Consistency key to success for Jets, Hurricanes

The Coaches Room is a regular feature throughout the 2022-23 regular season by former NHL coaches and assistants who will turn their critical gaze to the game and explain it through the lens of a teacher. Marc Crawford, Mark Recchi and Phil Housley will take turns providing inside.
In this edition, Crawford, coach of the Quebec Nordiques from 1994-95, Colorado Avalanche from 1995-98, Vancouver Canucks from 1998-2006, Los Angeles Kings from 2006-08, Dallas Stars from 2009-11, associate coach of the Ottawa Senators from 2016-19, assistant coach of the Chicago Blackhawks from 2019-22 and currently coach of ZSC of the National League in Switzerland, talks about what's worked so far this season for the Winnipeg Jets and Carolina Hurricanes.

When you look at the Winnipeg Jets (29-14-1), you start with goaltender Connor Hellebuyck. He has been lights out for them and he's given them a lot of confidence, given them a chance to win every game. He's given them a terrific job doing what he needs to do in the net and I think he's really spurred on their team. When you get great goaltending, it helps your defense. The defensemen are not quite as concerned with being perfect. Then what ends up happening is when they're not worried about being perfect, they have more free flow.
It's all of the things that feed off quality goaltending: Confidence in your defensive structure, the ability to know if you make a mistake, Hellebuyck is bailing you out time and time again. When things aren't going well, you kind of squeeze the details and when you do that, you're not playing as free. A free player and an instinctive player and a trusting player is a better player.
I really like the way the Jets play. Josh Morrissey has had a great year statistically, but they've gotten some quiet contributions from their other defensemen, supporting the attack and being great at outlet passes. You look at their first-pass completion, all those statistics like that, they're just terrific. They're really good at exits and that sort of thing and I think that goes a long way.
Secondarily, the focus overall on their defensive structure has been something that coach Rick Bowness has done a good job of getting them to buy in on. The early injuries that they had probably helped them because they needed other guys to tighten up their game and they've played from a strong, defense-first position.
Finally, they've had bounce-back years from guys who had poor years last year. Most notable there is forward Blake Wheeler for me, and you need those. Adam Lowry has been pretty good this year. You can keep going down the line of that group.
Now when you look at the Carolina Hurricanes (27-9-8), then you have to look at the consistencies that they have. First, their consistency at center is huge. Jordan Staal, Sebastian Aho, Paul Stastny, Derek Stepan.
It's also their premiere defense. For that, it's Jaccob Slavin, for sure. He's just such an awesome player. Brady Skjei is a consistent contributor. Brett Pesce is consistent. Again, when you're strong in the middle and strong on defense, that's always two of the biggest areas that you need to be strong on. It means you're going to have a pretty good defensive zone approach.
The other consistency is of coaching. I don't think enough is given to the consistency of that. What does Rod Brind'Amour do? His teams are in top shape. Even if it's only marginal, they have a consistent conditioning advantage over other teams. It shows itself early and sometimes it also shows itself late. Teams are starting to fade in the playoff push and they seem to get a second life.
They've also had really strong penalty killing. Jesper Fast has been there a long time and is a great penalty killer. Same with Aho. When I think of Rod Brind'Amour, I think of top conditioning, but I also think of him as a top two-way center. There's got to be something to that. He understands what it takes to play the game right and you have to give a lot of credit to him. He insists upon it and he consistently gets it.
You can also say they've had pretty consistent management. General manager Don Waddell did everything he could do to help the tea, he's been in the league for a long time, and he and Rod seem to work well together.
Then you have the skill elements that can also speak to that consistency. I'm thinking of depth guys. Andrei Svechnikov has been there for five years, the consistency of scoring wingers and the improvement of scoring wingers. Even when they weren't going to be good scorers, they had better players with them that maybe took that scoring shortage and brought it up a notch. Now they've improved, so they're relied on to provide the scoring punch.
Whenever you see a team that does well year after year, you just look at what the consistent things are.