The Blue Jackets went into the All-Star break on a high note Tuesday, posting their first shutout in more than two years in just the 14th 1-0 regulation win in franchise history against a St. Louis team battling for a playoff spot.
For a team that has battled some familiar issues all season – defensive lapses, closing out games with a lead – it was a welcome way to finish what has been a frustrating opening half of the season.
Are you a glass half empty or half full person?
It is true the Blue Jackets have blown a plethora of third-period leads this season, leading to yet another last-place standing for the squad in the Metropolitan Division. On the other hand, to lose third-period leads, you have to have them, and if the Jackets could have just turned just a few of those into wins, who knows how the season would look.
Again, glass half empty vs. glass half full.
At the end of the day, you are what your record is, so trying to say anything other than the Blue Jackets are a last-place team would be folly.
But if you’re looking for some positives, I would argue the Blue Jackets’ recent play shows they’re learning on the job. At the start of the season, the Blue Jackets were merely along for the ride in the third period when they had the lead, facing major shot disadvantages and basically playing a prevent defense for 20 minutes. It wasn’t necessarily the strategy, but the team too often turned caution into calamity, inviting pressure on itself that was generally too much to withstand.
While going 2-2-1 on the trip, the Jackets closed out a pair of one-goal, third-period leads in Calgary and St. Louis and generally looked good doing it. (The counterpoint to this is the blown 4-1 lead in Vancouver, but that was less about packing it in and more about taking penalties that led to three power-play goals.)
In addition, the Jackets are 10th in the NHL in expected goals against per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 since Jan. 1 and fourth in high-danger chances against per 60 in that time span, which is a fancy way of they’re playing better defense. Teams aren’t getting to the scoring areas against the Jackets nearly as much over the past month, and after allowing 34.7 shots on goal per game over the first 38 contests, Columbus has allowed 30.1 in the past 12.
For much of the season, head coach Pascal Vincent has been generally unflappable, largely because he knows histrionics aren’t going to accomplish much of anything. But he’s also done so because he believes the steps are coming, even if the record hasn’t necessarily showed it at times.
“We’re all about the process, right?” he said after the win over the Blues. “Who you are today is the result of what you've done in the past, and who you're gonna be in 10 years, it's decisions you're gonna make today and in the future. That's our team
“Who we are today is, we're learning, we're growing, we're understanding. Like you saw in the third period, Kent Johnson, the skilled player chipping the puck out. Johnny Gaudreau, chipping the puck out, just playing that real smart hockey game that we needed to play today.
"The one part that we're getting better at is understanding where the game’s at and what's happening.”
It’s been an improvement as the season has gone on, and that’s where this team is at right now. If you look at the top six scorers on the team, you have two veterans at the top in Johnny Gaudreau and Zach Werenski, followed by a 19-year-old (Adam Fantilli) and a trio of 23-year-olds (Dmitri Voronkov, Kirill Marchenko and birthday boy Yegor Chinakhov) who have a combined six years of NHL experience between them.
I know people hate to hear us keep harping on it, but when that’s your mix of top players, given their age, there’s going to be a learning curve. The good news is those young players look like building blocks for a long, long time.
Which is why captain Boone Jenner says there are positives to take from the first half of the season.
“There is,” Jenner said. “Obviously it’s not the spot we want to be in right now. We’ve had a lot of learning curves, learning the hard way, whether it’s leads in the third periods, different things, different scenarios all year that have been hurting us. I think we have to learn from that if we want to become the team we want to become.
“It’s frustrating when you're going through it, but it’s a process we can learn from. If we do it the right way, we’re going to like the other end of it.”
Vincent said where he’s seeing the biggest growth, though, is in how the team is starting to push itself internally.
Assistant coach Mark Recchi agrees, and it’s fair to say the Hockey Hall of Famer has learned a few things in 22 seasons as a player and three Stanley Cup rings. The first-year CBJ coach has been in a lot of successful NHL rooms over the years, and he sees the progress being made with the Jackets.
“I think it’s come a long ways,” Recchi said. "We haven’t gotten direct results like we’d like to right now, but they're doing a lot of things that are going to help continue to grow as players and as a team. That’s the important thing. As long as we’re continuing to do those things and understanding the standard has to be high, and that’s in the gym every day, taking care of yourself, that’s in the different phases of the game.
“There’s a lot of different parts that go into building a team that you feel wants to be champions, and that’s what we want to do with our young guys.”
Recchi Gets Honored
Recchi spoke with Bob McElligott of the Blue Jackets Radio Network before the team’s game in St. Louis, and I thought his comments were pretty interesting. Again, this is a guy who has been around the game for a long time, and he has watched how successful, Cup-winning teams being built throughout his career as a player and coach.
This past weekend, Recchi left the Jackets for a few days to return to Philadelphia, where he spent 10 seasons and racked up 627 of his 1,652 NHL points, to be inducted into the team’s Hall of Fame.
Already an NHL HOFer, Recchi had the chance to reunite with such names as Eric Lindros, John LeClair, Scott Hartnell and more in his trip to Philadelphia. Reminiscing about the good ole days, Recchi couldn’t help but draw parallels between what the Flyers had in his playing days and what the Blue Jackets are trying to build.
“That’s what we’re trying to do here as a coaching staff and management,” Recchi said. “We’re trying to set standards. We’re trying to set the bar a lot higher than I believe what it’s been set here. We want to get to a place where we want to be a team that gets in the playoffs every year and challenges. ...
“It’s not easy. It’s a lot of work. The players have to put in a lot of work, the coaches have to put in a lot of work, but we’re in it together and we’re trying to do those types of things that are going to make the people of Columbus proud. It’s not going to happen overnight, but you have a coaching staff willing to get to that level and do what it takes to help these guys and help the group get to that point.”
OK, enough of the serious stuff. The weekend was a fun time for Recchi, who participated in an alumni game and was honored in a pregame ceremony by the Flyers. The scoring touch is still there, as Recchi had a pair of goals, but the best part of the event was getting the chance to be with former teammates.
“It was a lot of fun,” Recchi said. “You get in the dressing room and there was a lot of my teammates from the end of the ‘90s, the early 2000s I had, and even in the early ‘90s. It was awesome. It’s just like you go back to what it was. However long it’s been, 20-plus years now, and you don’t miss a beat. The guys are still the same, having a blast on the bench, in the dressing room, chirping each other. It was a lot of fun.”
