Usage is a tricky subject in hockey. For many years, maybe forever, the way a coach uses a player has been taken as proof of who the player is, how they played, why they scored or didn’t score — the whole narrative stew of a goal-based view of a game. We’ve invented words like “sheltered” because playing good offensive hockey and having the most value scoring goals is suspect. We’ve decided the trick of dancing backwards in skates that is defensive zone play is really done by slamming into someone at high speed, and that a defensive zone breakout is the hardest thing anyone has ever done in the history of sport, so only the toughest of players can start a shift in the defensive zone.
Game 1 Usage: What can we learn from the coach’s decisions?
