Should The Avalanche Put Jonathan Drouin Back On Nathan MacKinnon’s Line?

There weren’t many negatives to take away from Game 1. Sure, the Avalanche probably should’ve hit the net a little more (I’m looking at you, Cale Makar). And yes, the Ross Colton injury isn’t ideal — albeit we aren’t yet sure if he’s going to miss time. Also, you probably would prefer to score on a lengthy 5-on-3 early in the game to truly set the tone.

But we’re basically nitpicking things from a 5-1 victory at this point.

The one other blemish from the game was a quiet night from the second line. Center Brock Nelson and wingers Jonathan Drouin and Valeri Nichushkin weren’t all that noticeable. And the numbers back it up.

According to Natural Stat Trick, Nathan MacKinnon, Artturi Lehkonen, and Martin Necas had a stellar Corsi For Percentage. They had 22 shot attempts for and only eight against in their 12:43 of ice time at 5-on-5.

The fourth line was incredible yet again, putting 11 shot attempts toward the goal while allowing only one — good for a 91.67 CF% in 5:49 of ice time.

But the second line finished at 48% — allowing 13 attempts while posting 12. It’s not a terrible number, but given how the other two lines looked, it was far behind. (The third line was harder to track because of Colton’s injury.)

Changing up the lines after a win isn’t always recommended. And I don’t think it’s going to happen to start Game 2. But if the game starts slow for the Avs, is it time to consider reuniting MacKinnon and Drouin?

When head coach Jared Bednar was experimenting with his lines late last month, I don’t think we ever ended up with the ideal setup before players started going down with injuries or rest. Initially, I was all for playing Nichushkin with MacKinnon and Necas. But Lehkonen was playing just fine on the top line.

I then thought maybe Drouin would be an option to replace Necas on that line, setting up Nelson with Nichushkin and Necas instead. But that trio also wasn’t all that great.

Would the best combination be to simply swap Lehkonen and Drouin? It’s tough to say. If so, it means MacKinnon wouldn’t have either of the two forechecking wingers on his line. But he’s got chemistry with Necas, and he’s got chemistry with Drouin. The three of them can give it a go.

It’s not that Lehkonen deserves to be demoted; it’s about finding a way to get the second line going. If Nelson gets both Nichushkin and Lehkonen on his wings, that could help distribute the production a bit more among the top two lines.

And if so, it would also put Drouin back where he’s most successful, playing on the wing with MacKinnon.

Bednar tried all of these combinations for this exact reason. He needed to know what works and what doesn’t in case he finds himself in a situation where a change needs to be made.

Again, there probably won’t be any changes to start Game 2. But if that second line doesn’t get going, and if that starts to hurt the Avs, then count me in on swapping Lehkonen and Drouin.

But hey, we could also see Nichushkin, Drouin, and Nelson dominate on Monday night, and things remain the same for the entire series. That’s the beauty of this team. Eventually, the talent will probably come through.

What say you?

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