Ben Shelley: Lukas Dostal and improved power play lead Ducks to win over Islanders

It was a good win. They played together and beat a veteran team. The Islanders skated well and shot 40 shots. But it was a bunch of low quality shots. I much preferred the 28 shots the Ducks did because they moved the puck around their own offensive much better. And in doing that they created better shot quality. Maybe the score was a little low. But in a 82 game season you just need to gets wins however you can. Not all of them are gonna be petty.

5 man unit … check..
defensive help & support .. check
Transition game … check
Dostal … check x 10 😋😋😋🤗🤗🤗🤗

Take this game to Pittsburgh and we come home happy…

5 man unit … check..
defensive help & support .. check
Transition game … check
Dostal … check x 10 😋😋😋🤗🤗🤗🤗

Take this game to Pittsburgh and we come home happy…
- dozerD10

Dostal was great. Defensively Anaheim looks better than maybe only Montreal. Even Pittsburgh looks stout compared to them and they suck defensively.

Dostal was great. Defensively Anaheim looks better than maybe only Montreal. Even Pittsburgh looks stout compared to them and they suck defensively.
- jfkst1

Your idea of defense is weird. Dostal had a .904 save percentage last year. All the sudden the Ducks start playing better defense and Dostal turns to a .943 Save percentage. The Difference between those two stat lines is because the Ducks are playing better defense. You Analitics types get too wrapped up in shot totals. Not one of you ever realizes that not ever shot is equal. Some are better than others. Like the 40 shots the Penguins shot. Most Dostal saw. The Penguins didn't complete any cross ice passes. The two goals Crosby scored were high skilled. A redirect that got buy Dostal 5 hole and a turnover in overtime. But the other 39 the Ducks played well.

Your idea of defense is weird. Dostal had a .904 save percentage last year. All the sudden the Ducks start playing better defense and Dostal turns to a .943 Save percentage. The Difference between those two stat lines is because the Ducks are playing better defense. You Analitics types get too wrapped up in shot totals. Not one of you ever realizes that not ever shot is equal. Some are better than others. Like the 40 shots the Penguins shot. Most Dostal saw. The Penguins didn't complete any cross ice passes. The two goals Crosby scored were high skilled. A redirect that got buy Dostal 5 hole and a turnover in overtime. But the other 39 the Ducks played well.
- Eman87654

Cronin still needs to go... Again the boy were not prepared to start a game... and the Pens did have some real good looks in the 1st even though we led.

Our game got better as we went along but - we simply cannot score goals and counting on Lukas to bail us out everynight is not sustainable..

Does anyone really believe that Dostal will lead the league in SV% for the entire season? The defense is doing a better job keeping the puck out of high danger zones and cleaning up the occasional rebound, but I don’t think a .943 Sv% is sustainable. And without that, this is still a bad team, like maybe 2-8 instead of 4-4-2.

There are a few bright spots - Terry off to a great start, the Z-Cutter pairing producing good scoring chances - but offensively this often looks like a team without a plan, and it feels like the first 10 games are a bit of a mirage.

Does anyone really believe that Dostal will lead the league in SV% for the entire season? The defense is doing a better job keeping the puck out of high danger zones and cleaning up the occasional rebound, but I don’t think a .943 Sv% is sustainable. And without that, this is still a bad team, like maybe 2-8 instead of 4-4-2.

There are a few bright spots - Terry off to a great start, the Z-Cutter pairing producing good scoring chances - but offensively this often looks like a team without a plan, and it feels like the first 10 games are a bit of a mirage.
- hardenx

The D should be better once Cronin pulls his head out and sits Cam and puts Tristan back in... The F in the D zone need to be stronger on Wall battles and quicker to the half wall on rim arounds ... the Pens were killing us with that last night... also we need to be more precise on breakout passes - We have made some strides in the zone though...

We still have been a bit snake bit on scoring.. lots of posts and just misses.. that I think will balance out as the year goes along. Finding a good RW for Z and Cutter needs to be a priority...I was screaming for Taffoli all summer... the guy would have been perfect... Another complete miss from Verbeek.. so we get Fabbri..

Cronin still needs to go... Again the boy were not prepared to start a game... and the Pens did have some real good looks in the 1st even though we led.

Our game got better as we went along but - we simply cannot score goals and counting on Lukas to bail us out everynight is not sustainable..
- dozerD10

Yeah the 1st period was slow for the Ducks. But it was the 4th game of a road trip. And the 2nd and 3rd were better. I mean as far as conditioning goes, I'm more concerned about the game in new jersey.

Yeah the 1st period was slow for the Ducks. But it was the 4th game of a road trip. And the 2nd and 3rd were better. I mean as far as conditioning goes, I'm more concerned about the game in new jersey.
- Eman87654

That Jersey game was complete no show...

This was a very winnable game... and if Lukas is going to continue to be lights out.. we need to take advantage - The Pens are terrible. And we should have lit them up.

We get the Hawks on a B2B and I'll be looking forward to much better results this yr on B2B than the last couple...