Laine calm, cool… and collecting goals

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This article was published 09/11/2016 (3254 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Patrik Laine’s pre-season was pretty quiet; he won’t argue the point.

But 11 goals in the first 14 regular-season games of his NHL career have exploded the theory advanced by some about the 18-year-old Finnish forward needing some seasoning with the AHL’s Manitoba Moose before he’d be able to contribute at the big-league level.

He’s the No. 1 goal scorer in the league at the moment.

“Yeah, I don’t wanna waste my goals in the pre-season, so I can score now,” Laine said almost matter-of-factly a day after completing his second career hat trick in Winnipeg’s 8-2 assault on the Dallas Stars Tuesday night.

“People can think it’s easy, and it looks easy — but everything looks easy when you know what you’re doing and when you’re good at it. But it’s hard, it’s the best league in the world. It’s not easy to score and you have to play well all the time.”

Laine, who has a mysterious ease about his game, is making the most of Jets head coach Paul Maurice’s decision to play him on a line with centre Mark Scheifele and left-winger Nikolaj Ehlers. The results have been nothing short of stunning. The trio combined for 10 points Tuesday and is expected to lead Winnipeg’s offensive attack tonight when the Jets play the Coyotes in Glendale, Ariz.

“I think we can improve our game a lot,” Laine said. “It’s just the second or third game as a line, so I think we can play a lot better than now, build a lot more chemistry between the three of us.”

Maurice expects the line to draw the Coyotes’ best defensive efforts, but he said he hasn’t noticed teams keying on the fresh-faced sniper. At least not yet.

“I think what you’ll start to see is they’ll become aware of him and start thinking differently about how you’re going to play against him,” Maurice said. “So I’m talking about, first it’ll be the left defenceman will know he’s out there and he gets that shot and where he likes to shoot from… They’re going to try to check that line for sure. We’re going to see their best.

“(Tuesday) night we decided they would play against (Tyler) Seguin and (Jamie) Benn, and that’s part of our development model here. That’s something they’re going to grow into.”

Laine has clearly learned quite a bit about the North American game in a short time, and has plans to expand his repertoire.

“I think I can score many different ways,” he said. “I can score (on a) wrister, slapshot, one-timer, tip-ins — it doesn’t matter. But I think I’ve changed now in these past few games. I want to be around the net more.”

Other changes are more subtle. Laine is also refining his game away from the puck.

“We found what most Finnish players will do is always curl to the inside of the ice and they’ll never chase a check, never finish a route to finish a check,” explained Maurice. “He’s not chasing it but… he’s learned that the style of game is different because of the age of the men, the speed of the men. The skill level of the men but also the shape of the ice.

“So he’s… fairly quickly adapting to the size of the rink. You’re seeing him be more physical. It’s just a decision to take a straight line… as he gets more comfortable with the systems and the game itself, he’ll become more efficient.”

Maurice does not want to interfere with development, and so there will be no information overload. He wants Laine, an intuitive player, to learn from his mistakes.

“I’ve under-coached this man,” said Maurice. “We’ve not really had a conversation about what he does with the puck, and that includes turnovers. He will process so much more, those kind of players (do), through experience.”

Does the rookie understand the significance of what he has accomplished so early in his career?

“I hope not,” Maurice said. “You know, come out and play, enjoy the game and don’t get too caught up in the success you’ve had, but feel good about it. I think he’s got a very even keel… he’s a really competitive guy. When it’s not going, he gets a little snarly, which we like. I don’t get any sense of surprise from him.”

mike.sawatzky@freepress.mb.caTwitter: @sawa14