Reviewing October 2023: Not good, but better?

Results

L 2-4 vs. PHI
W 5-3 vs. NYR
L 0-4 vs. DET
W 3-1 vs. CGY
W 5-4 (OT) @ MIN
L 2-3 (OT) vs. ANA
L 3-4 (OT) @ MTL
L 0-2 vs. NYI
L 3-5 @ DAL

Bad news: It’s the second straight October with just 3 wins. Good news: there was one fewer game this October, and there were a couple of overtime losses. Bad news: those were winnable games that we lost. Good news: Only two of the losses were truly uncompetitive.

Standings

Unsurprisingly, the Eastern Conference is once again a buzzsaw. The Blue Jackets would be just a point out of the playoffs in the West, but are second from the bottom in the East and the Metro. The silver lining? The one team behind them is the Penguins. That’s hilarious!

Stats

Not all the way to where we want to be, but demonstrable progress in the underlying stats and in goal prevention.

A weird thing (likely small sample size) is how scoring is down from last year, but way more teams are worse off so far.

Three Stars

Third Star: Jack Roslovic

It’s weird to put Roslovic on here, given that he started the season on the fourth line and was a healthy scratch in just the second game. But, to his credit, he responded well and after producing on the fourth line, he moved up to a top six role again. He has 2/4/6 in 8 games and is second on the team in assists and points. He also leads the team in 5v5 CF% and is top 3 in FF% and xGF%. Moving to the wing full-time has helped focus his game. Will it be enough to boost his trade value in February?

Second Star: Justin Danforth

Danforth got off to a great start last season, too (2/1/3 in 6 games) then became the first of a long line of players to suffer season-ending injuries. It was easy to forget about him over the off-season when projecting the lineup, and easy to underrate the spark he can provide to the lineup. He is second on the team in goals, with 3, and also leads in +/- (at +3). He’s boosted by a 15.79 on-ice shooting percentage at 5v5, but he’s also been one of the better forwards at shot suppression. He can play anywhere in the lineup, so even as the top 9 gets healthy, he can comfortably play on the fourth line and still have a positive impact.

First Star: Ivan Provorov

There were valid off-ice reasons to hate the Provorov trade this summer, but some on-ice reasons too. He had struggled as the #1 defender for a bad Flyers team. The change of scenery has cleared helped, and he leads the team in assists and points, with 7. He also leads in average time on ice, as a key player in all three phases of the game. His most common linemate has been David Jiricek, and he’s easing the young star in nicely.

Honorable Mention: Adam Fantilli

The #3 overall pick this summer, who turned 19 on opening night, is already third on the team in points (tied with Zach Werenski and Boone Jenner). Pascal Vincent is being cautious about giving Fantilli too much too soon, but so far he is looking the part. It’s only a matter of time before he gets the #1 center minutes (and linemates) he deserves.

Honorable Mention: Emil Bemstrom

With the growing roster of forwards, it is put-up or shut-up time for the Swedish sniper. He played his way onto the roster to start the season, and in Patrik Laine’s absence has finally become the power play weapon we’ve long hoped he could be. He has 3 points on the season, and all are power play goals.

Needs Improvement

Scoring Stars

Boone Jenner led the team in goals last season (26) and again this month (4). The next four were Laine (22), Johnny Gaudreau, Kirill Marchenko, and Kent Johnson (21 each). In 27 combined games, their goal total is…2. That’s how much Sean Kuraly has on his own in 9 games. You need your best players to be your best players, so this goes a long way to explaining why the scoring numbers are worse than last year.

The good news is, there’s a fair bit of bad puck luck here. Gaudreau has 12.73 expected goals in all situations and Marchenko has 7.89. They’re due for a hot streak once the puck finally hits the back of the net for the first time.

Dirty Hits

Laine and Werenski are two essential stars on this roster, and both have been injured this season by dirty hits: a knee-on-knee hit by Garnet Hathaway on Werenski, and an elbow to the head by Rasmus Andersson on Laine. Hathaway received a minor penalty, then a supplemental fine. Werenski missed just two days with a quad contusion. Andersson received a four game suspension for his hit, but Laine has missed five games so far with a concussion.

It’s so frustrating to see these plays happen. Can we dispense with the myth that certain players acquired in 2022 are able to prevent these sorts of injuries from happening?

Coaching?

Where should Pascal Vincent fall after his first month as head coach? The good side: the team is playing much faster in his system; they generally get off to good starts; and there has been accountability for poor play. Eric Robinson and Liam Foudy each got waived after playing just one game, and even a high-priced player like Damon Severson rode the bench for a period after a dreadful turnover that resulted in a goal.

The bad: The energy level is still inconsistent, with many of those fast starts followed by periods where the team gets run over; the defense has less frequent lapses than last year, but the ones they have are really bad and usual result in goals; the scratches have included talented youngsters like Marchenko and Johnson; the power play is still very much a work in progress.

I am mostly encouraged by the system, and I think consistency and success in executing it will come with more practice and experience over the course of the season. The line blending (which we should know by now that all coaches do) can be frustrating, but there’s also room for experimenting with different combinations. I think the Laine absence has been destabilizing, as he was a big part of the plan going into the season. That has left the coaching staff scrambling, and Laine isn’t an easy player to replace.