The scary part- We still have a line that led the team in scoring last year that has 8 goals combined on it. Imagine what is going to happen when those goals start coming... yea, its scary, I know.
Lets look at what the Thrashers have accomplished in the first quarter of the season:
- An impressive 10-6-1 record that has them slotted in 9th in the easy with several games in hand. Thats a points percentage of .617. Which means if we keep this pace up the entire season, the boys in blue finish with an stounding 101 points.
- The PK is finally shutting down opposing Power Plays. Never once in my life did I ever think this organization could boast a PK unit in the top 10 in the league... never! We have and its actually sitting at number four right now
- Goals against is down under 3. That helps when you are scoring at an average of 3.65 goals per game.
- Amist all the goalie confusion and whether Kari Lehtonen is actually healthy, the duo of Pavalec and Hedberg has come on strong and given this team a huge boost.
Some other things that made this possible are the minds upstairs. Not sure whose idea it was to find Mr. Rick Dudley and hire him as the man that fills the holes in the organization, but who ever did deserves a serious pat on the back for that one. Some very shrewd decisions to bring in serious competition at all positions during training camp worked wonders and made all these guys realize that no ones job is safe (OK, Kovy's might be, but you get the idea).
The offseason might be one of the biggest reasons this team is doing so well. The Thrashers took chances on a few players that other teams had considered either not useful, or just not good enough. Turns out they are becoming the cornerstone of a winning franchise. The Trade to bring Kubina into Atlanta makes Waddell look like a genius (wow, I just said that, haha), and Brian Burke a rookie GM. The Big A (Nik Antropov) might not be scoring goals but he has let Afinagenov and Kovy run rampant on the wings and score at will.
The one glaring hole that we seem to never be able to shake is the shots against category. Now I understand that 30+ shots a game is a lot to ask a goalie to stop, but when I started looking into things a bit more I started to realize that most those shots aren't from "prime scoring areas". What I mean is, long shots from the points or on the boards that the goalie can see easily and handle easily. I can deal with that if the shot are coming from the outside, not like last year when Kari had developed a rap sheet for how many goals he stole from opposing forwards.
Thats just some thoughts on what has gone right as a team thus far. I could go on for days and days about individuals and what they have done, but another good man has already beaten me to it. Have a read.
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