It’s hard to believe the preseason is almost finished.
The Blue Jackets have just three tune-up games left, and while captain Nick Foligno is ready for the real deal, he understands its importance in getting everyone prepared for the season ahead.
“I think you can start to see it, I mean these past few games have obviously been a little disappointing, just the way the results have gone, but were all competitive.”
The Blue Jackets lost their last three games by a combined score of 15-4. It’s only preseason, but you never want to see Sergei Bobrovsky give up five goals like he did against the Blues on Sunday afternoon. The Jackets had plenty of regulars in the lineup but were only able to get one goal past Ville Husso.
“I don’t think you can lose sight of the fact that we’re just going through camp here. No one is panicking at all. You want to feel good about your game and I don’t think the past couple we have played very well, a lot of things factored into that, but we know we need to be better and once we start getting more with each other especially as lines and get comfortable again and there’s always that period of time where you need to break in, and we’ll hopefully get that going here for the next couple of games.”
The team not winning is one thing, but they aren’t playing well in these losses either – which is slightly concerning. The Jackets have had a 50% Corsi or better just once this preseason; with the team cutting 24 players yesterday, we should start to see a roster that is going to resemble the opening night lineup from here on in.
Now is the time to try different line combinations and see what clicks.
One thing benefitting the Jackets this season is that they haven’t had much roster turnover. Cam Atkinson talked about this at media day and it’s something Foligno mentioned as well, with regards to team chemistry.
“I think as you go here and keep that core together for a while you want to get with that core as fast as possible. Early on, start of camp, it’s every man for himself mentality because you are trying to make the team, testing, and it’s a good thing, you get some competitiveness going. But then you want to get with your team once you get through that and start working together and what you’re going to be pushing towards in the season. I think we’re all looking forward to that being now. It was really fun to be out there today with everybody and see where things are shaping up and then get those roles defined. I think that’s important, too, as a team you get that cohesiveness because everyone knows what job they’re going to be doing and then you just start working at that.”
For the first time in a couple years, the Jackets don’t have a new big-time player at camp. Last season it was Artemi Panarin and Pierre-Luc Dubois. The year prior you had Seth Jones in his first training camp, plus the addition of Zach Werenski. These are top line players that can change a team, but this offseason, there has been little of that. The new additions are depth players, so the core roster doesn’t need to worry about their role or losing ice time. They can focus on themselves and getting ready for the season, which should do the team well as it tries to work out the kinks over the next week.
