The number one reason this team is going to be on the golf course next week is that there is not enough talent on the roster AND there is no real identity. That gets to roster construction.
After the Cup, we decided to place an emphasis on getting the defense to transition faster out of our own zone. The end result was that we may have improved in that area slightly, but we did so at the expense of the defense actually defending. From that we have not recovered.
I've heard the excuse that the talent pool available did not allow that transition to happen. That is probably true, but doesn't that get back to the question about why start a transition when the available talent can't be acquired to achieve it?
But, we don't have enough talent anywhere except in net.
As for the identity, when things aren't going well, good teams circle the wagons to what their strength/identity. For us during the Cup run, it was hard-nosed defense and taking advantage of whatever scoring opportunities we did manage to get. Case and point was game 7 of the finals, where we withstood Boston's first period onslaught, managed only 4 shots ourselves, and walked out of the period ahead 2-0. We do not have an identity to fall back on today, unless it is defensive breakdowns or playing down to the level of inferior competition.
When we go into coast mode, we just coast and almost randomly.
We are going to finish the season with upwards of 10 more points than we did last year. While that sounds like progress, it may be about the ceiling for the way this team is constructed. Just limiting the backdoor punch-in goals from awful to not good accounts for that.
It's no secret we need to get better across the board. Kyrou is not untouchable, but the problem is much bigger than just him or two or three other people not being the talk of the league. Isolating the problem to him is about like an airplane losing both engines and the pilots focusing on their altimeters being inconsistent.