TORONTO – “Take it one game at a time” may be the most clichéd phrase in sports.
Highly quotable hockey men Mike Babcock and Bruce Boudreau aren’t as prone to clichés. Sure, they may prepare game by game, but both head coaches divide their 82-game seasons into distinct, digestible — yet different — chunks.
That is why the Minnesota Wild clinging on to a 3-2 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs at Air Canada Centre Wednesday meant a little extra to both teams: not just a game but an entire segment was on the line.
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Let’s explain.
Babcock has broken his seasons down into five-game sets for years and it’s worked out well. His Detroit Red Wings qualified for the post-season for a decade straight, winning two Presidents’ trophies in the process.
“If you get six points in every five games, you get in the playoffs. Period,” Babcock says. “What I’ve found over the years, whether we’re winning 50 games in Detroit or here in Toronto, if you just stay focused on what you’re doing, things work out in the end.”
Problem is, the Wild were also zeroed in on their own smaller segment: seven days at a time.
“Our goal is to win the week all the time,” Boudreau says. “If you win more weeks than you lose, you’re usually going to be successful.”
Like Babcock’s method, Boudreau’s has served him well since he devised the concept “somewhere in Mississippi,” where he used to run the bench of the ECHL’s Sea Wolves.
The man may have been fired twice in the NHL, but he’s won his division eight out of possible nine times.
“Sometimes when you get down, and you’re, say, 10 points out [of the playoff race] and you say, ‘We’ve got to win 14 out of the next 18,’ it’s a daunting task and you don’t succeed,” Boudreau says. “But if you say you have to win two out of three every week, it makes it a lot easier mentally.”
Both coaches have gotten their troops to embrace their map to the playoffs wholly.
Wild veteran Zach Parise says Boudreau has even dangled a cancelled practice if they win the week.
So when a Mitch Marner forecheck forced a giveaway to Tyler Bozak, and Bozak undressed flat-footed Wild defenceman Matthew Dumba and roofed one past Devan Dubnyk in the second period to narrow the score to 3-2, the Leafs, with five points in four games, could smell a segment within grasp.
“I like it better,” Toronto’s Nazem Kadri says of his coach’s theory. “Especially for having such a young team, it helps us focus on just a few games at a time. To be honest, I don’t even know our schedule past those segments.”
They hammered the gas, outshooting the visitors by a comical 17-3 in the third period alone and out-attempting the Wild 87-41 in total.
Dubnyk — the league leader in save percentage, goals-against average, shutouts, and good feels — slammed the door for his fifth consecutive victory over his brother’s favourite team, and the Wild defeated Toronto for the seventh consecutive time since 2013.
“If he was in Toronto, there’d be no Carey Price,” Boudreau said post-game. “I’m just saying media-wise. He hasn’t allowed more than three goals in any game he’s played this year.”
Minnesota has already won the week. The Wild’s 4-3-2 unofficial weekly record puts them in a playoff position. Friday’s game versus Edmonton is a freebie, thanks to Dubnyk.
Last month, Boudreau half-jokingly said his team deploys four fourth lines. So we see a coach who once unleashed a run-and-gun style in Washington now battening the hatches and expecting his forwards to score off the cycle, like Eric Staal did in the second period by beating his man, Bozak, to fire his 30th career game-winner. Wednesday marked Minnesota’s 17th one-goal game this season.
“The more situations you can see like that, where it’s one goal and they’re coming, the calmer you’re going to be,” Dubnyk said after his 300th NHL game. “These ones feel extra good.”
As was the case in Vancouver Saturday, Toronto flashed the will to get off the mat but failed to pin their foe. The Leafs are now 0-6-1 when trailing after one period and 1-1-3 in Babcock’s five-game chunks (which are the rough equivalent of NFL weeks).
They’re also last in the Atlantic Division.
“You feel it, for sure. You are what you are. We were set up to win a segment here tonight. We didn’t do that,” said Babcock, noting the four quality chances his club surrendered. “We’d like to have 30 points right now after five segments. We have 25.”
This puts Toronto on pace for 82 points and another lottery ticket.
“I know Mike will try to say it’s still a process, but they’re getting there quicker than you think,” says Boudreau, an avid Leafs viewer. “By their own standards, they’re probably another year away, but that’s not my standards — that’s their standards.”
Babcock sees all the good — the offence creation, the improved special teams and work ethic, a steady Frederik Andersen. But, like a four-year-old with an ice cream cone, he hates dropping a chunk.
“We’ve hung in there just fine,” he says, “but we need to have a segment here coming up.”
The next five-game set begins Saturday in Boston.
“After that,” Kadri says, “I couldn’t tell ya.”
(chart via MoneyPuck.com)
