Well the first word that comes to mind is disappointment. Not many teams that win the President's Trophy would associate the same season with that word, but San Jose obviously will. They say hindsight is 20/20, and it seems that the Sharks had forgotten about the fact that the huge changes made in the past offseason were not about acquiring the most points in the regular season, or maintaining the most dominant home record in the NHL since the end of last season. No, the Sharks were about one thing: the postseason, and the Ducks gave them a rude wake-up call. It seems that everyone in San Jose (except for Doug Wilson) forgot about the fact that it wouldn't have mattered if the Sharks were the #1 seed by 50 points or the #8 seed by a tie-breaker; the only measure of success would be hoisting a Stanley Cup. The changes and tough decisions were made by the general manager, and instead the heavily-favored San Jose Sharks took a giant step backwards after being eliminated by the 8th seeded Anaheim Ducks in the first round.
Now, first of all, give credit to the Ducks. Jonas Hiller was an absolute beast in net, even in the 2 losses. Although the Ducks were heavily criticized for being a one-line team, that one line of Getzlaf, Perry, and Ryan absolutely took control of the game every second they were on the ice. And everyone knew coming into the game, it would be a battle of the defenseman: Blake, Boyle, Vlasic, and Lukowich against the championship core of Pronger, Whitney, Niedermayer, and Beauchemin. And you can't give enough credit to the third and fourth line of the Ducks (particularly Todd Marchant), who absolutely shut down the offensive depth of the Sharks, as they were put out against every virtually every single combination of forwards the Sharks had to offer in the six game series. Yes, the Ducks probably shouldn't have been an 8th seed with their skill set and end of the season. In fact, if they hadn't started Giguere in the first half of the season, they probably would've been ahead of St. Louis and Columbus, maybe even above Calgary and Chicago.
But regardless of all that, it was still a series that the Sharks had to lose. And that is exactly what they did. If someone had absolutely no interest in California hockey and just wanted a 20 minute recap of the series, they would just have to watch the third period of game 6. Absolutely no effort by the Sharks, oustanding defensive work in the neutral zone by the Ducks, and the two factors combined for a series-clinching goal by Ryan Getzlaf. In the final ten minutes alone, Anaheim beat out two icing calls. Plain and simple, the Sharks didn't put in the work to win the series.
Tomorrow, everyone in the hockey world will point to the very obvious failures of the Sharks: Thornton, Marleau, and Boyle didn't put up the offensive numbers. Evgeni Nabokov didn't even show a hint of his playoff brilliance that extended the Dallas series last year to 6 games and a quadruple overtime finish. The power play numbers were horrendous, the penalty kill (which carried the Sharks to the President's Trophy) disappeared, and every other aspect of the game was either horribly inconsistant or just plain sucked.
But let's think outside the box for a minute. Because the Sharks weren't total failures, at least not statistically. After the disappointing 0-2 start where they were 0-12 on the power play, the Sharks went 4-13. 4 isn't a terribly high number, but that's about a 30% conversion rate, which would've given you the top ranked power play in any regular season as far as I can remember. In every game, San Jose outshot Anaheim and put at least 30 shots on goal. Anaheim had the most allowed shots on goal (both total and on average) of any team in the playoffs thus far. And by looking at these statistics, you'd think the Sharks played right into Todd McLellon's system, a system that got them 117 regular season points, a President's Trophy, and about 20 franchise records and/or firsts. Yet it is this exact system that was the downfall of the Sharks. Yes, the puck possession system that won Detroit their championship last year in convincing fashion, and the system that got McLellon hired in place of the defensive-minded Ron Wilson.
How the system failed is very obvious, and became extremely obvious about midway through the season, when teams started to strategize around it: when a team who can play strong neutral zone defense out-possesses the puck in a game, odds are you will lose. San Jose had trouble winning faceoffs and getting past their own blue line throughout the first round series against the Ducks. Flash back to January, when San Jose's red hot start that had them leading the Western Conference by almost double-digits at one point, started to cool down and those 7-0 blowouts were reduced to 2-1 overtime nail-biters. Every team circled the Sharks on their calander after the All-Star break, and completely threw away their normal defensive scheme to stack five skaters in the neutral zone and on their blue line to stop the San Jose rush that generated them 257 goals in the regular season, a 34 goal improvement from 2007-2008. Look at the tape against the Anaheim Ducks, and you'll see the exact same defensive scheme. People will say that the Sharks couldn't work around that defense in the series because they didn't hustle or win the loose puck battles, or even win faceoffs in the offensive zone. But at some point, you would think a team would make some sort of modification to a system that is being strategized against.
Here is where the Sharks community will exile me: I truly believe that Ron Wilson should have stayed in San Jose. Last year, after my roommate (who shall remain unnamed) and I sat on the couch for 6 hours watching the Sharks eventually be eliminated by the Stars, he came up to me and said that Ron Wilson had to leave this year. I retaliated, saying the problems were obviously within the roster, and acquiring more skill on the blue-line would give Wilson the tools he need to finally make it to the finals. My roommate declared Wilson would be fired, the Sharks would win the Cup, and he would laugh at my face. At least he was right about one thing. Now, I'm not saying that Todd McLellon was not a good coach, and that all the blame is on him. But the city shouldn't have run Wilson out. Wilson's system was a much more playoff-suited style, and even having him as an assistant coach would have worked wonders in this series. Of course, I'm not just spewing this claim out of nowhere. One of the most glaring problems with the Sharks throughout the season (at least after January) was turnovers, defensive work, and goaltending. Let's take a look at some statistics, shall we?
Turnovers:
I am way too lazy and upset to look through complete game statistics, but let's just take two games from the Anaheim series this year and two games from the Dallas series last year. Both were pretty much 6 game blowouts that San Jose had no realistic chance of winning after the first two games were played. Both were considered major upsets of a Stanley Cup favorite being ousted out of the postseason by huge underdogs. First, in game 3 of the 2008 postseason when Dallas won 2-1 in overtime to take a 3-0 series lead: Dallas giveaways - 24, San Jose giveaways - 12. In game 1, giveaways were tied 8 for both teams. Let's take a gander at two games in this year's choke. Game 2, where San Jose lost 2-3: Anaheim giveaways - 12, San Jose giveaways - 21. Game 5, the 3-2 overtime win for San Jose: Anaheim giveaways - 14, San Jose giveaways - 18. The point isn't that the numbers are directly correlated with wins and losses. The point is that it is fairly obvious a change in the system led to an increase in turnovers, particularly in the defensive zone. And I'm not even going to try and begin finding regular season turnover totals.
Defense:
This can be explained very simply: Goals allowed in 2006-2007 compared to goals allowed in 2008-2009. The reason why I choose not to show goals allowed in 2007-2008 is because it was when Nabokov was a Vezina finalist. It still had less goals allowed than the 08-09 season, I just don't want people using that as an explanation. Goals allowed in 06-07: 199, tied for third fewest in the NHL behind Dallas and Minnesota (of course). Goals allowed in 08-09: 204. Still third fewest in a season that had only one team under the 200 GA mark. Not that big of a difference, right? But every year that Ron Wilson has coached the Sharks, except for 2005-2006, the goals allowed were under 200. But the most glaring defensive statistic in the series? Rob Blake and Marc-Edouard Vlasic, who were never broken up throughout the regular season as the #1 defensive pair, were tied for fourth on the team in plus-minus rating with a +15 (the top line of Thornton, Marleau, and Setoguchi took the top 3 spots tied at +16). In the series, Blake and Vlasic were a -5 and -6 respectively, the two lowest on the team.
Goaltending:
First and foremost, a lot of the blame can be placed soley on Evgeni Nabokov, who, for whatever reason, forgot how to cover his 5-hole. But can one technical error really account for huge jumps in statistical numbers?
Numbers in order for Evgeni Nabokov: GAA, Save %, postseason GAA, postseason Save %
2008-2009: 2.44, .910, 2.82, .890
2007-2008: 2.14, .910, 2.18, .908
2006-2007: 2.29, .914, 2.23, .920
The thing to note is the GAA, both in the postseason and the regular season. Almost half a goal more one year removed from being a Vezina trophy finalist.
Now, with all that said, do I want Todd McLellon out? Do I blame him for this step backwards? No. Last year I was adamant that Ron Wilson should not be fired, and two weeks later he was shown the door. If there is one thing Bay Area sports has shown, it is that championships are not won from one year's worth of changes. Things take time to develop and settle in, and the subtle fixes are the cornerstones of going from an early exit in the playoffs to making a run in the finals. In fact, outside of the Boston Celtics, most teams that try to make the huge change to push them over the top end up suffering drastically for it. Oakland Raiders anyone? Ron Wilson obviously did not deserve to be head coach, but I would imagine had he stayed within the San Jose system, a lot of the previously mentioned numbers would be a lot better. Ron Wilson was a defensive-minded coach, which got him a lot of criticism and blame for the offensive disappearance of his superstars in the postseason. But bring in an offensively-oriented Red Wings ex-coach and look what happened. In fact, I think the offensive numbers are worse.
A quick change is the worst direction GM Doug Wilson can take this franchise. Todd McLellon is a rookie coach, and about 25% of the team were not on the roster last year. Retirement questions are going to come up for Jeremy Roenick and Rob Blake. Roenick is more likely to retire, but that guy loves being in the locker room and is the hungriest player in the league for a Stanley Cup. Rob Blake still has a good year or two left in him, so he should stay. Dan Boyle being treated like Brian Campbell would be the biggest mistake possible this summer. If anyone wants to scream at Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau: coming into the postseason, Thornton averaged better than a point a game. In fact, this year is probably the first postseason he's actually "choked". Marleau is the captain, he revitalized his career, and he scored the game winning goals in both wins. Salary cap may demand a move or two, but keep in mind that Torrey Mitchell was gone the entire regular season, and we still have Kyle McLaren. A change in style and system would be horrible, and if anything, another year practicing with the same guys and the same coach would probably show a great improvement (yes, even though we broke all sorts of records this regular season) next year over this one. Thus, I'm looking forward to seeing most, if not all, of the Sharks return for another run at the Cup next year, and hopefully McLellon and his staff learn how to teach some defense.
If you want a model of everything that I said shouldn't happen, read this article.
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