Winless Blazers working on power play, happy with job penalty kill has done

The biggest missed opportunity was in Portland on Sunday when the Blazers went just 1-for-7 on the power play. Clouston says if the team can get more shots on net, they can create chances from there.

“A couple passes, get it to the net and get guys going there,” he said. “If we become a little bit more dangerous off the shot, then seams and different plays will start opening up. Get the puck in the zone, get it set up. A couple quick passes, looking for a shot, and with traffic going to the net.”

The Blazers, however, aren’t panicking about their 13 per cent rating on the power play, and nor should they. It’s only three games into the season.

On the flip side, the team’s penalty kill has arguably kept the games close. Kamloops has killed off eight of nine power plays against, only giving up a goal in the 4-3 loss to the Winterhawks. The Blazers held an offensively-gifted Chiefs team off the scoresheet on six man-advantage opporunties that spanned 15 minutes.

“One of our goals is to try to be a disciplined team, so obviously we didn’t really hit that this weekend,” said goaltender Dylan Garand. “But to take a positive out of it, we definitely had a good PK. I think we’re committed hard to being structured on the PK and I think it’s really benefitted us.”

Clouston added, “We’ve had some real good structure there. That needs to continue to have success. So we’ve done a good job with our neutral zone, we’ve made teams dump pucks, so we’ve done a good job confronting their entries.”

Clouston would ultimately like to see his team take that same structure and effort from the penalty kill to 5-on-5 play.

“One of the things we’ve shared with the players is if it works really well with 4 vs. 5, then we have to have that same mentality 5 vs. 5,” said Clouston. “Coming back and when we’re in the D zone, committing to that defense-first mentality: shutting our opponent down, being in the right spot, working as a group, and then when it’s time to go on offense, then we’re connected and we can take off together.”

by Chad Klassen

Winless Blazers working on power play, happy with job penalty kill has done

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