Raising Kane


Evander Kane returns to the Jets line up tonight against the Devils. Fireworks are going off! It's Kane's first action since the opening game in Phoenix where he and Mark Scheifele collided in the first period rendering Kane with a knee injury that has kept him sidelined, until tonight.

This is good news for the Jets as no matter what your opinion of Kane is, he 'gives an f' about what happens every game. He's 'all-in' every shift and wants to win. When the 'compete-level' narrative is brought up you never hear Kane's name as one that doesn't compete with enough effort.

Kane is a big gun but he's only as powerful as the guys providing the ammunition.

If the Jets are to get Kane back on that 30 goal pace as an elite power forward he needs a set-up man. Some one who gets him the puck at the right time and in the right position. Readers of this space will know that I have documented the effects both Kyle Wellwood and Alexander Burmistrov had on Kane, in particular his goal scoring rate. Kane needs that help, he needs to have players drawing attention away from him but also unselfishly feeding him.

Mark Scheifele is supposed to me that guy and Blake Wheeler is there to ride shotgun. Wheeler is not given enough credit for his passing ability, he sees the ice well and wants to distribute the puck and Kane should be a recipient. That was the plan when the season started and after how the trio were starting to click before Scheifele's injury last year. Now we get a third chance to see if some magic takes hold.

To get the most out of Kane the team needs to raise him up and SUPPORT his game. Kane may evolve his game over time but it makes more sense for the Jets, let alone any team with Kane, to put the right players around him. 30 goal scorers don't grow on trees they don't easily appear and they certainly exist for a reason- they do good things often.

That's the thing with Kane, other than the myth that he only shoots from the top of the circle what does he do on the ice that is poor? He back checks, he plays the PK, he plays the PP and he can log a lot of minutes and no one ever questions his effort. On this team, that is what you have to build around.

So Kane is in and likely the retrun of Ladd, Little and Frolik: a trio that works well and has success. In theory that strength on the first line should be drawing more attention in the past, more so because we know Frolik has been playing injured and seeing a far easier workload. The Kane Scheifele Wheeler line should be getting some favorable opposition and they should benefit.


Shoulda, Coulda, Woulda

It's all in theory. Rather it's more like a hope but there's no reason to think it can't happen but what if it doesn't? Unlike last year there's another option: putting Perreault with Kane and ??? It may not happen tonight, nor would I expect it too but the options has to be somewhat appealing now that Maurice has seen what Perreault can do on a regular basis. Predicting the line blender before it's even necessary is a true armchair coach move but with the Jets you can never sell that possibility short. Not with this group.

So should Kane not find chemistry with 55 and 26 then he could be matched up with 85 and that would be rather interesting to see what the possession darling in Perreault can do with the shot attempt beast in Kane. On paper it makes some sense, in fact a lot of sense but we don't get the results from paper. The best case is there are no more roster disruptions for the Jets and Maurice can work on making this elixir quite potent.

Zach Bogosian is a game time decision. After missing last game and skating today Maurice told media that he said Bogosian should come back to the rink and see how he feels right before game time. That's a good sign as the injury plagued Bogosian has show some resiliency, and play to hopefully gain some consistency. Should Bogosian be playing tonight this will be the first time the Jets have had a complete roster since that first game in Phoenix, one where they put up 6 goals.

Don't read anything into that last statistic, there's nothing to correlate to it with the roster health, but that would be nice. It would also be nice to get Kane scoring and that's what the focus should be because if you raise Kane, you're likely to raise the Jets record too.

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