Power Play at the Center of Sharks' Downfall in 2016-17

SAN JOSE – There was an NHL coaching casualty on Monday on a team that flamed out in the first round.

No, it wasn't in San Jose. It was in Chicago, as the Blackhawks fired assistant coach Mike Kitchen, who was in charge of their penalty kill. Chicago, swept by Nashville despite finishing atop the Western Conference, finished 24th on the PK in the regular season.

When it comes to the Sharks' coaching staff, there's no doubt that head coach Pete DeBoer will return, but it's fair to wonder if assistant coach Steve Spott is feeling a little heat right now. The Sharks' power play, a primary focus of Spott's, finished just 25th in the NHL this season (16.7 percent) after it was third in the league in 2015-16 (22.5 percent).

When asked if the full Sharks' coaching staff would return next season, general manager Doug Wilson didn't offer anything definitive.

"I haven't sat down with them yet. I think they did an outstanding job," Wilson said. "You go through the last 12 months with a compressed schedule, very few practices, integrating players. I'm very pleased with their performance.

"I think there are things that they want to do better. We all have to take a look back and be honest, and say since we're not playing right now, what can we do better? I think that transparency and honesty is a really good part of this group. We'll do that in the next week."

And what was Wilson's perspective of the power play?

"It's got to be better. [The coaches] will tell you. …  It's not [always] the percentage or the number, it's when you score goals. We certainly have the talent, and historically we've done very well," Wilson said.

There was no part of the Sharks' game during the regular season and in the playoffs that was more baffling and frustrating than its performance with a man advantage. Last season's success seemed to bleed into October as the Sharks were running at a 24.1 percent rate through the first month of the 2016-17 season, but after November 1 and through the end of the season, the power play was a miserable 15.7 percent (34-for-217).

In the playoffs the Sharks were a more respectable 5-for-28, but even DeBoer called that misleading as four of those came in the 7-0 blowout in Game 4. They were 1-for-18 the rest of the series.

DeBoer, as the head coach, took responsibility for that part of the Sharks' game when asked how much the miserable power play grinded on Spott.

"It grinds on all of us," he said. "This isn't about Steve. The power play is not about Steve. The power play is about our whole staff. We sit on all those situations as a group, and I'm the ultimate guy responsible for all those things. 

"I think it ground on all of us. It didn't give us momentum, it didn't create momentum even when it wasn't scoring. That's what you want your power play to do, is at least give you some momentum that you're feeling good coming out of it. We didn't get that, so that's something that's right at the top of our list."

One baffling aspect of the power play is that the coaching staff hardly ever tried anything different with its units unless it was forced into it due to injury. Patrick Marleau was bumped from the top unit for a brief stretch in the middle of the season, but it didn't last very long.

The second unit generated just seven goals in the 82-game season, and none after Feb. 2 other than rookie Danny O'Regan's score in the final game when several Sharks regulars were resting.

One argument regarding the top unit is that it simply became too predictable. Joe Thornton could be counted on to pass, Brent Burns was going to shoot any chance he got, and Joe Pavelski would be hovering somewhere around the slot looking for a deflection.

Pavelski said: "There were times where maybe we rushed it, forced a few things. Definitely all year it could have been a little better, a little more of our identity and what it has been in the past. So, that's on us as players."

DeBoer said: "I think we got a little stagnant. I don't think we had as much motion as we usually have and as much movement, and that comes with some confidence. You lose confidence, you tend to stand still. That's something that we've got to get back."

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