Playing a disciplined defensive system as the Los Angeles Kings did thispast season allowed them to win the Stanley Cup by beating the best NHL teams with more skill, speed and scoring depth.

Notably, 1^st seed Vancouver Canucks, 2^nd seed St. Louis Blues, 3^rd seed Phoenix Coyotes and the best from the east the New Jersey Devils.

Darryl Sutter and his coaching staff did a masterful job of fine tuning their current defensive system by convincing their big, aggressive, and physical forechecking forwards to finish their checks and wear down the opposition to create loose pucks. It worked like a charm.

This combined with their defencemen’s good defensive play of breaking uprushes at the blue line, retrieving loose pucks in the corner and covering open men in front of their net, then capitalizing on the oppositions mistakes, they scored on their limited scoring opportunities allowing them to win most games.

It also helped to have Jonathan Quick in goal to make key saves at the right time and to have Drew Doughty on defence leading rushes like a young Bobby Orr.

Coach Sutter: Did not match forward lines but used all 4 lines at different times of the game. He did use specific defencemen against the 2 top offensive Devil players.

He had his entire team play aggressively by finishing their checks.

And he had forwards screening the goalie when shots were generated from the point and jumping on any loose rebounds.

You as a coach can do the same thing this season.

Study your team’s strengths and weaknesses.

Analyze the opposition, develop a game plan to be competitive - then execute.

John Shorey

Author – “Hockey Made Easy”