Fixing anemic power play atop Islanders to-do list
No one who has watched the Islanders over the past decade, or perhaps even longer, needed Pete DeBoer to remind them what the power play has looked like for the vast majority of that period.Nevertheless, it was good to hear a stark acknowledgement of reality Saturday when the Islanders started work on the power play for the first time during camp.“It’s not a quick fix,” DeBoer said.“It hasn’t been good for quite a while.”Indeed, for a team that counted 16.53 percent and 30th overall on the power play as an improvement, tearing the thing down to the studs is entirely warranted.
DeBoer and Rocky Thompson, the assistant coach in charge of the power play, have their hands full.The first vestiges of their work on Saturday revealed two things.First, the composition of the units: Matthew Schaefer up top, Bo Horvat in the bumper, Brayden Schenn netfront, Cal Ritchie and Kyle Palmieri on either flank as PP1; Tony DeAngelo up top, Anthony Duclair in the bumper, Emil Heineman netfront, Mattias Maccelli and Simon Holmstrom on the flanks as PP2.Second, movement of players is being stressed as much as movement of the puck.“The good power plays are interchangeable,” DeBoer said.“There’s a lot of motion, there’s a lot of movement.
There’s a lot of guys moving to different parts of the ice and they’re interchangeable in their positioning.I felt like this group was really stagnant, almost deferring to, well that’s my spot there, that’s your spot.”That might be a good first step to recovery.“Guys are so good at reading plays now, you have to be more unpredictable,” Bo Horvat told The Post.
“I think us being a little more fluid and not standing around so much is gonna help for sure.” Sign up for Inside the Islanders by Ethan Sears, a weekly Sports+ exclusive.Please provide a valid email.
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