After the very difficult match on Saturday, Martin St-Louis decided to take out the blender and change his recipe.
In addition to the addition of Joshua Roy, recalled from the Laval Rocket in the morning, the head coach made changes within his lines while Lucas Condotta took the opposite route from Roy and returned to Laval.
Benched for part of the third period after a horrible second period in which the team allowed five goals to the Golden Knights, Juraj Slafkovsky and Kirby Dach were the big losers of this personnel shuffle, while Roy He is found in the company of Jake Evans and Emil Heineman within what can be considered as the second unit.
Dach therefore found the center with Slafkovsky on his left and Joel Armia on the right. Dach has been shut out three times in his last four games, while Slaf has no points during the same period.
Give more
Martin St-Louis was very clear on what he wants to obtain from his two young players who are having a fairly difficult start to the season.
“They have to push more and it’s not just about working hard, you have to do what the game asks you. Sometimes, it’s also about making good decisions and that takes more.”
In short, they need to improve their overall game, they can’t just say they have to. St-Louis also maintains that it is not necessarily a message to send them to the fourth line.
“I don’t know if it’s a message and I don’t know if they’re on the fourth line, but it’s mostly how you behave when the game starts. I don’t think it’s a message, it’s go to work.”
Constance
Coincidence or not, the Canadian held a team meeting that stretched a little longer than usual after training on Monday, even if Cole Caufield assured that it was the usual duration.
What Saturday’s game against Vegas revealed is that this team has been lacking consistency since the start of the season.
“It’s always more difficult to have consistency when you’re young, but it’s not impossible and that’s what we’re looking for collectively,” insisted Martin St-Louis. The more you have it individually, the easier it is collectively.
“We are the second youngest team in the league, we are still experiencing learning difficulties, but we must not accept it. What bothers me the most is not the defeat, but how we lost. It was opposite in the match before, we won, but above all I am happy with the way we won.
This shows that the Canadian’s balance is still very fragile, since we go from one extreme to the other in the same week.
Advance
With 20 games on the clock, the Canadian has reached the halfway point of the season and is in last place in the Atlantic section and penultimate in the general ranking.
Still in progression mode, Martin St-Louis put his team’s position into perspective, even if the stated objective before the start of the season was “to be in the mix”, which is clearly not the case.
“It doesn’t matter where we are, we have to keep moving forward. But our first ten matches hurt us a little. We are more difficult to face than we were.”
