Follow @james_tanner123 After a five game losing streak that saw the Coyotes allow nearly five goals per game, they finally got back into the win column last night vs the Minnesota Wild.
Oh and by the way, I guess you can can all those Auston Matthews to the Oilers articles for a while since by boys just won their fifth in a row even though they still are without Yakupov and McDavid. Don't look now, but this team is absolutely terrifying. Why? Because it's very hard for teams to defend against two lines that both feature insanely good centres. Not to mention that if not for Patrick Kane's insane point streak, Taylor Hall would be getting the Hart Trophy conversation off to an early start.
But back to the Coyotes.
They won their first game in two weeks - hallelujah.
It was a nice victory for Lindback, who the team should probably reward with the permanent starting job - not on merit, but just based on the fact that he isn't Mike Smith.
It wasn't that nice of a victory for the Coyotes who did not deserve the two points they got.
Now, I don't want to take down anyone's excitement level, but the Coyotes won the game in overtime after the Wild hit the post, at one point, three times in like two minutes.
Not to mention that the second period was half over before the Coyotes even registered a shot in it. They were outshot 28-21, but at 5v5 it was 22-13 for the Wild.
And really, how could it have gone any different? The Coyotes dressed Vermette, Tikhonov, Richardson and Chipchura down the middle in what very might well be the worst overall group of centres ever dressed for a real NHL game.
Unfortunately the coach -who needs to be fired by the way - does not know this. Because he inexplicably still believes in the finished Vermette he played the line of Reider, Boedker and Vermette three minutes more than the Domi/Duclair line.
Fact: Anthony Duclair should lead the Coyotes in ice time for forwards every single game.
Hey, a win is a win. Except that if you want to be fair about it, the Coyotes were dominated like an NHL team was playing an AHL team for two periods and then they won on a power-play in overtime. As far as meaningful wins go, this wasn't one.
In the bad news file, Hanzal will not play tonight vs. the Canes and Doan might. Yikes.
A win is always nice, but if you forget the results and just look at the process, that was as bad a loss as the Coyotes have had all year.
Thanks for reading.