2009 Stanley Cup final: Bylsma's adjustments pay off

by James Mirtle on Jun 10, 2009 1:49 AM CDT Comment 31 comments

Q. The Jordan Staal line obviously had a big game. What did you see in Jordan's game tonight that you had him on the ice more than Sidney Crosby?

Coach Bylsma: Penalty kill had a little bit to do with that. But he was also getting the match-up with the Zetterberg-Datsyuk line, so that had something to do with it as well. But I think Jordan Staal can, with his skating ability and his size, he can be a force in the defensive zone, he can be a force with his speed through the neutral zone. He can be a force in the offensive zone. And I think I saw him probably we saw him do that numerous times tonight where he was a force in whatever zone he was in. He's a unique combination of skating ability plus the size he can bring to the game. And he's a young kid. He's just learning what he can do out there, and tonight was a game he did it on both ends of the rink.

For the first time in this series, I think you can definitively say that Dan Bylsma out coached Mike Babcock in a game. Who would have thought that, with their backs against the wall, the Penguins would go with 20-year-old Jordan Staal — the player in dead last on the team this postseason at minus-6 — up against the most lethal line in these playoffs?

And who would have thought it would work?

Here's a quick snapshot at some of the adjustments Bylsma made in this game, comparing the ice time he gave his troops in Games 1-5 with what happened in Game 6 in Pittsburgh on Tuesday night:

	Games 1 - 5		Game 6
PLAYER	GP	ATOI	ATOI	Diff
Maxime Talbot, C	5	15:27	19:47	4.33
Brooks Orpik, D	5	19:33	21:52	2.32
Rob Scuderi, D	5	18:50	20:37	1.78
Matt Cooke, LW	5	14:04	15:45	1.68
Craig Adams, RW	5	9:28	10:55	1.45
Jordan Staal, C	5	18:12	19:31	1.32
Hal Gill, D	5	18:00	18:48	0.80
Pascal Dupuis, LW	4	8:15	9:02	0.78
Tyler Kennedy, C	5	12:37	13:19	0.70
Evgeni Malkin, C	5	20:17	20:08	-0.15
Sergei Gonchar, D	5	22:30	22:04	-0.43
Mark Eaton, D	5	18:38	18:10	-0.47
Ruslan Fedotenko, LW	5	15:47	15:01	-0.77
Kris Letang, D	5	19:54	18:26	-1.47
Bill Guerin, RW	5	16:09	14:17	-1.87
Sidney Crosby, C	5	20:31	17:54	-2.62
Chris Kunitz, LW	5	16:43	13:53	-2.83
Miroslav Satan, RW	5	8:48	DNP	--
Philippe Boucher, D	1	11:01	DNP	--
Petr Sykora , RW	0	DNP	6:31	--

Staal got the accolades (as he should have given the key points he put up) but how about that 4.5 minute ice time bump for Max Talbot?

Bylsma's pull back came with his top line, which sat for some of the game's key minutes, meaning that Zetterberg and company were tasked with a different set of opponents than they were likely expecting.

On the back end, meanwhile, Orpik and Scuderi picked up key extra minutes and also played well.

Here's a look at the even-strength minutes Staal has faced Zetterberg's line in this series, and just how big a departure Bylsma's Game 6 decision was:

Staal-minutes_medium

In other words, Staal faced the lower half of the Red Wings' lineup about 65 per cent of the time in Games 1 through 5 and hardly ever was up against the big guns as Detroit coach Mike Babcock tried to match Zetterberg and friends against Crosby as much as possible. Bylsma was able to get Staal out there about 50 per cent of the time against Detroit's top line in Game 6, but without last change in Friday's finale, he will have more difficulty getting that match-up.

Everyone's calling the Cooke-Staal-Kennedy threesome the Pens' dynamic third-line after their performance in this one, but their coach used them as a first line based on the minutes they played. They were a big factor because Bylsma allowed them to be.

It'll be fascinating to see if that continues in Game 7.

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With the final change at home it will be interesting to see if Babcock respects the effectiveness of this matchup and works around it or chooses to face it head on.

As an aside, I can’t help but wonder if we’re living through a golden age of Cup Finals with five of the 15 all-time Stanley Cup Game 7s coming in the past eight seasons.

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by puckreport on Jun 10, 2009 3:35 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs

…any way you slice it, and regardless of which team you follow, 1 GP for the Cup is just flat out fun. Wouldn’t it be nice to have our first overtime of the series in this one?

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by jrwendelman on Jun 10, 2009 8:10 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Would that make it the first game 7 OT SCF history?

by Hansmoleman on Jun 10, 2009 8:38 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Wings won one of their cups in the 1950’s against the Rangers in OT

by mc keeper on Jun 10, 2009 9:02 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

There’ve been two, actually, but they were long, long ago.

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by James Mirtle on Jun 10, 2009 11:15 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Game 7, OT, penalty shot.

Just like every kid’s dream playing ball hockey in the road.

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by Chemmy on Jun 10, 2009 10:01 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

OT would be wonderful — and not an enviable position for the refs, at all.

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by Dominik on Jun 10, 2009 12:26 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

normally, id agree wth you, but theyve been nonexistent for 5 of the 6 games anyway! Wouldnt surprise me at all to see Game 7 completely unregulated, and then have one of those late calls that has to be called have an impact.

The Fan in me would love a long OT, but the cynic in me would hate a long OT, because it will bother NBC (especially if it further impacts Conan’s ratings). Gotta remember – there are no commercial breaks in OT. And with the NHL doing all it can to please NBC, Im worried about the long-term existence of unlimited playoff OT.

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by poploser on Jun 10, 2009 12:37 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Yeah, you can just see it coming: we’re likely to see more non-calls that would’ve been called earlier in the playoffs … which will make that one big late call all the more salient.

And with the NHL doing all it can to please NBC, I’m worried about the long-term existence of unlimited playoff OT.

Any change there would make this grown man cry.

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by Dominik on Jun 10, 2009 3:31 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

but how about that 4.5 minute ice time bump for Max Talbot?

Talbots been a surprise this series. It seems like every game he gets a couple breakaways/ 1v1 rushes. Especially on the PK.

by Hansmoleman on Jun 10, 2009 6:37 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs

If Im Babcock, I’ll take a Game 7 matchup where Talbot and Staal get more ice time than Crosby any day.

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by poploser on Jun 10, 2009 9:03 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Yeah, I don’t care who he’s playing against, Crosby needs to get more than almost 18 minutes each game. He needs to be up 20-22, like Malkin still was.

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by Afino on Jun 10, 2009 9:17 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Definitely. How much of the problem last night was his linemates? Guerin did not look very good, and I didn’t notice Kunitz either way.

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by Back In Black on Jun 10, 2009 10:31 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I thought that was Guerin’s best game of the series. He had 6 shots on goal and was skating effectively.

Now he didn’t convert and did take some bad angles to the net, but I think Guerin was a force when he was out there with the puck.

by Hooks Orpik on Jun 10, 2009 10:43 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

It seemed to me that Guerin was shooting from a distance and making weak passes at the top of the offensive zone – bailing out instead of working the puck closer to the net (which is where Crosby is most effective).

But that was just my impression; I admit that you may have noticed stuff that I missed. Guerin looked much better to me in the Washington and Carolina series, but there are obvious reasons for that.

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by Back In Black on Jun 10, 2009 11:33 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Guerin and Kunitz have played well in the postseason, but they’re not a good match for the way the Red Wings play. Seems a little late to change Crosby’s linemates, no?

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by James Mirtle on Jun 10, 2009 11:37 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Guerin’s penalty, 180 feet away from Fleury, might have been enough for Therrien to take him off of Line 1, but then again, if Therrien was calling the shots, Crosby would have already been teamed with 11 or 12 wingers by now, making a last-minute line change par for the course.

by TD O'Dell on Jun 10, 2009 12:08 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Better to change his linemates than to keep him off the ice.

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by Back In Black on Jun 10, 2009 12:58 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I agree with Hooks. Guerin was solid offensively all night. Kunitz was a nonfactor again, except for one good hit on Lidstrom, I think.

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by poploser on Jun 10, 2009 11:12 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Good call on Orpik

He was very effective last night. Scuderi and Gill looked a lot more comfortable, too.

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by Back In Black on Jun 10, 2009 10:30 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Scuderi’s my guy… been talking about him on the Langway Award posts all season and finally he’s shining for everyone to see. Should be a good payday in free agency for him (Jeff Finger money?).

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by James Mirtle on Jun 10, 2009 11:16 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

When Scuderi first came up with Pittsburgh, I thought he was the worst d-man in the entire league for a couple of years. Man, has he improved. He gives me a probably false sense of hope for Ryan O’Byrne.

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by saskhab on Jun 10, 2009 11:22 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I was thinking the same thing (well, except for the O’Byrne part). Does it speak to the long learning curve for defensemen? How offensive tools are so much easier to identify at an early age, whereas the tools/intelligence needed to be a strong defenseman can be learned over time?

Going into the draft, this is heavy on my mind.

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by Dominik on Jun 10, 2009 12:30 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Mine too, James. It’s been an amazing progression from Scuderi going from a 5th round pick to college to a depth player in the minors for three seasons followed by an uneven start in the NHL. Most Pens fans wanted Scuderi run out of town along with Joe Melichar, his much maligned frequent defensive partner.

But quietly Scuds just kept plugging away, improving more and more every year. It’s the subtle things you have to watch to appreciate in his game, so I was happy the spotlight’s on him for the big save…..Even though that likely means the secret is out.

Brooks Orpik parlayed a good playoffs into $3.75m for six years (with more money on the table from other teams). It’ll be interesting to think what the market for Scuderi will be.

by Hooks Orpik on Jun 10, 2009 11:24 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Don’t really see a ton of Pens games as a Hawks fan, but it looks like Scuderi wouldn’t be such a bad butterfly goalie if he wanted to be

by hawksfan21 on Jun 10, 2009 12:35 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

And, hey, unlike Orpik, I didn’t hate Scuderi when he was at BC. In Orpik and Kunitz, the Pens have two of my least favorite players since Jason Blake, ranking right up there with Joe Finley.

by J. Michael Neal on Jun 10, 2009 1:01 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I would have thought that putting Staal against Datsyuk-Zetterberg would be a move to get Crosby and Malkin against Detroit’s “lesser lines,” but that didn’t exactly allow them to put any points on the board.

Who were they up against?

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by PRC on Jun 10, 2009 11:01 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs

On the Staal thing:

Interestingly, based on Vic’s TimeOnIce shift charts, Staal spent large chunks of the 2nd and 3rd periods NOT playing against Datsyuk and Zetterberg. I remember seeing this too, when his line kept maintaining posession down low and getting weird scoring chances for Matt Cooke, he was mostly against Helm.

Based on the pattern, with Staal hitting the ice right as Z and Datsyuk were leaving, it looks like Bylsma was actually ducking those guys with Staal’s line. Which seems weird, because Staal was, by my eye at least, doing a good job limiting those guys when he was out against them. Might just be that the matchup looked good early, but Bylsma saw the Wings coming on and decided to change things up? Alternatively, maybe it’s something interesting about playing to the score? Use Staal to check those guys when you need offense from Crosby and Malkin, but when you’ve got the lead play power vs. power? Jibes with some of my thoughts on the Z-Crosby matchup as well, in that it seemed like games were just lower event overall that way with those two more or less cancelling each other out.

I thought it was interesting, anyway.

by MattM on Jun 10, 2009 1:59 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

I didn’t look at how the matchup changed throughout the game, but it would make sense that, as Pittsburgh was sitting on a lead, Bylsma might be more leery about getting Staal out against the Red Wings big guns.

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by James Mirtle on Jun 10, 2009 3:09 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I love this post. Great insight into what made the difference in the game supported by interesting data.

This is what makes this blog my first stop everyday

by AwkwardMoment on Jun 11, 2009 12:23 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Appreciate that AM.

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by James Mirtle on Jun 11, 2009 12:29 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

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