The Coyotes take on the Flames tonight and get a break as Johnny Gaudreau and Brian Elliott will both be out.
The Coyotes have sent Christian Dvorak (and also Justin Peters) back to the AHL and they will continue to sit Dylan Strome again tonight.
The plan here is confusing. Obviously Strome has twice put up 100 points in the OHL so there is no point in him going back to junior, and he isn't eligible for the AHL, so the Coyotes are sort of stuck with him.
If you look at the Leafs, they've had a rookie (or two) on every line all season. If they screw up, if they have a bad game, they're right back in.
The Coyotes, on the other hand, are giving the ice-time to Vrbata, Doan, Martinook, Richardson and Hanzal. Collectively, not a very exciting group, but to one extent or the other, they've all played reasonably well this year. Even shockingly well in the case of Martinook.
But what's the point? These guys could all have career years and the Coyotes aren't winning the Cup or likely even making the Playoffs. But who cares? This year isn't about the results.
So instead of trying to squeak out a victory, they should play for the long term and give Strome some sheltered minutes and a ton of power-play time. I understand that there is no agreement on the 'earn it' vs 'just play 'em' argument, but I just don't see how it makes long-term sense to stack the powerplay with vets, or play rookies for nine minutes.
Even Duclair. I know he's not exactly having a great year so far, but it was only like a week and a half into the season when he didn't yet have a point when he skated for just 11 minutes.
Watching the contrast between how Babcock and Tippett are handling a fairly similar situation is fascinating - to me anyways and perhaps you, if you're still reading.
If there is good news to be had, it's that Mike Smith and Martin Hanzal are back.
Then again, Domingue was winning me over, so I don't know if Smith deserves to be the starter anymore. I guess we'll see.
Hanzal, obviously, is huge plus. The Coyotes desperately need him, as we recently saw when a game featured de facto #1 centre Jordan Martinook.
Neither of these teams is good at preventing goals.
Here's hoping for a 10 goal game!