CBJ vs Philadelphia 3/24
Jet Greaves, Zach Werenski and Adam Fantilli
The Blue Jackets, though the journey was certainly not a straight line, carved out a solid victory and finally got some help across the league.
The major story must be the putrid start from the Blue Jackets. They were okay there for a while but the sum total of the first period was dreadful. Jet Greaves, thankfully, showed up entirely.
Greaves
The two big saves are the obvious ones but he’s got so much more presence than that. In fact, the first period featured excellent examples of how good he can be as a puckhandler how how much his defensemen use that facet to help solve pressure.
Not many goaltenders get first touch on retrievals and send backhand rim exits.
Philadelphia, it appears, specifically targeted the low-feet and shot often for rebounds. In the following clip, you’ll see Greaves scoop the shot off of his toe while Zegras was crashing the back door.
Is this a pre-scout or something Tocchet thinks is a superior tactic? Greaves’ rebound control, at least relative to Elvis Merzlikins, has been a significant strength this season. Still, last games’ “called off” goal featured a wide sprayed rebound. Perhaps fatigue, perhaps intentional scouting by opposition
Their largest chances, outside of the two breakaways featured above, involved rebounds and, generally, involved Provorov and Gudbranson. Not to criticize them specifically but each of these chances came out of different scenarios.
I suppose you could blame Mateychuk for allowing the Couturier backdoor goal, though his stick was on his, but I would lean more towards Gudbranson. His whole identity is crease clearning and cycle stopping, so we have to at least assume he’s going to be added value there. Instead, Cates puts the puck through Greaves and Couturier pots the open net.
Provorov’s physical crease clearing probably saved the powerplay goal but Tippett’s sequence of chances came off of him losing some coverage off of a faceoff. Plays happen but it must be concerning to the Blue Jackets that their veteran defensive defensemen can lose these specific situations.
I mention these specifically because they once again featured prominently on the on-ice chance share. With those struggles in mind, ice time allotment is difficult to understand.
Denton Mateychuk, and similarly, Kent Johnson were the lowest deployed players at 5v5. I simply do not see reason for these in either case especially considering Provorov was the most deployed and Gudbranson the last in the top four.
Eventually, Bowness separated pairs and played Gudbranson alongside Provorov to protect the lead while moving Kent Johnson alongside Jenner and Heinen and Lundestrom up to his position next to Monahan and Garland.
Frankly, when I checked the shifts to see if there was a definite reason for these adjustments, I didn’t see anything obvious. I would say it’s concerning, or perhaps frustrating, but this was more or less what was expected of Bowness. In some cases, it feels like the close games are by design.
Werenski Heroics
Zach Werenski and Damon Severson continue to be a dominant defense pair. Werenski’s puckhandling mistake created a huge chance and a bid on the powerplay to save possession resulted in a penalty-shot. Personally, Marchenko has to move earlier and perhaps simply be satisfied with his pressure on a relatively non-threatening forward in Noah Cates, but Werenski could have also played it differently.
In the second period, however, Werenski single handedly pulled the Blue Jackets back into the game. Last season, he was an outrageous performer when trailing with a remarkable capacity to pull the Blue Jackets back immediately. He’s done that a few times this season, Minnesota and Anaheim I think specifically, but he hasn’t been quite himself since returning from sickness.
His remarkable capacity to produce when the Blue Jackets desperately needed some offense was really a treat. From there on out, he was brilliant only conceding with the empty net off of a distant shot.
Werenski’s capacity to turn play-kills into possession and attacking sequences is simply brilliant. This game, he was a master of transition. The Blue Jackets didn’t, and generally don’t, look to create a ton of controlled entry offense and Zach Werenski’s capacity to draw attention and then place pucks into recoverable positions, and to prevent the puck from leaving, helped the Blue Jackets sustain pressure through the rest of the game.
Fantilli Driving
Though Werenski gets the big credit, I don’t think Adam Fantilli’s presence in this game should go unnoticed.
He didn’t get a point on the second goal there but he was the critical player in the whole sequence. He reacted quickly to expose Philadelphia on the initial breakaway for Marchment, surfed back to keep the puck in the zone while having the presence of mind to draw two Flyers to him before passing to Marchment again, thereby creating both the passing lane and runway for Werenski’s ultimate goal.
Outside of that, his growth in transition is remarkable. He passes early, modulates his routes with respect to the defense and plays off of his teammates heavily. This game, his work in winning pucks on the wall and finding passing options was very noticeable.
Kirill Marchenko’s puck hunting shouldn’t go unmentioned either.