Arizona Coyotes’ New Years Resolutions

More Playing Time For Young Guns

The Arizona Coyotes best days are certainly ahead of them.

Widely considered to have one of the best prospect pools in the league, a lot of those key players have already arrived in the NHL.

That list includes Max Domi, Anthony Duclair, Christian Dvorak, Brendan Perlini, Lawson Crouse, and Jakob Chychrun. All figure to be important pieces going forward.

So why, then, have aging veterans consistently been given more ice time than most of these players? Apart from Domi, each of the forwards mentioned has played less than Holland, Doan, Richardson, Vrbata, and Hanzal.

As for Chychrun, only Connauton (now in the AHL) and Schenn have averaged fewer minutes this year. The gap between him and the next most played defenseman is a full three minutes.

Playing the veterans more is clearly a strategy to win games. For example, Hanzal is the most experienced center and wins faceoffs while Vrbata leads the team in scoring.

11-21-5 is not a winning record, however.

The Coyotes have nothing to lose and everything to gain by playing the young guns more. Playoffs are out of the question at this point, so the priority needs to shift to giving the future core of this team as many quality minutes as possible.

And who knows? Maybe that recipe will lead to more wins.