The Catalyst of Change
Zack Dawson | Pittsburgh Penguins
Mar 13, 11:51 PM | Hype this story!
The Penguins have now played 12 games under Interim Head Coach Dan Bylsma. Their record during this stretch is 9-1-2. They have vaulted themselves from tenth in the Eastern Conference to sixth over that stretch. Their shootout loss to Columbus Thursday night snapped a seven-game winning streak, which included and 5-0-0 run on consecutive road games.
The past few weeks have been one big success story for a Pittsburgh team that was going through a stretch from December to January that was stricken with turmoil: The Pens were battling through injuries; they could not string wins together; they were dropping crucial games and letting teams gain ground on them; they were being outshot in nearly every game. They were just playing poor hockey.
Then came an embarrassing loss to the lowly Toronto Maple Leafs on February 14, 6-2. It would be the last game that then Head Coach Michel Therrien would be behind the bench.
It was a tough loss to swallow. Three nights before, the Pens nabbed two points from the San Jose Sharks, the best team the Western Conference had to offer. The Pens played a responsible game, they generated chances. They showed they had life.
But to allow six goals against a team that wasn’t even in the playoff hunt was unacceptable. But it was the story of the season to that point.
The Pens were an enigma. The team would win 9-2 against the Islanders, then lose 6-3 to the Flyers; win against the Thrashers 6-3, then be blown out by the Maple Leafs 7-3 – and all in the same four-game stretch. It was night and day. The Pens would show that they could explode offensively, then implode entirely.
Speculation as to the cause was the hot topic. The finger-pointing was spread out. Some thought the numerous injuries were to blame. Marc-Andre Fleury, Ruslan Fedotenko, Mike Zigamanis, Tyler Kennedy, Ryan Whitney and Sergei Gonchar all missed time at one point during the first half of the season. But the argument fell a little flat when looking at the Pens’ run last year and how they overcame injuries to clinch the second seed in the Eastern Conference.
Others pointed to change in personnel. The roster from the Stanley Cup Finals team a year before was not intact. Marian Hossa, Ryan Malone, Ty Conklin, Jarkko Ruutu, Gary Roberts, Adam Hall and Georges Laraque had all parted ways with Pittsburgh in one way or another. But the current roster had been winning in October and November, coming out of the gate with a 14-6-3 record through November. So they could win, but the next two months didn’t see them do so with any consistency.
The only other possibility was the coach. Therrien came into the year having been given a three-year contract following a season that saw the Pens reaching the Stanley Cup Finals. His defense-first approach had focused on a responsibility to one’s own end, creating offense from defense. The team had thrived last year and made the system look brilliant. However, the team this year began to get away from the execution of the system. And they began losing.
It was thought that perhaps Therrien had lost the team’s ear. They did not want to hang back and wait to pounce on a team once they made a mistake. But there was no way to confirm if this was indeed the case.
So as the tension built, and the need to win became more dire, the only thing that could be done to turn things around was done. Therrien was removed from behind the bench.
On the surface, as the Penguins have earned 20 of a possible 24 points over the last 12 games, firing Therrien was the answer. To some degree, this is true. Under Bylsma, the team has played with a vigor that hadn’t been seen since their playoff run. However, was it simply Therrien that was the issue?
A coach can only do so much for a team. At some point, the team must take what the coach is preaching and enact it on the ice. The players were not doing this on a consistent basis. Though the answer of why is not readily available, the result was obvious on the ice. This isn’t necessarily the fault of the coach, but his inability to pull the team back together means that he is no longer able to be an influence.
In the end, Michel Therrien is not entirely to blame for the worst portion of this season. Injuries did play a part, though they are not an excuse. Great teams overcome. And the roster did seem to struggle with the system, perhaps both physically and mentally.
The only thing that could be done to turn the season around is try to find a coach who would be able to motivate the team. Therrien, after getting the team to the Finals, became the scapegoat.
Dan Bylsma has been the catalyst for turning the season around, and the Pens are right now attempting to maintain a spot in the playoffs. His high-intensity, high-investment system is one that has inspired the team to play a better game. And a full, sixty-minute game as well. The team has bought in to what Bylsma is bringing and, by doing so, sold Therrien out.
Comments
DS
Mar 14, 12:39 AM
The Pittsburgh Penguins: We coach kill more successfully than Ottawa, New Jersey…and other team in the NHL that’s around for more than 20 years! (and some that haven’t!)
I refuse to believe they ‘quit’ on him. I cannot believe that they would be so stupid as to never hold a third period lead that they somehow managed to attain in the first place, because they dislike the coach.
I can understand feeling frustrated and hopeless, and I’m glad Bylsma has somehow magically persuaded them to shoot the puck more, but isn’t it funny how they also magically start playing better when Shero decides to bring in the proper personnel to let this team roll four NHL lines again….!? (and do strange, unusual things like going to the front of the net!)
I’m just disgusted that it took the firing of Michel Therrien to get them to play like they were LAST SPRING. Under Michel Therrien.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I don’t care what happens this spring, don’t expect to see Dan Bylsma (and don’t expect to see whoever they might hire instead of Bylsma) coaching the Pittsburgh Penguins Hockey Club in 2013. There is no shelf life in this town, and for all that Michel loved this city, and did for this team, that’s really sad.
The country club of inmates running the asylum has returned.
Nate
Mar 14, 08:35 AM
@DS I agree with what you said, but would like to add that I believe the loss of veteran leadership in the locker room was a big factor. Guys like Roberts, Recchi, Ruutu, and Malone were allowed to walk out the door and take that presence with them. So now you’re left with a team lead by a 21 and 22 year old duo. I think when those two quit believing in the system, the whole team followed. I, also, don’t believe the team purposely quit on HCM, but they sure as hell didn’t play good enough to keep him here. It was a bad situation and I hope HCM can catch on somewhere else, he is obviously a great coach in molding young teams.
Zack Dawson
Mar 14, 09:16 AM
DS and Nate, I agree with both of you. Firstly, in the fact that I was a huge Therrien supporter from the get go. He had done a tremendous job in WBS. Plus there was no way he’d be worse than Edzo behind the bench. He took a team of youngsters and turned them into Cup contenders.
Both of you have touched on two of the many roots of the Pens’ problems this year. It’s hard to say why the team was opposed to the system that had gotten them to the Finals last year. To be honest, I think it was more of a problem of execution by some of the less motivated players. When those who were keeping it by the books saw that results were coming, more players wanted a change in approach. This is all speculation of course, but I remember Talbot and Orpik stating in separate interviews that they believe in the system because it got them an Eastern Conference Championship. Some of these guys were still on board.
As for the veteran leadership, I think that was a big part of it, too. Without the guys you mentioned, and with Gonchar out of the locker room due to his injury, it really was just the young guys. Sometimes they need to be roped in a bit by a guy with some tenure in the league.
In the end, the locker room needed a shake up to light that fire again. You can’t fire the players, so Therrien was the unfortunate victim cast off. It still amazes me that the guy who guided us to within two wins of a Cup is looking for work again.
Zack Dawson
Mar 14, 02:34 PM
Wow Tom, you hit pretty much every nail on the head there. I have to say you laid that out very well. And you’re right about the acquisitions of Kunitz and Guerin. They are both players very akin to this style of play.
I can’t elaborate much more on what you’ve said. Spot on.
Brad
Mar 14, 03:11 PM
In 06-07 Ottawa went the SC finals. In 07-08 they had the best start in the NHL. Then their goaltending fell apart and they have never been the same. In 07-08 the Pens went to the SC fianls. In 08-09 they had a record start for the franchise if I remember. And then….the goaltending fell apart. Terrien’s system did not start the season with the 1-2-2 trap but it was his solution to the problem by trying to protect the defensive zone, it did not work. Bylsma’s solution is to keep the puck at the other end of the ice. They still give up an average of 3 goals per game with 25-30 shots against per game but have the abilty averaging 40 shots on goal to score 4 goals per game. And when Fluery is on his game it works out even better.
DS
Mar 14, 06:52 PM
The goaltending “fell apart” because Fleury GOT HURT and and Sabourin unfortunately had to tread water beyond his shelf life, and yet, possibly not long enough for MAF to have the complete rehabilitation he was able to take last year. That’s on bad luck and Shero going with strict logic over sense and not keeping Conklin.
As for “oh the players didn’t want to play the system any more…”
Um. Yeah, that same system that Crosby and Malkin and Staal and Letang and Orpik and Sykora and Kennedy played within last year, the one where they won games 7-1 and 8-2 in the spring and 12-2 in the playoffs and a post and a game short of the Cup; that system?
It’s ABSOLUTE BS TO DISPOSE OF A COACH WHO’S DONE SO MUCH BECAUSE THE “SYSTEM’S” MAGICALLY NO LONGER WORKING. Less than a YEAR after he takes them to the Finals??
Who cares what the players want? They get paid an obscene amount of money to do what they’re told, and with the track record of this coach v. the track record of these players, he deserved to be treated like something better than yesterday’s garbage, in the words of Scott Burnside.
John Stevens and Lindy Ruff can go on ten-game losing streaks. Ruff and Lemaire and Trotz and Tippett and MacTavish have jobs for life, practically. But because Mario says they have to make the playoffs this year, because of the blinding spotlight on the Penguins and their shiny young stars, and because this is Pittsburgh, Coachkillingville, everything MT managed to achieve may have hurt him more than it helped him.
Now what kind of a coach or system do you suppose it will take to get this team to stop blowing godforsaken two-goal leads??
DS
Mar 14, 09:43 PM
Isn’t it interesting, Tom, how Therrien never had a chance to work with 2. and 3. (And I believe I remember the Rangers saying something in the playoffs about “not wanting to run-and-gun” with us, for all that everyone seems to insist MT was trying to turn Sid and Geno into the NJD or the Wild. Even this year, there were games where they broke the other team open.)
Firing the coach for not having the personnel to execute, and then bringing in the same people who might have helped. What great timing. This organization goes for the quick fix at the expense of loyalty, and I just find it really, really disturbing.
And the power play still sucks, and they’re still blowing two-goal leads or going down 3-0. IF they get into the playoffs, it’ll be very interesting to see how far they get, because all of their problems are certainly not fixed — and I’m almost glad they lost today, infuriating as it was, because they sure need to learn they’re going to have to work a lot harder to change.
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