The Utah Hockey Club has been struggling since racing out of the gate and winning four of its first six games of the season. It has now lost seven of its last nine games, and head coach Andre Tourigny has struggled to find a lineup that can perform consistently.
Tourigny’s job has been challenging dealing with injuries, and by no means is this a piece directed towards him. Tourigny is in his fourth season coaching this team; the first three were under the Arizona Coyotes. In those three campaigns, Tourigny helped improve this team’s point percentage. However, you can tell he is desperately searching for a recipe that will yield more consistent results.
Related: Utah’s Inconsistent Play Leads to Loss to Predators
In this search for consistency, we have seen good things from some of Utah’s new line combinations, but at the same time, it has resulted in two players being underutilized who were off to great starts to the season. Those two are Barrett Hayton, who has been playing on the third line the past two games, and Josh Doan, who was sent down to the American Hockey League’s (AHL) Tuscon Roadrunners after nine games with Utah to start the season.
The Case for Combining Barrett Hayton and Utah Hockey Club’s Premier Playmakers
Hayton started the season on the top line with Clayton Keller and Nick Schmaltz and scored six points in Utah’s first five games. Since then, he has only recorded two points in his last 10 games as he has bounced around the second and third lines with various wingers. It has now reached a point where Hayton has only played just over 12 minutes in each of Utah’s last two games despite averaging 16:38 minutes per game this season.
Hayton has great offensive numbers: he is fourth in the NHL in expected goals, 16th in scoring chances, and 10th in high-danger chances at five-on-five. However, he is not a guy who is creating these chances on his own. Hayton is an excellent player off the puck; he finds open space in high-danger areas but is reliant on playing with linemates who can make those passes in front of the net. That is why he had so much success with Keller and Schmaltz, two great passers at the start of the season.
In addition to producing offensive chances at a borderline elite rate to start the season, he is limiting chances at the other end, and overall, Utah has been dominant statistically at five-on-five….
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at The Hockey Writers…