New Hands on the Wheel

I was talking to my dad yesterday, naturally, and he clued me in to the fact that the Sharks had finally settled on Todd McLellan, formerly an assistant coach for the Stanley Cup-winning Detroit Red Wings, as their new head coach. McLellan hasn’t been a head coach in the NHL before, but he’s had success in the AHL and, obviously, under Babcock in the NHL. He seems to be focused on defense, power plays and puck possession. Aside from possession which the Sharks already professed to concentrate on under Ron Wilson, those are traits that the Sharks could have used a lot more of in the last few postseasons.

Perhaps I’m still sipping the teal Kool-Aid but I’m optimistic. I’ve said for a couple of years that the Sharks have the talent (mostly attributed to Doug Wilson) to go very, very deep into the playoffs but they seem to lack a particular spark to make them take advantage of that and I put the responsibility behind the bench. I hope I’m right and McLellan can be the guy to push the gang that extra step they need to make a real run at the Cup.

In other related news, Nabokov got robbed of the Vezina by Martin Brodeur. I can’t help but point out that Nabby had almost universally better stats, especially where it counts (W) although I guess the voters were impressed with the Devils’ ability to give up more shots.

For a minute there I was starting to think there was no East Coast bias. I guess we dodged that bullet.

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