It doesn't matter which side of the river's newspaper you subscribe to, the message from Yeo is the same. He's displeased with his players for not coming to the rink ready to play for the full 60 minutes. Gee, it only took Yeo six games into his first NHL coaching stint to figure that out. Todd Richards was either clueless for two full seasons or just never wanted to acknowledge the gorilla in the room, even while it was breathing down his neck. I said this the last two seasons but here goes again:
The problem is in the locker room and it's not with any of the newer players.
Now it appears that Yeo, Russo and even some of the players are saying it out loud. Excerpt from Russo's Rants after the loss to Pittsburgh:
"The flat start better sound off alarm bells. Coach Mike Yeo said it was on him, but baloney. As Devin Setoguchi said, it's on the players to come out jacked, it's on the leadership corps"
Problem is the Wild was playing at home, and its objective is to make Xcel Energy Center a tough arena to play in again for the visitor. It certainly wasn't that way tonight.
That's why the media was awkwardly ushered out of the locker room after the game because of a short team meeting that would follow.
There was just little sense of urgency in the first period, and certainly not that assertive, aggressive, fast hockey Yeo expects to see."
Yeo broke up Setoguchi-Mikko Koivu-Dany Heatley to start the second. The line has no even-strength goals the past five games -- scoring one power-play goal in Ottawa. Heatley's chances are getting fewer and fewer, and tonight, he had one shot and two missed nets. Setoguchi tried to force him the puck a few times in the first, and it didn't work.
And Koivu? No goals and three assists and a .495 faceoff win percentage and a lot of turnovers in six games for the $6.75 million captain.
On one of the goals, Niklas Backstrom gave up a cheesy one to James Neal.
Tonight, the Penguins were minus five or six of their big players, including Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang. Marc-Andre Fleury was a spectator. And the Wild still didn't come out with the urgency needed to beat a team this prime for the kicking.
There were plenty of WTF moves made by any number of Wild players in Tuesday night's game so don't be thinkin' I'm all hatin' on just Koivu, Heatley and Backstrom.
There were also some things to be happy with: Bulmer's working his butt off to show he belongs here for yet another game. Clutterbuck seems to be on track to being his old self: nagging pain in the opponent's sides and scoring goals when nobody's lookin'. Colton looked good out there and you just can't help but be proud of how he's handled his situation in getting here. Powe continues to impress and Cullen seems to be in "message received" mode like Latendresse.
Yeo's comments on Wednesday after practice, courtesy of Russo's Rants (can you find the football reference Youngblood mistakenly uses?):
After this loss, Yeo wasn't so pleased with his team's effort, describing the way they began the first quarter as "sleepwalking."
As for the lapses the team displayed at different points in the game? "For me, effort is a lot more than skating in a straight line," Yeo said. "It's the second effort, and third effort you show me. If you're on a forecheck and they move the puck somewhere else, do you say, 'My job is done now?' Or do you stay on the hunt, keep pursuing and keep tracking, do whatever you can to create a turnover? It's jumping on a loose puck and taking a hit to make a play. it's making a hard play, winning your one-on-one battles. And I don't think it was at the level that we needed last night."
Fairly strong words, I'd say. Perhaps more interesting was the Yeo went on to say he expected these lapses early in the season. Yeo feels he is trying to change the culture of the team, and knows it doesn't happen overnight. I'll write more about this later, but he was quite specific about the issue. "To think you can come in and flip a switch? It doesn't happen," he said. "You're changing habits. We're asking a lot. But that kind of stuff, more than anything, takes time. But it will come. I know that. I know it."
And like Russo said the night before: BALONEY!!
Changing Habits?? What, asking a player to go from not earning his paycheck to coming to the rink prepared to skate hard for 60 minutes is a culture change? It's called an ETHIC and why on earth should Yeo feel like that's his responsibility to change and that he's asking a lot of these guys?
Good Lord - just do it like you did with Latendresse. Apparently he got the message: "Get yourself in shape or spend the next season in the press box waiting to be traded for a bag of used pucks. Your shit from last season ain't gonna fly going forward." Gui did just that and is working his ass off to show he's worth the paycheck - so far.
Why on earth should Yeo (or the GM or the owner, for that matter) feel they have to handle these players like they're being asked to sacrifice their very lives?
It's a shame that nobody's addressed this before the second coach in three seasons got here. Now the question is: Can Yeo do something about it? Will he have the support of the GM and owner to do whatever that something is?
Makeup!!
Note to Wild photographer: Please work some photoshop magic on Matt Cullen's head shot for the jumbotron starting line up announcement. Lord, he looks like a tired washed-up old man in that shot. Not intimidating or fierce at all.
And Now For Some Ornithology
What the hell does this have to do with hockey? Thanks to the mostly entertaining but sometimes obnoxiously drunk Penguins fans sitting behind us, it has everything to do with hockey.
Drunk Guy 1: What's a Wild?
Drunk Guy 2: I dunno...but I think it trumps a bird
Drunk Guy 1: Bird? Who's the Bird?
Drunk Guy 2: The Penguns, Dude!
DG1: Ohhh...Are Penguins a bird?
DG2: I think so...lemme think about this...
DG1: Okay, so there's like eagles and hawks and the ones that fly...what's next?
DG2: Then there'd be the ducks cuz they can fly and swim.
DG1: The and chickens and the penguins would come after that.
DG2: Yeah, cuz chickens can fly and penguins can't so they'd come last.
Dee and Vicki: WTF are they talking about??
Dave: Actually, it sounds like a good stab at the order of things (says this with mostly a straight face)
Dee, Vicki and Alex: Rolling off our seats with laughter and wiping tears from our eyes.
This turned out to be the highlight of the night since the game had already gone to hell in a hand basket.
And just for giggles - turns out the drunk Pens fans weren't too far off the mark. Here's the actual order of the Subclass Neornithes, Superorder Neognathae:
- Anseriformes—waterfowl (ducks)
- Galliformes—fowl (chickens)
- Charadriiformes—gulls, button-quails, plovers and allies
- Gaviiformes—loons
- Podicipediformes—grebes
- Procellariiformes—albatrosses, petrels, and allies
- Sphenisciformes—penguins (who knew?)
- Pelecaniformes—pelicans and allies
- Phaethontiformes—tropicbirds
- Ciconiiformes—storks and allies
- Cathartiformes—New World vultures
- Phoenicopteriformes—flamingos
- Falconiformes—falcons, eagles, hawks and allies (they got this one wrong)
- Gruiformes—cranes and allies
- Pteroclidiformes—sandgrouse
- Columbiformes—doves and pigeons
- Psittaciformes—parrots and allies
- Cuculiformes—cuckoos and turacos
- Opisthocomiformes—hoatzin
- Strigiformes—owls
- Caprimulgiformes—nightjars and allies
- Apodiformes—swifts and hummingbirds
- Coraciiformes—kingfishers and allies
- Piciformes—woodpeckers and allies
- Trogoniformes—trogons
- Coliiformes—mousebirds
- Passeriformes—passerines
Because it wouldn't be an Ornithology lesson without this video:
And of course there's this little ditty...
