Mantha's 4 Goal Game 10/06/19

[Brewin Flames]

 

[yave1964]

Man his confidence level is through the roof right now.

 

  @SpikeDDS and I have both railed against Coach Blashill for years, Mantha has been his whipping boy for his poor defensive play and his offensive zone time has been limited. It is so nice to see Mantha finally with the training wheels off and the big line of Larkin, Mantha and Bertuzzi is clicking as well as any in the game. Two wins to start the year without Athanasiou in th lineup both against very god playoff teams from a year ago, that is a lot better than last season when we were more or less eliminated by the first of November.

[SpikeDDS]

This was a very entertaining hockey game!

 

The Wings came out flat. The Stars took advantage. Seguin totally undressed Larkin getting around him to score his goal, and Larkin knew it!

 

And you think back to last season. One of two things usually happens: Either the team stops playing at all, and we end up with  7-1 loss, or Dylan Larkin puts the team on his back and we make a go of it.

 

Neither of those two things happened.

 

Instead, Anthony Mantha put the team on his back, and we made a go of it! And what a go!

 

For whatever reason, Mantha had time and space in this game. Even his third, rebound goal, no one touched him but the goalie. I’m not sure that it was all Mantha creating that time and space. I think Dallas didn’t play him tight enough. But Mantha made the most of what he was given.

 

He really does look like an elite player right now. His second goal—like his goal against the Preds the night before—was a statement goal, announcing his arrival. They are goals of will, borne from talent.

 

But I will say this—the Larkin Line is going to get its goals, they are going to score. The question for this team is where is the secondary scoring going to come from? Eventually, opponents will adapt and put their elite shutdown lines up against them. They may not stop them completely, but this line won’t be scoring 4 goals per game every game. Who else is going to step up? Hopefully, when AA returns, his line will answer that question in part. But with the level of D we have, if we want a chance to compete, we will need consistent scoring from people other than the top-4. So far, of our 9 goals, Glendening’s is the only secondary goal.

 

But yeah, we ride Anthony Martha’s wave as far as it goes. Hopefully, if teams try to crowd Mantha, it just opens up space for Larkin to create.

 

Oh, and I really like Hirose on the PP. The feed to Mantha on his first goal was his signature. I REALLY like his play. I am a quick fan of this kid. He is the kind of secondary player we need. He keeps going like he is, and continues to grow and improve, I’ll soon be saying top-5, not top-4. But I’m hoping he turns out to be more than a Fillpula. He needs to shoot sometimes. 
 

Bernier looked bad on the first goal. He got better and better as the game progressed, with a huge set of saves as the clock wound down. Good to see him play better, and good to see the team rally and support him with scoring.

 

This was, indeed, a good win for the Red Wings.