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Friday, October 22, 1999
Guilty!
Iginla admits his poor play costing team
Disinterested. Embarrassing. Lazy. Uncommitted ...
Brian Sutter has named them all. Challenged them publicly, and embarrassed them with his biting criticism.
And the players' response?
"Brian is totally right," deadpanned Jarome Iginla.
The truth of their coach's criticism is as obvious as the one-win-in-eight-game record the Calgary Flames take into tonight's game with the NHL's hottest team -- the Florida Panthers.
Iginla is just one of the guilty parties.
But for Iginla, there will be no Johnnie Cochran-inspired defence.
He pleads guilty.
The punishment -- another losing season, another missed playoffs. Unless this team can find a way to commute the sentence.
The problem is that no one, including Iginla, has demonstrated an ability to atone for their crimes on the ice.
"As a team, we are just not playing good at all," admits Iginla, who held out for the first three games in a contract dispute.
Some have suggested that holdout has now lasted eight games.
"I think five games is plenty for me to get going," admitted Iginla.
"I'm definitely not playing as well as I'd like. I'm not doing much out there. I have to be a lot better.
"There isn't more pressure from the contract but going into my fourth year in the league, it's time to make more of a difference every night, to produce numbers. But I want to be able to be out there in meaningful defensive situations as well.
"I have to take my game to the next level, because I'm not in those situations. I have to find ways so the coach wants me out there."
The immediate conclusion is that Iginla and the Flames are not good enough. But that's not necessarily true.
Virtually this same lineup proved in the second half of last season that hard work, a disciplined team game and a commitment, night in, night out, was enough to be competitive.
"We have the tools to be a good team and competitive and be a playoff team, but right now we're not," said Iginla.
"We have Fuhr and Freddie back there who are great goaltenders and doing their job giving us a chance to win every night, and we are not helping them at all.
"We're not playing defence. We're a team who can't give up four goals a night or we're not going to win.
"Obviously we need to score more, but in doing that we aren't going to win 6-5."
The problem could also lie elsewhere. There comes a point on many teams when a coach's mantra becomes stale. Teams can quit on coaches when they no longer believe in them.
Has Sutter's act worn thin?
"We do still believe," said Iginla, one of a few players often criticized by the coach.
"We realize how it must be so tough on Brian because we were doing a lot of good things the last half of last season. I think the big part of why we were finding more success was that we were a hard team to play against.
"You hear that a lot from Brian and that's part of what we aren't this year. When you play good defence and are aggressive and a real pain for teams, then if you catch a team that doesn't really feel like playing that day ...
"Well, this year, we have to pick up our intensity and get the buzz going again.
"We have to find ways to frustrate the other teams."
If there is a positive this club can take out of their humiliating 7-1 loss in St. Louis, it is that finally all the crutches supporting this team have been kicked out.
There are no excuses left. This team is playing horrible.
"Those games are big wakeup calls," said Iginla.
"When you lose by one goal, you might think it was a game you could have had but for a break or two. This way, we realize things have to change and it's not close.
"It's not for one or two breaks that we are losing. It's our whole game. Sometimes you hate to lose like that, but it is definitely more of a realization than losing eight games by one goal.
"This forces you to get back into it and to realize you have to change things around right away."
That change has come in each of the past couple years, but it has been too little, too late to earn a playoff spot.
This is a tired script that needs to be changed.
Or perhaps, it requires a change in the cast of players, coaches, and management.
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