A Touch of Iginla

 

There’s been plenty of talk this year about the level of effectiveness, or lack thereof, that we’ve seen from Jarome Iginla through the first six weeks of the season. The captain is wallowing in the depths thus far, with 9 points in 17 games, and a scruffy looking -10 next to his name. The underlying numbers aren’t any source of comfort either, as Iginla has been outshot thus far against middling comp with a neutral ZS %.

With that noted, it seemed like a worthwhile plan to watch Jarome even more carefully than usual to see what exactly was happening. I reviewed the video of last Friday’s game against the Hawks, collecting data showing every touch Jarome had in the game, along with a few items of interest added for illuminative purposes. 

Before we get into the meat of it, a bit of an explainer is in order. I think the OZ, DZ, NZ acronyms should be clear enough, as well as the RW/LW and F/O stuff. I’ve just used the player numbers generally for the sake of brevity, since typing Bouwmeester a dozen times was just more than anyone should have to bear, but on the off-chance you aren’t clear on the Hawks, 2 is Keith, 4 is Hjalmarsson, 7 is Seabrook, 8 is Leddy, 19 is Toews, 81 is Hossa, 88 is Kane and 10 is Sharp.

Let’s look at what we have, then:

 

 

Jarome had three shifts where his activity caused some action in Chicago’s end. Emery made a good save off of him at 02:40, but the rebound allowed Backlund to have three attempts from the doorstep. At 09:41, he went hard after the puck behind the Hawk net, forcing Hjalmarsson into a penalty, and the rush at 15:00 was a good one, with speed carried from the neutral zone to the off-wing. Good period for Jarome’s line in general, and Backlund looked sharp in his first game. 

 

 

Again, Jarome was decent in the second period. His sharp pass at center ice at 03:37 got the Flames a good entry into the zone, but Backlund’s return pass was a couple of feet behind him. At 15:09, he, Backlund and Tanguay made a good rush, and Iginla’s pass had Backlund in a good spot. Backlund likely should have finished that play. Iginla also made a fine play to Tanguay at 18:02, and he made a good play in tight quarters to Moss about a minute later that set up a very good chance from about 4 feet out.

Two plays that gave me a bit of pause were when Seabrook and Hossa easily out-muscled him for pucks in the Chicago zone. Those guys are very good, but Jarome still needs to make physical plays as a matter of routine if he’s going to be effective, and he was dusted off pretty handily on those two occasions.

 

 

With the Flames chasing the game in the third, Jarome had 9 shifts, but other than the Backlund shot at 02:49 and his own good chance from the left dot at 07:02, the period was fairly quiet for Iginla and his mates. He didn’t get much help from Tanguay, who struggled in the period with a penalty and some questionable OZ play. Backlund was pretty good right up until he fell asleep on the Stalberg goal, but that goal obviously finished the affair for Calgary.

One thing that really stood out in the third was the way Duncan Keith picked up his play head to head versus Iginla. I’ve spent the last few years noting it, but Keith is, in my view, the most effective individual defender in the league against Jarome. He’s incredibly aggresive in the neutral zone and the Hawk line, getting right up against Iginla, which takes away Jarome’s ability to enter the zone with any pace at all. Keith isn’t overpowering by any means, but he’s very quick to the puck, and very effective at taking away any space for the Flames to operate. Hossa was good as well playing the left side against Iginla, and his strength as a two way player was a boon when facing 12.

Something else that seemed fairly clear was that the Flames’ breakout in this game utilized Jarome as an outlet on a regular basis. The Flames used Bouwmeester and Butler behind that line much of the night, and the duo were solid, routinely finding Iginla on the wing to allow the Flames easy exit of the zone. It was fairly obvious that Kane and Sharp were a much bigger menace on the cycle going head to head with Gio and Hannan. 

In all, Jarome’s line played decently against Toews and Hossa, battling them to a draw until the late goal. Iginla himself was quite good in the main, with very few poor decisions or turnovers on a night where he had the puck quite a bit. If he played that way every game, I suspect that the results would start to fall into place in short order, but as we saw on Tuesday against the Senators, that type of performance isn’t always a lock.