The Hockey PDOcast - The First Two Games of Avalanche vs. Stars Are Living up to the Hype

Episode Date: May 10, 2024

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by Sean Shapiro to work through the first two games of Avalanche vs. Stars, the key head to head matchups we've seen so far, and what to watch for as the series moves to Colorado. 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.

It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the Hockey-O-Cast. My name is Dmitri Filipovich and joining me to close out another week of shows. My good buddy, Sean Shapiro, Sean, what's going on, man? I took a nap this morning to recover, so I have energy for the show. I took your notes after last time since I was brought good energy last time when I was not at my house. clearly that was probably based up a good full night of sleep. So this time I took a nap this morning after getting the kid to school.

So I'm ready and prepped to bring it for you today. So that's that's key here. Well, you've got it with these Stars, avs games ending at like 4 a.m. or whatever it is your time. So it's a lot to do the next day. But no, it's been a fun series. We're going to get into that here today. Looking forward to it.

Yeah. It's one that, you know, I think everyone, had very lofty expectations for kind of talking about it as this heavyweight bout between arguably two of the best, to two best teams in the league and kind of like one that's fitting for a West Final or even to determine the Stanley Cup champion. And we're getting it in round two because of the playoff structure in the Central. But I will say for as fun as I think these first two games have been, right? And we got overtime in game one.

We got the near comeback from the abs in game two kind of mirroring what happened in the first one. it still feels like the best is yet to come. Like it feels like both these teams have more to give us yet. And the reason why I say that is we've seen them kind of trade punches so far, right? Like the stars have had their moments, the Avs certainly in the later stage of these games with their comebacks. But when they've been happening, it hasn't really felt like it's been simultaneous, if you know what I mean, right? It's been like one team kind of just throwing haymakers and the other ones. sort of turtling and hanging on and hoping that the moment passes. Whereas I do think we're slated

for, it could be in game three. It could be at some point later in the series. There's going to be a stretch of time, whether it's a period or even a full game, hopefully, where they're just both of their best at the same time and they're just going back and forth and showing us why they're the best. And I do feel like that's going to happen. Maybe the reason why it hasn't happened yet is a credit to each of them, right? Because their best is so good that when it's happening, the other one has no other choice, but to kind of just like read the room and act accordingly.

But I do think we're going to get that at some point. Yeah. And it's also been kind of, in my view, it's been a classic example where the studs, the best guys on each team, they've shown up in different games, right?

Like I thought in game two, by their lofty standards, McKinnon and McCar were just kind of pedestrian last night, but by obviously their lofty standards. And then, of course, that's the game when Ropa Hens breaks out and goes off. And it's, we've kind of had, we've had it within the game. And then we've had it within that where when both teams, hopefully it's game three, because it'll be fun as heck when that happens.

Hope when you can get both teams best players going at the same time, that's going to be frenetic fun, it's fun hockey. And it's already been a fun series with how it's been already. But it's been more of like, oh, we just kind of, they just kind of take turns. being the puncher versus the punchy as opposed to both swing it at the same time. Yeah. I mean, listen, it might just be, like I said, it might be the reality of kind of their differing styles and approaches in a way, right?

Where it's like what it does to your opposition is kind of what's being reflected where they just almost can't coexist. I think they've certainly played fun games in the regular season between these two teams. I think the most, like the most recent meeting they had at the end of the season when the star is just really dominated off. defensively was probably the best version of that in terms of encapsulating it. But still at the same time, I did feel like even those regular season games were generally the stars kind of starting off hot

and building a lead and then us seeing the abs turn it on to try to catch up and actually coming back and winning those games late. And so we'll see. But I'm very curious to see how all that plays out. Let's get into what we've kind of seen from the first two games, unpack it both from what happened, but also what it could mean for the rest of the series. Do you want to start with Rupa Haynes?

you kind of mentioned him sort of finally having a signature performance after a truly bizarre first, what, eight games of the postseason where he had one point and it was an empty net goal. And there were some opportunities along the way, probably not as many in volume as we've come to expect, but still ones where he was just uncharacteristically missing on them. And I think the best example of that was in the final minute of regulation of game one, where he breaks free on this kind of rush opportunity that we're used to seeing him bury and last year's version probably does

and that game doesn't even go to overtime, yet he misses the net. And it was a recurring theme. And finally in game two, he scores the goal of a great pass by Nealz-Lunquist who we'll talk about in a second here, has the three assists. And it was much more like the performance

we're used to seeing from him. Yeah. And it's, I think the other key context we have to have here is Pete DeBore basically admitted this week, kind of in his defense slash call out all at the same time of top players. He talked about hints. And he mentioned that there's a full story we don't know about Rope Haynes. And if you want to read between the lines on that, means he's playing with some sort of injury that we're going to get, whenever the star season ends, we'll get the gym, nil will go through the list of, oh, so-and-so is having this surgery on this. And I'm sure, I feel like a pretty good, I feel like I've done this long enough to read between the lines that Rope Hince will be on that list in some shape or form.

So he's dealing with something. And whether it's impacting how he shoots or misses the net, I don't know. But we saw a Rope Hince for like the first eight games. It was just kind of weird where he didn't look confident. And that's something that hasn't really been Rope Hintz's M.O. for his entire career. I haven't really ever seen him. much like that. And that was kind of one of the weirder parts about that funk he was in.

Game one, there was the missed and that, but there was also the play in that game as well, where he makes that pass to Jason Robertson on the two-on-one and misses. And a more confident Ropa Hince, I believe, shoots that puck and doesn't even try to pass. And I think it kind of took last night, he kind of just kind of needed one of those moments of simplicity to kind of just unlock everything else. And I think the goal, the assist on the Hishkin and first power play goal, that's not something where that's just an instinctual play. It's a play where he does a good job of basically drifting from one side, winning the puck back, doesn't overly worry about the shot. I think sometimes it just takes a moment like that to just kind of break the glass and get your confidence back.

And I think to me that was that that's kind of the moment we saw for hints last night, which makes me, me excited about what we can see with him for game three because a confident rope be hits, even if he's playing with some ailment that's being hidden, is still a very fun rope be hits. Yeah, I mean, that assists to Miro, it was like a cross-ice bullet and Eddie O in the broadcast told us at least 47 different times about how you just don't understand how hard of a pass that was, even though I think it was pretty clear everyone watching it. It was a very hard pass. You still don't understand how hard that pass was.

Listen, you watched it. You're listening to us talk now. You think you understood it. But trust me, there's no way you truly understand how hard of a pass that was. I like to imagine that there's like the producer in his ears, like telling him like, Eddie, someone said it was a soft pass. Like, I'd love to imagine. It's just like, yeah. Yeah.

I thought the pass that he made actually in the third period on a power play. that was kind of like, he was near the blue line, and it was a no look dime cross-ice for a Joe Pavelsky one-timer, and George, to his credit, got across and got, like, his skate on it to keep it out, that pass was like, oh, wow, he's really, he's really feeling it type of play, right? And that is very encouraging. I'm not sure, you know, hearing you talk about that, because clearly, and I think this has been happening even well into the end of the regular season,

where we noted how he just didn't have the same pop. on his shot entering the zone off the rush. And it just, even his goals were kind of like garbage goals around the net as opposed to flashy highlight ones that we become accustomed to seeing from them. So I'm sure this is something that's been lingering for a while. And he's certainly not new to kind of having these injuries pop up

just because of his playing style, how demanding it is on his body. But we go through this in the postseason with players, right? Where it gets kind of glorified or lionized when players play through injuries and ailments in the postseason. And whenever a star player underperforms or doesn't produce toward expectations, I think it's kind of like the natural immediate inclination is to be like, wow, this guy's hurt.

Right. And then I think with him, it's much more understandable because you just watch it and it visibly looks different than it does when he's at his best. But I just, I'm pointing that out because we go through this all postseason, right? At the start of that round one series for the Canucks, Quinn Hughes is a bad game. It's like, oh, he must be hurt because this looks weird. And then all of a sudden, he looks great and he looks like himself again. And I think it's also okay for star players, regardless of their stature and their expectations,

to sometimes struggle and have bad games, right? And so there's that. The other thing is if it's getting to a point where it's limiting you so much to the weight, to the point where there's been times where his lack of production offensively, I do think it's been a bit of a liability for this team, acknowledging that he had a big burden defensively going head to head with Jack Eichael, right in this series, he's getting a lot of minutes against McKinnon as well in the head-to-head. There's a value that he provides to the team certainly beyond scoring.

But if you're just missing opportunities because you're not healthy, at some point, you do reach kind of like a point of diminishing returns where it's not really like this cute story about how this guy's persevering through pain. It's like, all right, maybe we need to adjust accordingly because this just isn't going to get better if he keeps going out there and playing this way. I agree with you on that. That's not. I think the Ropa Hintz injury story. I don't think anyone was really I think the Hughes one was more like we're looking for excuses

I think the Hince one was throughout the Vegas series everyone was saying like where's Rope Hince? Where's Rope Hince? The injury one I think that narrative to give credit or blame I think goes on Pete DeBore I think when the coach comes out and says he's playing through something out of a story

I'm not telling you that's where the Rope Hince would comes to because I don't think it was much of a natural hey he must be playing through something. Like I think that, I think he went from, and maybe it's just good coaching. Maybe it's a good narrative flipping. Pete DeBoard does a good job of reading the room sometimes.

And maybe he intentionally shifted it that way to give an excuse for something the guy needed to come over. Maybe that's part of the part of this. But I do like, you make a really good point about how we all, we lionize these injuries. We overly talk about all they did this and everything like that. And the hints one to me, though, just goes back to it's more related to his coach going out and basically saying that's what's happened. That's kind of where the hint storyline on that comes from me. Because otherwise, it's, you could be like, I'm like, I'm not going and saying, oh, look, Joe Pavelski's hurt. Joe Pavelsky's just been bad.

Right? Yeah, he's. Yeah, he's hurt. He's hurt by age, I think, unfortunately. Yes. Yeah. Listen, they need this version of hints. And I think game two, that goes without saying it's kind of obvious, but then you see it in game two and it sort of reminds you of it.

Just purely through that, like they got through that round one series against Vegas, right? It was obviously a very close margin, but they got through. As much as I love Wyatt Johnston, and we talk about him so much on the show, and he's been their best player and most productive one, and they have so many other weapons and depth and all that. at the end of the day Rupa Hintz is kind of and this is a reminder of it, the only player they really have that can look Colorado's top players

in the eyes and match their gear. You know what I mean? It's great to have guys who can score in different ways and get the puck down low and pop up in the slot and create and all of that. But at some point if you're going to go head to head with the avalanche and toe to toe,

you need to get into this skating competition with them. And you don't want to do it over the course of a full game because they're just going to win that. But at some points, you do need to just match them in that way. And the stars have a bunch of great skaters, but hints just in terms of his power is kind of the only guy that can really sustainably do that. And so for him to actually put together a performance like that, I think that is huge in terms of like just being able to match that. And so I do think in a series like this, it probably takes a little bit more importance for me than it might in another series against a different team.

But there's also the timeliness of what's the feeling in Dallas today if he doesn't have that game last night because all of a sudden, if Hince doesn't have that game last night, they're down 2-0 in this series, they're going to Denver, and it's hard to believe. I always hate when people will be like,

oh, well, a team came back from down 2-0 in the last round, they could do it again. It's like, no, there's a reason. They went 16 straight six. series of going down 2-0 and losing. This doesn't happen often. Like, there's a, there's a state of panic today in Dallas before they get on the flight to Denver if Hince doesn't do what he did last night. And I think that is a huge turning point in this series of it actually being a series right now. You know what these two games showed us, I thought. And I think this was generally

understood, but it really hammered at home, is this Colorado team, in my opinion, has like an unparalleled margin for error. And by that, I mean, they can play a bad period. They can play a bad half the game. But they have an ability to just kind of ratchet it up. And within a 10 minutes span or a period span, their best is so transformative for a game.

They can just overwhelm you and erase all of those deficits and all those sins. Right. And we saw obviously the three-go comeback in game one. Came very close to doing so again. and gave two and had opportunities with the empty net. And that's similar to your point of like, all right, well, we came back from a two nothing deficit in one series so we can do it again. It's one of those situations where you don't necessarily want to make a habit

of coming back from down three nothing in every single game. But at the same time, I think it does show you why over the course of a year, over the year, anyone you talked to around the league would discuss this team. And this was even before they made the acquisitions, but certainly after the deadline, in a different kind of toad in terms of like the threat and danger level they present and kind of how they're treated by by other teams and people within those organizations, right? Where it's like we're walking a very fine line.

It's a slippery slope and you almost you can't take your foot out of the pedal because in 10 minutes they can just blow a game wide open and we saw that here. Right. And I think that's that's so impressive because their top gear is just so unrivaled in a way. and that's kind of where the head to head of this series is so fascinating to me, the dynamic of it because Dallas certainly has those stretches, but it's much more kind of like a methodical accumulation, whereas you just see this massive explosion from the other team

and watching them go head to head in that way is really interesting. Yeah, it's kind of funny because you're kind of summing up last night. I did some post game with the radio station down in Dallas last night. I did some post game stuff with them last night. And there was a lot of feedback from Stars fans of being like, what do we do? This is like, what do we have to do to stop taking these leads and stop the avalanche from coming back?

And hockey fans so often sometimes get caught in their own like bubble, right? And forget that sometimes this is the MO of a team, right? The avalanche, I looked it up. But in the regular season, they had 10 wins where they were down by multiple goals and they came back to it, multiple goal comebacks. They had like 27 comebacks or whatever total wins. but 10 where it was in multiple comebacks.

Like sometimes it is a, and this was me talking to Dallas fans last night in particular, was sometimes you just have to give credit to the other team that this is one of their strengths. And this is something that, is it something you want to be, of course you don't want to be down for nothing. You don't want to be down for nothing.

You don't want to be down through nothing. That's never the plan when you put into place, but Colorado can get away with it because they can ramp, the way they ramp up in a five-minute stretch to me is always so impressive. It's one of those where it's like you'll see them in a, you'll see what it could be the start of a period. It could be a middle of the period or whatever, but it's one of those where you'll see one shift.

You'll be like, oh, okay, I start to see something. And then they just all of a sudden stack like three shifts on back on top of each other. And somehow all of a sudden you're like, oh, man, I feel this momentum coming, like just watching the game. And that is a real testament to that team because it's not, doesn't have to necessarily McKinnon obviously drives so much for that team, but it doesn't necessarily have to start with McKinnon.

And I think that's the thing about this Colorado team. The reason they're able to make these pushbacks and everything like that is because McKinnon can either jump on board on it, midway through. It's unlike Vegas, right, where we talk so much about Jack Eichol in that series. With Vegas, so much was Eichl had to start it to get it going, right?

Like, you needed Eichl to get things going. Colorado doesn't need their number one guy to get it going. He can jump in on that third shift in a series of five that turned the game. And I think that's the big thing when I watch this Colorado team. Counterpoint, I do think they need their number one guy to get it going. The thing is, though, is that number one guy isn't necessarily Nathan. I would argue it's Kilmacar. That's fair.

What you watch and these were really stuck out to me. And part of it is kind of just anecdotal. but I feel like whenever these bursts happen, they score that first goal. And then literally within 15 seconds after the puck drop when play resumes, you look up and they're in the offensive zone and Kilmokar's walk in the blue line and you feel like a second goal or scoring chance that could lead to one is imminent. And you're like, how do this happen so quickly? Like it just like you didn't even have a chance to recover or almost breathe.

And it's directly to him. And you kind of mentioned off the top, and we're going to get into their both individual performances. While game one was obviously superior for him, I do think what's stuck out to me in is kind of concerning for the stars is how easily McCar has been able to flip the ice so far in this series, where he's going back and retrieving the puck and just immediately, cleanly exiting and getting the puck in the offensive zone and allowing the aves to start their offensive zone sequence. and Vegas didn't really have anything like that, right? We talked about how they have all these big names of the blue line and they're such a good passing team, but they had to do it in multiple passes or a full sequence, and that would take time and allow Dallas to get back defensively

and get set up, whereas in this case, Makara is just such a freak as a skater that he's absorbing the foretruck by himself, breaking it out, and then breaking you down all by himself. And that's just an entirely different problem that he poses that very few defensemen can do to you. I'm not sure what you do to it because he's regardless of your Fortech's game,

he probably will have success. But that stuck out to me just kind of how he's been chewing up and spitting out essentially anything, the stars throw at him. And for my money, he's been. I mean, he was awesome in the Jet Series, but he's been really, really good so far in this one.

And he's been really good in the transition part. When I mentioned, I think he kind of babbled him more and struggled. But I thought last night in the offense, it's more. Yeah, he had a couple, couple like, kind of sequence killers for sure. Yeah, and so in the, more so in the offensive zone. But the key is how often are we watching those where those are sequence killers in the offensive zone?

He's not having those sequence killers or those breakdowns in his own zone or the neutral zone. He's at least, he's making the mistakes where you need to make the mistakes, right? Like if you're an abs fan, you get frustrated when you see a play die on a stick in the offensive zone. But just think about what could have been if that play is dying 40 feet earlier, 60 feet earlier, back in the other way. I think that's a really good point on just the flipping of the ice. And it's, you're like, how do you handle it? I mean, there's a reason he's one of the best hockey players on the planet. That's the, like, at the end of the day, I think sometimes you just got to kind of like

tip your cap to people on this is the reality of what he does. I'm not sure, and you kind of have to figure, you do your best to try to limit it, but if there was a book or a, if there was a book or a place, call on how to stop Kail McCar I feel like it would have been, it would have come out

three or four years ago already. Yeah. No, he certainly, I mean, he is, they just haven't really been able to get to him

and he's just, and in the offensive zone, you're right, there were a couple times where the puck wound up on a stick and it bounced on him or he kind of made a bad decision and it killed that sequence

and the stars were able to sort of get out and get a change and restart. There were a couple times. in both these games, though. One of them led to a goal in game one. Another one was a great chance in game two, where the puck came up to him at a point,

and he beat that guy that challenged him and just took the puck to the net and gave Dallas's defensive structure so many issues. And that's also kind of a rare thing for a defender to just go downhill as purposefully as he does in the offensive zone. And I just wanted to shout out because, you know, he had kind of had a bit of an up-and-down regular season. He was banged up.

He still wound up finishing as a Norris final. but it feels like he's really ramped his game up. And so far, he's been a real problem for Dallas. There's all sorts of other defensive stuff that I want to talk about with you. Let's take our break here. And then when we come back, we'll jump right back into it and do all that stuff on the other side. You're listening to the HockeyPedio cast streaming on the Sportsnet Radio Network. We're back here on the Hockeypedio cast with Sean Shapiro.

Today we're doing Stars abs after last night's game two of the series. We talked about McCarr before break. there's other sort of head-to-head defense versus offense things that I want to talk about with you here. I'll give you a pick. Do you want to talk about TANF or Murillo Hayes getting out the top? Let's go Miro first. Just fits well going off the McCar topic. There's the natural tie in there, right? Certainly. So I've got him at 54-36 through two games on the series. Now game one did have a pretty extended overtime session. he's played 247 minutes in nine games so far. The only other non-star in the NHL that has played 200 minutes or more is Charlie McAvoy with 231.

I just think he had a very productive game too, right? Scores the goal off the top, like is very involved offensively and really has been. I don't want to be speaking out of both sides of my mouth here because it feels like so many times over the past year or two, you and I have gone together and we're like, ah, I'd love to see a situation. where Miro gets to play with Harley and we get to see him be involved offensively and really just like see what he can do at that area of the ice. I think we've gotten that at this postseason. Like he's been as active as involved as I ever remember seeing him.

The issue is that with the volume of minutes he has to play and how much they're putting on his plate because they just keep using five defensemen. And when push comes to shove, Pete just sends him out there. And it feels like even in game one, I don't know what he finished with, but it felt way too low compared to like my eye test where I just didn't really see him leave the ice at all. It's just almost unfair to expect him to do everything at both ends, right? I think Harley's done a great job of adjusting to it and really killing plays defensively in that pairing as the postseason has gone along.

But yeah, I think you're seeing a lot of like the reason why some of his metrics are lower and why he's being sometimes exposed defensively is just, I think, the reality of the situation he's in. Yeah, I want to give Thomas Harley a quick. credit piece here too because this is a Tom Starley's the player you and I both really enjoy watching but obviously the

example is this is very much an easy side by side comparison but in game one and overtime Miles Wood basically it's a tire in Miles Wood is a very fast player let's be clear Miles Wood has great straight line speed

basically out speeds and out bullies Hachkin and on the game winner in overtime in game one would had a breakaway last pseudo breakaway in game two where Harley

does a really good job of making that little defensive play right at the end to limit it and I want to give Harley credit here because I think he were seeing a lot of things with Harley where last year was kind of like the massive thrown to the wolves learn everything

moment and this is now the year with Harley where we're seeing and you and I wrote a really nice piece about him at EP Rings side in the middle of season. This year with Harley, we're now seeing kind of that master's level study of things where it's like he's adjusting and you see things that might beat Thomas Harley in game one of a series or whatever and then they don't beat him again later. So I want to give Harley a ton of credit real quick on something. Because I think that's been a really fun development. And of course, who can't enjoy talking more about Thomas Harley's game with Hageken.

And this is like the grand experiment, right? It's the, Hock and Paw is not taking part in morning skates and practices. And that's typically the thing that is the indicator that he's close to playing. Stars have no one else they trust after their top four, even with Lundquist making the play last night. Like, it's kind of funny. Everyone will remember the goal on the Hints, on the Hintz goal,

but to play on the Hens goal, but he's on the ice, even if it technically wasn't his fault, he's on the ice in the third period for the first time, in eight games and there's two goals against when he's on there, which we both know in the coaching world now means, well, we can't put him on the ice in the third period again. So the stars are running this grand experiment with basically running four and a half defensemen, five defensemen, and everything has to go through Hishkin. Even in like tonight was like last

night was the night where they really wanted to, I was texting with someone who knows how things work there a little bit. They really want to dial his minutes back last night. Like last night was the night where it's like, you got a 4-0 lead in the third period. Let's try and cool it off a bit. Let's try and coast. And then the as flipped that switch and it turns into, well, now he's got to play. His amount of work it is. This is one of those like, the Heishkin and usage experiment for this playoff run is one of those things that it's been really fun to watch and study in real time.

And I'm really fascinated to watch the usage of it long term because it's not just a minute thing. We've seen guys play big minutes before. We've seen cup winners have guys play big minutes. But even when that happened, someone said to me the other day, it's like, oh, well, the Kagan's when they won the cup, they had Godowdy playing a ton of minutes. They still used six defenders. They still use, like, it's the fact of there's no, there, there's no, like, there's no one coming to help. And that's, and I think that's kind of one of the, the motion, the emotional tolls on this, too.

And I think Hachin and challenged himself after game one. knowing him a little bit. I think he challenged himself after game one, and we saw a little bit of him pushing himself in game two. And that's what he has to do with how this Dallas roster is constructed right now. Yeah, I mean, his minutes, the volume is obviously impressive, but what's happening within those shifts is also,

I think, an important distinction to make, right? Because I think people remember, like, you're talking about Dowdy, you know, certainly like Duncan Keith and his prime, Zadano Chara at times, Ryan Suter when he was on the wild. It's like, oh, he played 32 minutes tonight. And it's like, all right, I'd say 20 of those.

He was kind of just standing in one spot and not really doing much, like really limiting his motion and movement and how much energy he's expending. These Mero shifts at this point are for him to be playing even 25 minutes, let alone getting into the high 20s is just really demanding and taxing, right? And I think that's partly why you're seeing some of it is bad luck and just not getting saved at the right times, but he's been in the ice for what, eight of the 13, by one five goals they've given up so far this postseason. And it'll be interesting to see as a series shifts to Colorado and Jared Bednar has last

change, not that he is really much of a matchup hunter. But the stars have gotten a lot of Chris Tand Evan. We can talk about him in a second here against McKinnon so far, right? And he's had a lot of success in that matchup. The times we've seen McKinnon get out there against Mero and Harley, he's had a bit more success and we've seen middle stats line in particular. I think they don't really have goals to show for it yet, but their pressure and the chances, middle stat and Lekanen together have created against that pair has really swung things in Colorado's favor, right? So as we get into games three and

four in Colorado with their last change, I'm curious to see whether we see more McKinnon versus Hayeskin and against because all of a sudden that could be really interesting because he might almost have to dial it back a little bit and change the way he plays. Otherwise, it'll be really tricky for him, I think, to handle that much speed and that much defensive pressure. And it'll be, I can't wait to see it because I think we'll get our answer pretty quickly. Yeah, it's going to be, you and I talk going into the playoffs. It's one of the great chess match evolution of the playoffs.

And it's going to be, it is going to be a really fun thing to watch in game three. Granted, it'll be at 10 p.m. at night, my time. and I'll be sucking down coffee. I want more hockey. I also at the same time, now that I know that a Rangers win on Saturday means this Dallas-Colorado game, four is at a normal human time.

I'm very conflicted with what I need to happen in that first Saturday game now. Oh, you know, it's funny. You mentioned Lunk was there, and he did get the four third period shifts, which are a rare sighting than a unicorn or a S-squad. or whatever you want to, whatever mythical beast you want to reference there.

Two of them resulted in goals against and we'll see if he gets any more a third period shifts the rest of the series. But last time you and I spoke and you referenced it off the top. The last week's show was really fun. We were very passionate in our arguments against the shot counter on these broadcasts

and how that's leading people astray and people really seem to enjoy that. It was very fiery. also made a joke kind of in passing about Lundquist getting a little sore from sitting on the bench for so long. And I'm sure our pal Luke Jokka will not mind me referencing the fact that he actually reached out. And he was like, to answer your question, yes, he is in fact going in the tunnel and getting some exercises in and during TV timeouts, getting out there, going for a spin, making sure he stays loose and stays mobile and fresh. And so I just wanted to note that because I kind of pose a question of I'm wondering what his regimen is right now to make sure that he he doesn't just completely lock up physically from sitting for 40 minutes or however long a period last in real time. And we got our answer there.

So there you go. I love the image of itself, because knowing how knowing that building in Dallas and how well it's set up and how it's set up and just I can't help up a picture. Like there's a little like team. There's a little like pseudo suite. it's used for MBA game that sometimes as in the morning is used for like team meals and everything like that. I almost like can picture like Pete Devor and Luke Chilcott going in there and being like, we're going to set up a skating treadmill in here. So like during the game, like Nils go just like he's like a hamster on a wheel just like getting ready to go. Working on edge work for 40 minutes.

He's actually putting in more ice time than Heskin in, but it's on a synthetic surface that's rolling. Yeah, good stuff. Good stuff. Niels. Yeah, it was nice to see. him get that primary assist on that on that great hand's goal so kudos to him but yes i wanted to just for the sake of completeness you know we raised that question we got our answer that's what we did here in the pdo cast let's talk tannib because in round one he was tasked with ice go eclose hymen right and despite the fact that like he certainly moves well enough but tanev is kind of of an older generation defender he's not necessarily thought of as this new wave mobile guy who just effortlessly uses edges and glides up and down the ice. His understanding of like where he needs to be positionally

and using his stick allows him to so uniquely absorb speed coming at him. And you saw that in round one where Ico was able to burn, I think, more traditionally mobile defenders like Mero and Harley. Yet Tanev was just always in the right place and able to kind of angle him to where he wanted them. We've seen that so far in this series as well where he's played 22 out of Nathan McInnan's 39-5-15 minutes. In that time, shots are 9-5 Dallas, high danger chances, 3-1 Dallas, and there hasn't been a single goal. And this stretch now that he's had of nine games against two truly premier rush attackers and what he's able to do to them head-to-head is phenomenal. And I wanted to show him out because that's been such a big part of the story

of we keep wondering, all right, well, McKinnon compared to his standard as he hasn't really, been himself yet. What's going on there? I think that's a big reason for it. And as we get to games three and four, that's kind of why I noted it with the head to heads, because I'm curious to see if Jared Bedner is able to free him up for a few more shifts on the fly against different defenders to let him build up that momentum and give him some rush opportunities and maybe see if that gets him going going. Because so far, Colorado must be happy that they're going home 1-1. And that's all well and good, but I think they need him to have his breakthrough offensive game. And Knowing McKinnon and his skill level, I'm sure it will come, whether it's game three or four, like we're going to get it at some point here.

It's a really good point you raised to because so often the imagery of the stars when they traded for TANEv and brought him in was they needed to protect their net better. They needed to create more of that bubble around the net. So the goalie had a little bit more time to read the play. It wasn't getting jostled as much, all that stuff. And he has done that. But I don't think it was something that was talked about a ton. of he was going to limit rush attacks. And it's a really good point you bring up.

Because the whole TAN of people think like that old, as you said, like the old school, more physical. And yes, he has done that. But it's the limiting of the rush that is completely kind of flying further under the radar just because the only way you can really tell it's happening

if you're is the lack of rush chances that Dallas is giving up when he's on the ice. It's, a very good point by you, so well done. Well, I appreciate that. You know, the one guy who has given him trouble in these first two games is actually Val, right? And I think that's not a coincidence because on a lot of these plays where he's getting into some trouble is, obviously Val is like a freakish reach and he covers ground so effortlessly and is able to kind of just like, out of nowhere on the four check just appear and almost teleport and provide pressure.

but in a lot of these instances it feels like he's almost physically engaging Tanev and he's just so strong that he's overpowering him at times whereas ironically enough it feels like when Tanev's able to sort of maintain that gap and then allow positioning and his stick to do a lot of the work he's having success but when you're actually getting within that stick reach and then engaging physically that's where and very few players are as strong as Ntushkin is but he's able to kind of win that matchup And I think that's where they've had success. So yeah, it's interesting to see that kind of in comparison,

sort of offense versus defense and how these like physical traits often dictate, dictate how that goes. And I think we're seeing that in these first two games. So yeah, that's something I'm going to be watching more because the primary versus secondary matchups are fascinating to me, right? Because we're seeing a lot of wide Johnston against Gerard and Manson. We're seeing a bunch of middle stat on Lekinen against Muriel and Harley.

And then we're seeing the hints versus McKinnon lines kind of go head to head. And I imagine we'll probably see more of it as these games go along. Because like I said, I don't think Bednar is going too far out of his way to change that up. And it seems like both teams are kind of comfortable with those assignments right now. The Val thing reminds me of, so in that his last season with the Dallas, he had that famous year where he had zero goals and zero penalty minutes, right? And while I think it was a bit of a stretch to make this claim, I remember there was someone who had that, someone from the stars organization at that time brought up to me, it's like, well, like they were upset about the zero goals,

but it was the zero penalty minutes almost upset them just as much because they were like, oh, that's a sign that he's not using his body. He's not using his body. He's not using his size to wear on other teams. Like he's not putting himself in those spots where he could even take a bad penalty or whatever. Well, I mean, last year, he only took one penalty in the entire season last year and was still almost a point per game player this year. So it's kind of funny, almost from a star's perspective to hear,

just knowing that, having had that conversation, geez four or five years ago now, makes me feel ancient, four or five years ago where like, oh, well, he doesn't use his body well enough, and that's why he'll never make it to now see his use of his body be the very same reason he's causing so much trouble for Dallas and Winnipeg in the series before. and it's

there's irony, I guess, right, in that. Yeah, that I love using penalty minutes as a barometer for physical play. It's definitely a good thing to put your your team down a man. If only more players took more penalties, then we know they're really physically involved. Yes.

Was Ken Hitchcock there at the time? Was that your source? It was, this was not a conversation with Hitch, but it was it wasn't a conversation with him. Ken Hitchcock was around the star. Ken Hitchcock was part of the Starz organization. What are you looking for as this series shifts to Colorado? We kind of highlighted a few of the matchups.

Is there anything, whether it's tactically, whether it's an individual player, just someone breaking through or something that kind of might not have happened in the first two games, but could make a difference in these upcoming ones in Colorado that you're kind of looking for. Yeah. I'd like to, it's at some point, and it's kind of sad right now to, that breakaway, quote unquote, breakaway by Joe Pavelski last night, it was very sad. Like, it was the, like, it was kind of, like, I don't want to see Joe Pavelski look like

a Saturday night beer league or going to get a breakaway. And I know he's never fast, but it's, and I don't know, I kind of hope, like we see, like, I think, we know this is Zach Parisi's final playoff run, right? And not that Parisi's been great or anything like that, but I think we kind of see times where we see Parisi will occasionally, like, he almost Otensur made the great save on Parisi in the first period last night. We've seen times where Parisi has stepped up and been like the old guy who's shown us that he still has it in, a chunk here and there. I'd love to see it from Pavelsky. That's something I would love to, I'm not expecting it to happen for the full 12, 13 minutes, but I'd love to see that just from a

you want to see, because I have a gut feeling that this is probably the last year of Joe Pavelski. I don't know that for sure, to be clear on something, anyone aggregating, whatever. I am not reporting. I'm just, I get this gut feeling watching the games that this is we're seeing the end of Joe Pavelski's career. And I'd like to see a couple of reminders. of what he was before that end comes. So I'd like to see that. The other thing that I like from just a Dallas

coaching tactical perspective that I thought was really interesting, I like that Pete DeVore wasn't too tied to Radic Fox's scoring a game winning goal in game seven. I think that to me is the sign of the mark of a good coach where Mason Marchman is healthy and cleared and comes back for game two.

And just because Fox has scored one goal in game seven, that doesn't mean that you're going to completely scrap your process because of points on the stat sheet. I think that's another thing I like watching about this series. I think these are two really good coaches. I think Bednar's a really good coach. I think DeBoers are really good coach.

I think they're two really good coaches who are giving us new twists to this series as it's gone. And that's the thing that we've kind of said that quite a bit on this show already. But that's kind of the really nerdy part of thing that I get excited about watching on Saturday night. Yes. On the facts, I know I did, I actually laughed out loud though when he scores that game seven goal, you're referencing against Vegas, which is a game winner. And then the first shift of game one, he tries another back end. And it was like, it was so good. It was a point. It was someone being like, all right, let's see if this works again. And it's like, oh, no, that was a one off. And never again, probably. It's the, it's the, it's the, it's the, it's the, it's the guy who

like, you hit one three. They hit one three at the gym. and then all of a sudden you feel like you're a shooter for the rest of your life even though you never were. Radic Faxa checked if he suddenly has this in his bag and we can report that he does not. But still, that was

quite a goal he scored. And yeah, I'll be curious though to see now because, you know, we talked about this potential of them running the very rarely seen 13-5 deployment. I do wonder though now that Marchman is healthy and faxes available if we do see that at some point,

I still think they like the idea of having Lundquist there so that someone can be occupying those tunnels during the game, but gives them another option. And we'll kind of see what plays out there. On the Pavelsky note, the breakaway was quite a sad visual. I will say, though, he had a couple nice passes on the power play

and had opportunities. I mentioned the pass from Hints earlier, the one-timer. At least he's getting a few opportunities so far in this series compared to the Vegas one where he just had nothing at all. And so we'll see. I think he still could play a role in here, but you're right.

It's maybe time to kind of adjust that. And to your point, like, maybe it took longer than it should have because it went for a number of games there in round one, but the mark of a good coach is not being necessarily too beholden to the past or like kind of what the player represents rather than what they actually are right now in the present.

and to his credit, Pete DeBer made that adjustment, right, and put Stancove on the top line. And he's actually a player to answer my own question of what I'm looking for. Like, he hasn't scored yet this postseason. Certainly not for a lack of trying. It feels like he's just tantalizingly close to breaking through. And I expect if he keeps playing this way, and he pretty much, he just, I think he knows no other way.

Like, he's always involved in winning battles and doing stuff. So I think he'll break through eventually here. So I'm looking forward to that. I'm looking forward to seeing if McKinnon and, and Rantanin can break through in a slightly different matchup at home. And so it should be a fun one. It's kind of one of those spots where, I mean, it's fitting because it's 1-1. And so the series is tied, but it does feel like it's one of those situations where

if you gave both teams truth serum and asked them how they're feeling, I think they're both probably feeling pretty good heading into game three, right? Like there's a story you can kind of tell yourself, and it's not a delusional one where it's like, we've already have proof of concept that the stuff we're good at. we like to do and need to do to succeed, it's going to work in this series. Now, just a matter of doing it more frequently. And so that makes for a fascinating one, right? Because sometimes you can watch the first couple of games of the series, and even if it's

tied or whatever, it becomes clear that the stuff a team does just doesn't work in this matchup and they have no real answers for the other team. That's not the case here. Like, it goes both ways. And so I think both teams probably are feeling pretty confident, yet also I imagine. slightly nervous because the other team's best is just so good. And I'm sure both teams

too have found both sides of the coin on this series being 1-1, right? From a Dallas perspective, you have 48 hours to get ready for the avalanche. They're arrested. We're coming off. Stars have lost game one of a series.

They haven't won game one of a series since the bubble in 2020. Like, it's, you have to go all back to 2019 for the last time Dallas won game one of a series in front of actual human beings. So for Dallas, it's like, oh, this is what we always do. This is, this is normal. Who cares about game one? It doesn't matter. Obviously not the greatest philosophy. Same reason the avalanche philosophy of going down three nothing is probably not a great philosophy on life to typically try to strive for. But so both teams have both sides of that coin where the story's been,

the story and the on play on ice have been great for both of it. And that's kind of what I love the build of this series. There's no like this whoever wins this series, whoever it plays out, I will feel fulfilled, I think, by this series. And that's not something you can say about many playoff series, especially in the first two

rounds often. Like we sometimes get one or two that are great. And then sometimes you get a snoozer here and there. This one is going to be great. And I just feel that way continuously going forward with it. And that's what I like most about this one. You know what? In speaking about the abs, it feels like whenever, like you kind of, I mentioned their margin for error and how they're able to just put together these stretches that are just so overwhelming.

A lot of that credit gets attributed to and drop the feet of the personnel and like the talent of their tall players, right? The coach doesn't get a lot of the credit because I think everyone just sort of feels like, all right, this is a pretty good job for someone to have, right? You got McKinnon, McCarr, rant, and then you got all these guys like, you're working with some, some good horses here. here. Yet in the context of where we're at as a league right now with the turnover at the coaching position and just how volatile it is, but also how short a lot of these 10 years are. You even had Pete DeBur. And I think part of it was sort of self-serving and in his own interest as a coach of being like, well, how is a coach supposed to succeed here? Like you have no time to build up relationships. Like you're having dinner. You're getting married. You're getting divorced by the time

the appetizers come. It's like, all right. Well, yeah, I think, you know, This serves you well to kind of take that perspective of it, where you could also go the other way. But I do think the point stands there about Benner, who's one of the longest tenured coaches right now, I do feel like he has such a good feel for the team he has and kind of in reading the room and pushing the right buttons. And I do think I'm very fascinated to know more about kind of what their preparations like or what they're doing, right? Because Corey Massisag had this great article about what they do for game prep. I think Zach Parise had a quote I saw. recently where he was talking about how he's never been with an organization that they've kind of

prepared him for games the way the avalanche do right now under bednar where he's essentially just arming you with every piece of intel you need to succeed in terms of like what to look for strengths, weaknesses and then how you need to play to do so and so you know credit to them for for kind of taking that route and utilizing that and wielding that as a weapon but i do think a lot of that credit goes to bednar and so i kind of wanted to note that because we've been talking a lot about the coaching landscape right now, and that's sort of the other extreme that I think is worth noting. Yeah, the Parisi one's interesting because I remember Colorado came through Detroit soon after, it was probably about seven or eight games after Perisi had signed with Colorado.

And I remember talking to Parisi at that time about coming in. And he had never really met Bednar before, like he played in games against him, but didn't really know him, right? And it was interesting at the time. It's interesting looking back at that kind of. conversation where he was what he was like to come to Colorado and Perisi was so impressed at that time and this was in the regular season about how Bednar went out of his way to go over everything with Parisi,

a guy who's played X amount of games, whatever it is about these are all the little ways, little things that you can do with this team, all these things that they went over and Parisi was impressed about it then and he obviously had the quote the other day about it and that's why media, that's why media members keep going to Zach Perisi because he gives good quotes. but it is it is a credit to to bednar i think the other credit to bednar too about this and it's one of those things and i wrote something about it this morning over at my site with just kind of how

one of the reasons that nchl owners are so quick to drop the axe is because a nchel coaches don't make a ton of money comparatively speaking right like toronto fired sheldon keef yesterday they're going to make the money the money to cover shelding keef's costs is one home game that's really all it is. It's not really that big. And owners are also in a league that is still very much a gate-driven league or whatever at the same time. Owners want, they really want to be playoff bound and everything like that. So one of the things that Bednar had, I remember covering those god-awful avalanche teams where he was allowed to, he went through his growth as a coach with this organization. Obviously, there's been a lot of roster turnover, but he and

McKinnon, he and McKinnon kind of went through that same growth path of learning the league, learning how they operate, they do this. Like we hear all this stuff, all these stories of like, oh, Nathan McKinnon pushes teams to be harder and faster and stronger and the way he works out and Nate Dogg and all that stuff, right? But so much of it also, too, is he's had the same coach for so long. He's never had to adjust to another coach. He's never had to do this or not never, but for this stretch.

And you're right. Bednar is an example of there's probably other great coaches out there that never got the chance to get to year three or four because of how quick the NHL is axing coaches. I think that's just kind of a key thing where it's a great chicken or egg question because you can't just keep giving the wrong guy

the wrong opportunity, but Colorado is a point that I would see and I wonder with Utah and Arizona, sorry, Arizona now Utah, as they move forward, if this is the type of space where if they have success someday, we start saying similar things about them sticking with the same guy through all of this. So that's a, I mean, Baddnar is a very good coach.

I will say that. And he's, but he got the chance to live through some mistakes because I remember times when the avalanche came to Dallas and it was Nathan McKinnon versus Carrey Latin and basically at a one-on-one showdown for the entire game. All right, Sean. Well, enjoy the rest of the series. Keep up the great coverage of it. People can check out your work on your substack at EPRingside.

at D Magazine for all these. And we're going to have you on again soon. I'm sure to talk more about this and other stuff. We got to do a full show about coaching because getting a lot of questions to the Discord about it. And with so many openings right now, still unfilled and a bunch of the same names are being regurgitated, but also our conversation about David Carl a while back.

Like there's a lot of stuff for us to get into on the coaching cycle. So we'll do that here soon. Keep up the great work, man. Looking forward to chatting with you again. Everyone, thank you for listening to us. Enjoy the games this weekend. And I will see you back here on Monday with a new episode of the Hockey P.D. Ocast streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network.