LAK at 7 - Now for Something Completely Different — The Fourth Period

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• News post

• Dennis Bernstein

Two weeks into the NHL 2022-23 season, scoring continues an upward climb – teams are registering over six and a half goals per game, an increasing trend over the past five seasons.

• Kevin Fiala
• Brandt Clarke
• Matt Roy
• Alex Iafallo
• Phillip Danault
• Anze Kopitar
• Blake Lizotte
• Adrian Kempe
• Brendan Lemieux
• Carl Grundstrom

• Rob Blake

# Drew Doughty

That’s what we’re supposed to do, we’re supposed to defend the other team. We’re supposed to be more offensive, but we need to get back and play better defense. It’s easy to balance the two (the offensive push and defensive responsibility) out. Don’t take high risks, make the right play at the right time when you can jump into the offense you do it, but you just can’t create offense from nothing. If you (the defensemen) do things the right way, the points will come your way.

It’s not all on the defense, I’ll tell you that much. We need more support, we want to be more aggressive on the forecheck with the defense and in turn, the forwards have to support us. They do 80 percent of the time, but the other 20 percent is catching us right now. We were watching clips of the Pittsburgh game (a 7-1 rout by the Penguins) and the decisions we’re making offensively are affecting us defensively. That game got out of hand so maybe that why it was happening, but it was happening way too often. We were losing guys, 3-on-2 against, breakaways, 2-on-1’s. If we want to be more aggressive, we need more coverage and be smarter with our aggression.