The Coyotes beat the Canadiens 5-4 last night. They picked up their third win of the season and their first in regulation. Unfortunately, this comes in game 21 and sets a new NHL record for futility.
A lot of people are frustrated, and given the Coyotes non-stop off ice soap opera, their usual place in the bottom of the NHL and their young GM, people are jumping to conclusions, and all of them are bad.
1- John Chayka
Chayka is a good GM who has proven to be a master of making great trades. Have faith, his vision will pay off eventually. Keep in mind this team is still in a rebuilding mode. Reading too much into short-term results is exactly the kind of thing Chayka was brought in to avoid.
Chayka didn't take over a team that was good and drive it into the ground. He took a team that wouldn't rebuild - and kept playing veterans over developing their young players - and he set it up for long term success by investing in a youth movement and putting his young players in position to get real NHL experience.
Some people think because he added in some veterans over the summer (Hjalmarsson, Raanta, Stepan) that he was in "win now" mode, but he was simply replacing the vets he got rid of (Smith, Vrbata, Doan, Michalek) because a hockey team needs players of all ages. You have to surround your youth with support, and that's all he tried to do.
2- Getting rid of Doan/Tippett.
Tippett wouldn't adapt his game to this generation of hockey. He wanted to play a tight, trap based game and insisted on giving all the prime power-play time to guys in their 30s and so he had to go. He would have Clayton Keller on the fourth line, so good riddance, regardless of current record.
Same with Doan, Smith and Vrbata, who, along with Tippett made up the old core of the Coyotes. They all had to go so the team could move on.
The current record does not change this.
3- Current Results.
The current results are way worse than they should be. No one wants to be 3-17 but a couple things should be kept in mind:
- The Coyotes played nine out 21 games so far missing two of their top four defenseman (Hammer and Chychrun).
- Their starting goalie was injured during training camp and they've dressed four different goalies (don't bring up the Knights, I don't care about fluke results) and only had their starter for 10 of 21 games.
They are currently 30th in the NHL in PDO, suggesting that even putting injuries aside, they've been incredibly unlucky.
I won't get into their schedule, but it has been insane. By far the worst in the NHL in terms of travel and days between games.
Going Forward
The Coyotes have been sabotaged by the schedule, injuries, bad luck, and just about everything else. They probably won't make the Playoffs - barring a miracle - but it's important to realize that based on their actual play - and not their results - they should be a lot closer to a .500 team than they are.
The schedule gets easier, team will shortly inject massive amounts of talent into their lineup when Jacob Chychrun gets back (shortly) and Dylan Strome is recalled (also shortly).
Their goalie has played great and if he continues to do so, the Coyotes will win more than they lose. The hole is too deep to climb out of, but this team is not going to finish 31st.
They've been above 50% Possession in three of their last five games, and their record in their last ten is a respectable 3-5-2.
The Coyotes just got finished going through one of the most unlucky stretches an NHL team could hope to have. They aren't close to as bad as their record suggests and they remain in a great position as far as their rebuilding process goes.