Too many goose eggs have convinced Blackhawks coach Darryl Sutter not to put all his eggs in one basket.
In his latest experiment to inject life into his offense, Sutter split up center Jeremy Roenick and slumping right wing Joe Murphy Monday night against Ottawa. Christian Ruuttu centered for Murphy and the plan was for Ruuttu’s playmaking skills to get Murphy the puck more in prime attacking positions than Roenick does.
“If I can suck the defense to me,” Ruuttu said, “and pass Murph the puck as we come over the blue line, he should be able to use his skating ability to find the open spots.”
Sutter also was trying to counter Senators coach Rick Bowness with this new strategy. “Bowness played Mark Lamb 30 minutes Saturday night (a 3-3 tie with the Hawks) so he could keep him on Roenick. No forward has played that much against us this year and giving (Bowness) two scoring lines to think about is important, especially on the road (where Ottawa has the last line change).”
Left out: After making the critical turnover in last Thursday’s overtime that led to Detroit’s 4-3 victory, Michel Goulet felt Sutter’s wrath Monday. He scratched the veteran, saying he couldn’t believe Goulet had messed up an easy play in the Hawk zone that the Wings intercepted and Ray Sheppard scored on.
“Our left side has been awful,” Sutter said, speaking collectively of Goulet, Stephane Matteau and Patrick Poulin. Of the latter pair, Sutter added: “They both basically drive you crazy. I don’t know shift to shift, let alone game to game, which one of them I can play. Goulet was out there to end the Detroit game because I had to keep Steph and Patrick on the bench watching.”
Key twosome: Jocelyn Lemieux and Dirk Graham are third liners. But Sutter shudders to think where the Hawks would be without their first-rate efforts. “If they hadn’t played as well as they have, we’d be in a lot worse shape,” he said.
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