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Av And Coaching Issues Thread


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Av is the best coach in the histroy of the Canucks. MG should know whether or not the players have tuned him out. If so he needs to go. But he is an excellent coach. He has a stubborn side to him though in his not playing ballard in scp last year when our other d were banged up and his stubborn refusal to sit mayray.

Im willing to bet he stays but if he goes i cant think of anyone that is better and available at the moment

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Haven't read through this thread so I don't know if people are criticizing Newell Brown but if they are, don't. Just because the PP went cold down the stretch and into the playoffs, does not mean Newell Brown should go. Remember, he's the guy who orchestrated the PP in the first place that was dominant and 1st overall in the league last year and 1st for most of this year. Without him, the PP would never have been dominant at all. It just went cold. Period. That's on the players, not on the coach who created the system that was so successful for the most part.

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Av is the best coach in the histroy of the Canucks. MG should know whether or not the players have tuned him out. If so he needs to go. But he is an excellent coach. He has a stubborn side to him though in his not playing ballard in scp last year when our other d were banged up and his stubborn refusal to sit mayray.

Im willing to bet he stays but if he goes i cant think of anyone that is better and available at the moment

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So many aspects come into play and AV's comment about the level of parity has a lot to do with it. The Canucks struggled with their game from February on. Closed the season with a nice 6 game win streak. My take;

1) Goaltending: Played well enough to win. I would keep Schneider and deal Lou because fundamentally Schneids is stronger. He is younger, will cost less. Lou can be moved for help up front.

2) Defence: I said many times the series would be won/loss in the Van d-zone and it did not turn out that way. Whether it was the goaltending that bailed them or defensive play the series wasn't lost there. Edler disappointed, Ballard exceeded expectations and Tanev cemented a spot for next year. Hugh upside for him. IMHO the d-core does not have the QB that all championship teams need. Edler hopefully.

3) Offence: The guns cooled off. They had some pretty decent possession time in the zone. With luck they played well enough to win the last 3 games. Daniel scores on his breakaway and probably a different story. All the elements exist within the offence for success. Perhaps not that power forward that we all hope Kassian will become. The fact that Booth was not able to power to the net was important.

Coaching: Lots of calls for AV's head. Most coaches coach to the rosters strengths. The strength in the Van roster for a number of years were the Twins and then last year Kesler joined them. Van has emphasized a puck possession game for 3 seasons now to maximize the Twins game. The question is whether it is a winning strategy. Detroit is quoted ad nassum on that one. When people talk about Detroit and puck possession it is always on the offensive side. At their height the Wings were one of the best puck support groups I have seen. Van has never achieved that level.

The weakness I see in Van's puck possession game was exhibited in the last half of Game #5. LA was gaining momentum by choking off the neutral zone and turning the play back onto the Van defence consistantly. IMO Van forwards had to start dumping the puck into the LA zone and play the boards which they were dominating for a stretch. It was only brief periods in the series that the LA d-core were being worked steadily. I go back to my orginal pitch that the series would be won/loss in the Van d-zone. As it turned out the series could have been won in the LA d-zone. Van was winning those battles. LA was boxing out the front but opportunities were there. I don't know whether my take is right or not but that is how I see it. If I am right then Van coaching failed to adjust their game. I'm not suggesting that the Twins become bangers but the other 3 lines sure should have been.

Another issue brought up during the broadcast was the number of CUP winning people LA has in their coaching group. What an asset during a playoff run. Very happy when Mike Gillis became the Van GM becuase he actually played the game at the NHL level. Perhaps it is time for Van's coach to be that type of mentor for this group.

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I'm still on the fence about AV. He's coached the core group here for 6 years, plus for a couple more years in Winnipeg for guys like Burr, Kes and Juice. If we assume that the core will not be blown up, then in my view it's more likely that AV will be back. There's a leadership structure and trust level in the room that means AV rarely has to go into the room...the core group basically runs the team.

Where I have had issue with AV, and particularly in this series, was with line combinations. Of course the changes were dictated by Daniel's injury, but late in the season the team did appear to find some chemistry on the first line with Lappy playing with Hank and Burr while Pahlsson, Higgy and Jannik appeared to be gelling as well. The second line never did find its game. So why would AV change up the lines again for the first three games of this series and move Lappy and Booth to play with linemates they barely played with all season?

Sometimes I wonder whether AV switches things up just to show how smart he is.

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In my opinion AV was never more than a C+ - B coach. One of the classic examples of his incompetence came in Boston last year. Luongo gave up eight goals and a reporter asked him if he would start the next game. "He doesn't even need to ask me,'' said AV. (i.e. he knows he will play) I found this bizarre. What kind of a message is that to send to your goal tenders or to your team? He doesn't even need to ask? AV handled the goal tending so badly against Boston last year it was bizarre. Luongo gave up 18 goals in three games! Schneider should have played the last two games at least.

- as an aside AV had Malholtra playing (half blind) when he could have had Hodgson in the lineup.

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I'm still on the fence about AV. He's coached the core group here for 6 years, plus for a couple more years in Winnipeg for guys like Burr, Kes and Juice. If we assume that the core will not be blown up, then in my view it's more likely that AV will be back. There's a leadership structure and trust level in the room that means AV rarely has to go into the room...the core group basically runs the team.

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AV must go, I can't stand watching this team play with him coaching anymore. Too many boneheaded lineup moves, his inability to adjust and out coach other teams, his inability to motivate his players. I could go on and on. Bottom line: It's time for the Canucks to have a new voice behind the bench!

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As much as I thought I liked Mike Gillis the more I am worried that he has really hamstrung the Canucks. Samuelsson and Sturm for Booth...you may say Sturm needed to go and I agree but who got Sturm in the first place...MG. Luongo and his lifetime contract. Trading CoHo..I still think CoHo's camp requested a trade so it might not be his fault, but if there was no trade requested terrible move. Letting Ehrhoff go, although I guess the money wasn't there I still think it was a mistake. Pahlsson definitely wasn't the bigtime shutdown guy he was touted to be...I dunno I just see a ton of great moves there.

I don't want to be super negative but the future in Vancouver is murky at best in my opinion.

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AV blamed the first round loss on parity, and while there's something to be said for that, I don't think it's the whole story. I don't think his team was ready to play, and the PP had died and he had no answers for it. (Having said that we really missed the creativity of Samuelson and Ehrhoff.) I think it's time for a change as this team looks like it has permanently stalled under AV.

- I still don't know why he didn't put a playmaker on Kesler's line. (I guess putting Burrows on the line, finally, was an attempt to do that.)

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