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Post Battle #29 & #30: Panarin and Bob lead the way to a four point weekend |
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Final Score: Blue Jackets 5 – Devils 3
Final Score: Blue Jackets 1 – Coyotes 0
Game Summary
The Jackets entered Friday night’s game a point behind the Devils for top spot in the Metro and finished the weekend with a two point lead. The Jackets played the Devils on Friday and needed a strong game to redeem themselves from what a poor showing at home against these same Devils on Tuesday. The game didn’t start out well with the Devils having a 2-0 lead after one, but from there it was the Artemi Panarin show.
Make that five primary assists for Panarin as the Jackets pick up a huge road win over a divisional rival. Panarin hasn’t been the goal scorer the Blue Jackets expected, but he's been a spectacular playmaker. 15 of his 19 assists have been primary, putting him in a tie for fifth in the NHL. When he has the puck on his stick good things happen, and players like Pierre-Luc Dubois and Josh Anderson are reaping the rewards.
Dubois has found his offensive stride playing with Panarin. He has eight points in his last seven games, after scoring against New Jersey and adding an assist against Arizona. He's showing the offensive upside that saw him score 42 goals and 99 points his draft season in the QMJHL. He's also showing his 200 foot game that made him the third overall pick and why the Jackets were so confident he could transition to centre and play the position at the NHL level.
William Karlsson is playing very well for Vegas but Josh Anderson is showing why the Blue Jackets protected him in the expansion draft. He leads the team with 11 goals, and really has been one of the most consistent players this season. He scored the only goal for the Jackets on Saturday, 30 seconds into the game, but it was enough to win it. That was Anderson fourth game winning goal of the season.
Sergei Bobrovsky played both ends of the back to back, and while he wasn’t strong in the first game he was unbeatable in the second. Against the Devils, Bobrovsky stopped 21 of 24 shots for an .875 save percentage. This was the third game in row Bobrovsky had been under .900 save percentage. Everyone knew a stretch like this was coming; no goalie can keep up what Bobrovsky was doing in November. The offense was able to step up and pick up the win on Friday. Bobrovsky returned the favour and pitched a shutout on Saturday, his fourth of the season.
Cam Atkinson has been slumping badly. He has no points in his last six games, and on the season he has just nine points in 25 games. He had a particularly poor game against New Jersey, he played just 9:36, by far the lowest ice time of the season, and was benched for entire third period. On Saturday John Tortorella took it one step further and healthy scratched Atkinson. We have seen Tortorella do this to veterans before, notably with Scott Hartnell last season. It’s worked before and hopefully it works again with Atkinson. Sometimes when things aren’t going well you need to take a step back and reset. Ideally this will spark Atkinson and he will get back to being the Cam Atkinson that we all know he can be.
Stat of the Night
Stats courtesy of
Natural Stat Trick and
Hockey-Reference.
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