Connor McDavid

2022 - 5 - 25

Shannon: Connor McDavid is playing a Sidney Crosby style of game (TSN)

Longtime sportscaster John Shannon joins Creech and Dean to talk about his longtime relationship with Dean dating back to Hockey Night in Canada, Battle of ...

The Oilers are so much more than just Connor McDavid (Yahoo News Canada)

Labelling the Oilers a one-man team is selling Edmonton's secondary stars and depth pieces well, well short.

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How Connor McDavid helps the Oilers even when he's off the ice (Sportsnet.ca)

Connor McDavid is having a playoff run to remember, and while his on-ice contributions make the highlights and are obvious, Justin Bourne writes about the ...

You can’t take your eyes off the guy, and defenders logically have to know where he is at all times, which makes life for a guy like Kane a lot easier. If you’re concerned about who’s on the ice against McDavid – and you should be – then you have to be concerned with who goes out there when he’s on the bench, because you need certain people available at the right time. This isn’t a knock on Kane the player, who still has had to cash those chances in, and he has. (At least that effort is justified if you’re containing said star player, but it hasn’t been the case for the Flames to date.) So instead of just rolling four lines over the boards, you’re not putting your freshest guys out or the guys you want in specific zones, so much as you’re preparing for the McDavid minutes. They sagged off on rushes, and forced them to make plays above (or shoot through the D) rather than getting in foot races wide, which comes with keeping tighter neutral-zone gaps. Now, because of that, less attention would be going to combing through other game states – the penalty kill and power play, or low-zone defending, or something minute like defence against a set break out. They’d be showing video to the team, and talking about a plan to slow the man. The reasoning is simple: In a playoff series, the clock between one game ending at the next beginning is finite, and in that time – usually about 45 hours or so – you’ve gotta sleep twice, eat a half-dozen times and occasionally travel. If it feels like Connor McDavid is sucking up about half the oxygen in conversations about the Battle of Alberta, it’s because he should be. To do that accurately, you need to know who’s available to the other side. Great players do so much more to beat their opposition than what shows up on the highlights.

How to help the Oilers even when Connor McDavid isn't on the ice (Eminetra Canada)

Calgary Flames was the third best team in the NHL's regular season in terms of goals per game, averaging 2.5. Throughout the four games of the second round, ...

This is basically “how close the defender is to him when he stands across the arc without the ball, compared to when the defender is a random bench player.” His stronger gravity takes the team’s defenses a little out of shape. This doesn’t yet knock Kane on the player who needed to monetize those opportunities, and he does. But even when he’s on the bench, it’s worth noting that his influence is beyond his actual ice time, as he connects flames with all those ideal game plans. To do that exactly, you need to know who the other side can handle. So, as long as you’re not only rolling four lines on the board, but preparing for McDavid’s minutes, you won’t have the freshest people or the people you need in a particular zone. You need to be able to present this information to the player hours before the game. He takes you out of the game you want to play without having to walk around. They will show the team a video and talk about plans to slow down the guy. The coach needs to plan in the game how to go through the previous game, determine what happened, reach a conclusion, and adjust in time for the next game. Ideally, they will have this information ready the next day, so it won’t make a last-minute change to the player. I’ve been on the other side of greatness and have seen the distortions that those players can cause, even when they’re not on the link. If Connor McDavid feels like he’s inhaling about half of the oxygen in a conversation about the Battle of Alberta, that’s because he should be.

Oilers' Connor McDavid Compared to Gretzky, Lemieux as Playoff ... (Bleacher Report)

Connor McDavid will eventually need a Stanley Cup title to join the list of the all-time greats, and he took one step closer to accomplishing that feat with ...