Last night was the first game I've gotten to see in person this season. Glad the Isles won in OT. However, we saw AGAIN an Isles team that carried the play largely for two periods and then had the play carried TO them in the third period. The Isles got out of that game largely because of Roloson in the 3rd period. He was HUGE stopping 18 shots in the final period. Made up for two soft goals earlier in the game.

However, last night I decided to go into the game and try to keep track of lengths of shifts. I didn't really give much credence to the "they are tired in the 3rd" theories out there due to overspeed. I saw teams on tv just not skating in the third.

But last night the Isles came out slow in the third and they raised their level of play gradually. But we took a few penalties because guys weren't moving their legs. We looked to get a second wind with about 8 minutes to go and evened out the level of play. I thought the best scoring chance of the third was ours with Tavares making a great pass that Bergie redirected, but Theodore robbed him on with 4 minutes left.

But throughout the 1-2 periods I noticed HOW LONG our shifts were. We had guys going over 1 minute shifts at a time. At one point, the 4th line was out and they had a great shift in the second where for a full 1:15 they had a sustained forcheck in the Caps end. Finally, the caps broke out of their zone and there was a quick faceoff in our end. There was a tv timeout and Gordon keep them out. I NEARLY LOST IT!!!!! WTF!!!!

If we are playing this highly aggressive OVERSPEED system where everything is based on the forecheck, we need to have shifts go 45 seconds and get the f off the ice asap. Why the heck do you have the 4th line, after a great 1:15 forcheck essentially double shift? I know there was a tv timeout, but so what. Get them off. This is why your your team is gassed in the third period Scott. Shorten the damn shifts. I saw MANY instances of 1:30 shifts and that is just too long. In this "system" and at this level, must shorten then.

I would have put this in the "game thread" but I've been wondering about this in many games and it was just confirmed in my mind last night.

I'm interested in your comments...

That 4th line was there to cover Ovechkin and they are playing 25 minutes a game. I'm sure with the offensive zone faceoff AO was staying out there. I didn't really notice the other 3 lines but I have noticed the length of shifts we do take. I don't mind when it's KO taking that long shift, he can stay out there 30 minutes for all I care.

WHAT WAS CRAZY IS THE WAY THE CAPS THROW THE PUCK AROUND ON A POWERPLAY
HOW THEY ARE ONLY FIRING AT 17% I'LL NEVER UNDERSTAND
TALK ABOUT NOT HOLDING ONTO THE PUCK
NOW IF THEY ONLY WERE GREADY AND SHOOT MORE THEY BE PUSHING
25-30% ON THE POWER PLAY

COULD YOU IMAGINE IF YOU THREW JT INTO THEIR PP MIX
WITH HIS PASSING ABILITY THERE WOULD BE NO WAY THE PP KILLING TEAM WOULD EVER TOUCH THE PUCK AFTER THE FACEOFF

Just surfing right now, I'll post something more substantial in the game thread later, but I agree with your comments. Even KO got himself trapped out there---he was out over 2 minutes at one point. Of course, he's better at 80% than many others at 100%, but I would have liked to see faster shift changes, that's for sure.

Again, I don't remember the source but I think Gordon said one of the things he was working on with Tavares was shortening his shifts. He looks at Erik Staal's shifts as a comparable and they were 30-45 seconds or so. I think this is more of a discipline problem than a coaching problem.

It isn't a discipline issue when the coach is keeping lines out there for face offs after just having a minute shift. The 4th line shift was the most glaring example of it and Webb might be right, but I don't recall OV's line being out there for the face off, but they probably were. Still, there were times that KO and Tavares were out for more than a minute AND STAYED ON for the next faceoff. Same thing with Franz' line.

He's got to shorten lines and make more line changes when he has the chance.

I did hear that too, that Gordon was looking for some of the younger guys (Tavares as IW86 said) to shorten shifts. However, they roll 4 lines consistantly so it shouldn't be an issue.

The reason why the Caps had the puck so much on the PP is because of the ineptness of the PK unit to clear the zone. They had ample chances to clear several times. One time Sutton hit Thompson in the back and another time Sutton fanned on an easy clearing attempt. There are so many holes in this team that they need the opponent to fail miserably on good chances. And it's happened against both the Rags and Caps. It won't happen all time.