of the Hughes family in it to guarantee maximum entertainment. And obviously

in the Hughes Bowl, like the team with the more Hughes's wins. Like, that's not a, that's not a shock. Yeah. It was like six, five on the final, on the scoreboard, but two one on the, on the one that mattered. Quinn was hilarious. I kept it on the, on the broadcast after the game ended and I was I was watching the, uh, the media availability. He was really emotional. Was that you that asked him about, you're like, I'm sure the devils are the team you probably watch the most other than other than Connect's tape, yeah.

Well, and then, and then, so Jack Hughes was asked about it in the other room by Kevin Woodley. And he was like, no, tape, just vibes. No, no, no, no. No, he was like, oh, yeah, I knew what to expect. Yeah. And then he sort of walked it back. He was like, they did a great job preschool getting two and did a, but like his initial instinct

was like, I'm glad you noticed that. I definitely knew what I was doing today. Yeah, I love that. Yeah, very cool. Now, Quinn seemed very sad even for his standards. So he's six and one in that matchup. And one thing about Quinn is there's no like... No, he's not...

He's six and one against... Sorry, he's one and six. Yeah, I was going to say, I was like, I feel like the devil's owned that. I'm saying the devils are... The devils are... So Jack has owned that matchup, six and one. And, like, the thing about Quinn is he's really supportive, right? Like, this is not every time they play one of these games.

Some reporter comes and does the, like, does the like, do you guys have a bet on this? Like, you know, what bragging rights are on the table, right? And Quinn loads it. Like, you immediately see his body language change. Like, he doesn't, he's, it's not that he's not competitive with his brother. It's that he's, because he is. It's that he mostly is supportive of his brother and, like, protective of his brother and, you know, wants them to succeed in every game that they don't play him in.

And then, you know, his family was in town. I'm sure it was like a big 48 hours for him. But, yeah, I mean, I thought he seemed pretty emotional toward the end of that scrum. And, you know, I'd imagine, I'd imagine given the chorus deal that Hughes has, that, like, being one and six against your brother and now your brothers sucks. Yeah. Okay, Tom, I think, well, we got to get out of here. I wanted to talk to you about Alas Patterson and his contract because I thought that your colleague Chris Johnson now had an interesting little tip in the mailbag. But I feel like, you know, this isn't something that's necessarily.

going to be resolved before the next time I have you on. I think we'll have time. I think we can build a full show on Pedersen because like I think he's not playing like he's not playing at the clip that he was early in the show. He's not, but I thought he was awesome last night. He's awesome. Like he was all over it. This is, this is like you can't put Pedersen with two middle six wingers and expect him

to just go out and drive 13% on ice shooting clip every game. Like the fact is that he can do it and he will do it again. But like if he doesn't do it for 15 games, you know, And then everyone's like, well, he's got multiple injuries and da-da-da, and he's not playing very well. And, you know, you can't pay a guy $12 million if they're going to just, he's, he dominated the flames. He was one of the three best players on the ice last night.

He's playing with Sam Lafferty and Ilya McKeyev and any Toronto area listener would be like, really? Yeah. You know, like, I don't understand. Like, if you want a guy to produce, like, the best players in the world, like, you've got to get them more help than that. I don't know what else to say about it. Okay.

plug whatever you want on the way out here. Go check out the Athletic. Have a big column on the Hughes Bowl. Oh, nice. The fun and the concern. A fun game that was alarming for all involved. Is that fair? Yes.

I think that's your description that I'm just ripping off. It was alarming and it entered in equally. Equally so, depending on your glass half, it was the rare fun game that left me worried for all. Yes. Anyway, I've got that column up at theathletic.com and a lot of other stuff, of course, covering the Vancouver Connection. occasionally doing some other stuff.

And then I'm on Canucks Talk, SportsNet 650. Download that wherever you get your podcasts. Awesome. Well, I'll have you back on soon to do that Pedersen conversation. Oh, actually, can I also plug this? We just unveiled like a separate standalone segment. It's called The Whiteboard. Okay.

And we do 25 minutes, everything you need to know about the Canucks in one day. So even if you're listening to this and have no time for my takes, give that more neutral product a shot. No one listening to this right now has no time for your case. Everyone is saying, especially not to this point. Everyone is saying more advanced. Tom, this is a. blast. We'll have you on again soon. My quick plugs

recently did shows on both Quinn Hughes. If you were listening to this show by now, you're probably interested in that. And your boy, Sasha Barkov, with Daryl Belkrie recently. So go on the... Literally all my faves. Yeah. And they were both... Are you guys doing Palat next? No, I think we're doing Jack Eichel next. Who's also one of your faves. So... We didn't talk about it, but the game I saw Jack Eichel play last week in Vancouver, like, that was Prime Joe Thornton. Yeah. It was the return of Prime Joe Thornton. He's continued what he did last year. It's been

really fun to watch. I don't think he took more than three strides the whole game and he dominated the entire thing. It was so cool. Okay. So look forward to that. Go check that out on the YouTube page. You can watch along with me and Belfrey and go join the PDOCass community and the Discord. If you like this show, you're going to love it there. The invite link is in the show notes. That's all for today. Thank you for listening. And we'll be back soon with plenty more of the Hockey PDOCast streaming on the Sportsnet Radio Network.