Sign of things to come?

[smelly]

AHL to test revisions in ice markings

TSN.ca Staff

12/17/2003

American Hockey League President and CEO David Andrews announced Wednesday that the AHL, at the request of the National Hockey League, will carry out a limited test involving revisions to the neutral-zone ice markings, in an effort to evaluate the impact of an enlarged neutral zone on the offensive flow of the game.

The test will comprise adding two feet of width to each blue line beginning at the leading edge of the line in the attacking zone, and adding one foot to either side of the leading edges of the center red line.

For the purpose of determining a two-line offside pass, the initial pass will be permitted from within the enlarged blue line, thereby increasing the size of the neutral zone by as much as five feet. The size of the attacking zones remains unchanged.

''With all 30 NHL teams developing their prospects in our league, the AHL provides an ideal opportunity to evaluate these potential changes,'' Andrews said. ''We remain committed to assisting the NHL with the growth and development of our sport, and we are confident that this test schedule will allow for a fair assessment of the proposal without compromising the competitive balance of the AHL.''

[rbdf]

so the blue line will be 3ft wide?

other than allowing guys to basically be offsides, and for pucks technically being kept in the offensive zone when they normally would have been cleared, how does this help the game?

move the nets back 3ft if you want to increase the offensive zone. how many goals are scored from behind the goal line? very very few i'd guess, so all that space is basically wasted. move it out in front of the net instead. pretty simple.

[chrisg19]

The Hockey News had an article about just this idea in their annual yearbook for this year. I think it is a good idea, because it effectively makes each zone larger without increasing the rink size. I strongly suspect this idea will gain acceptance, and be implemented in the near future. We'll see, but this to me at least is one of the better ideas to be floated about.

Chris

[chrisg19]

so the blue line will be 3ft wide?

other than allowing guys to basically be offsides, and for pucks technically being kept in the offensive zone when they normally would have been cleared, how does this help the game?

It helps the game by expanding the neutral zone, and lengthens the two line pass. In theory it would be harder to clog up the neutral zone, as there would be more space. It also make s the offensive zone two feet larger going out, which theoretically should make it harder to clear the zone. These changes are aimed at opening the game up some more. I am not one who complains about lack of scoring, I just feel if they are going to tinker with the game, this is one of the better ideas. Each of the zones is effectively larger, yet the rink dimensions don't change. We'll see how it works in an applied test, but I think it holds some promise.

Chris

[Rock]

Bobby Smith former player and GM wrote that article in THN. It actually made a lot of sense. With 2 foot wider lines that should eliminate a lot of off-sides too!

[Don]

Bobby Smith should work on improving his team. *grumble* Even Roy's sucky Ramparts are heads above the Mooseheads.

I dunno. I can't see widening the blue line suddenly creating a boost in scoring. All I can foresee is a huge mess in offsides calls.

['7']

more stupidity by the league, they know how to fix this, MOVE THEN NETS BACK! That's how you enlarge the neutral zone by 6 feet.

drawing thicker lines and making the ice surface look weird won't fix a damn thing. It's another example of how the NHL "solves" problems by creating more problems. The league can never admit its mistakes, it just tries new and crazy methods to fixing simple problems. Why go this route? Just go back to what works.

the fact that they're testing it probably means it will come to the NHL next year. still with where the goals sit right now, the natural flow of play is to the corners and boards. This won't change anything, it will still be hard to drive to the net, it still takes the slot away from shooters, and it's still impossible to get from the boards to the net quickly like in the past.

it's so typical of them to take the least suggested, least practical, most hairbrained idea and put it into practice.

Edited December 17, 2003 by '7'

[rbdf]

gotta agree with "7", moving the nets back just makes all the sense in the world. Like I said before, it's wasted space back there, how many goals get scored from behind the goal line, how much free skating is going on behind the net? None.

Push the nets back 3 feet and you open up 3ft more out in front of the nets for shooters to set up in, for skaters to skate in.

[sammyk]

They were explaining the wider lines on TSN, and at the end McKenzie said, why not just move the nets back?

[JunkYardDog]

You cannot move the nets back, you'll ruin the flow of the game. How is a team going to be able to cycle the puck down low when they are going for a game tying goal in the closing moments? How will a player shake off a defensemen while looking to hit his winger for a one-timer in the slot? It will also affect the PP and PK units, as well as other aspects of the game. How many points would Gretsky and Ron Francis, among others, lose if they could not set up behind the net?

[Swede]

You cannot move the nets back, you'll ruin the flow of the game. How is a team going to be able to cycle the puck down low when they are going for a game tying goal in the closing moments? How will a player shake off a defensemen while looking to hit his winger for a one-timer in the slot? It will also affect the PP and PK units, as well as other aspects of the game. How many points would Gretsky and Ron Francis, among others, lose if they could not set up behind the net?

Well, in Gretzky's time the nets were a bit futher back, they moved them forward a cople of years ago

[devilsrule33]

I would think Most Devils fans woudn''t wnat the nets moved back since our team in the past and now has relied so much on cycling the puck down low to generate scoring chances.

Edited December 18, 2003 by devilsrule33

[Sarge18]

You cannot move the nets back, you'll ruin the flow of the game. How is a team going to be able to cycle the puck down low when they are going for a game tying goal in the closing moments? How will a player shake off a defensemen while looking to hit his winger for a one-timer in the slot? It will also affect the PP and PK units, as well as other aspects of the game. How many points would Gretsky and Ron Francis, among others, lose if they could not set up behind the net?

Gretz prefered where the net used to be. It allowed him to be back there but didnt give much room for a defender to get back there with him. It gave him a sense of security that the larger space doesnt allow.

Also what is the point have having so much room from where you cannot score.

And it wouldnt effect the cycle. THe Cycle is always in motion, its not as if they are mucking it up behind the net constantly. It actually would help it i think when they come out of the corner. The chances are now greater that the puck carrier is in front of the net and has a better shooting option along with the pass.

[devilsrule33]

I don't know how much that would help. Trapping teams would adapt to the new changes.

['7']

in the past you would just crash the net and make a centering pass, now you're forced to cycle just to get to the front of the net with a better angle to shoot.

kariya would talk about all the useless cycling that goes on and leads to nothing but a clear or a wide shot. Players miss the net way more often now than they did years ago.

[NJD Jester]

I don't know how much that would help. Trapping teams would adapt to the new changes.

I think that's the bottom line with all of this. Widening the blue lines could make for a better offensive flow, but goalies and defensemen are now too good for the league to slip back into its Edmonton 6-5 days.

<JESTER>

[CaptainScotty]

fer christs sake, take the bloody two line rule out.

[rbdf]

Other than making the ice look really goofy, I just don't see making the blue lines 3ft wide as having any real effect on speed/flow/trap, etc. The only benefits I see are that there will be fewer offsides as the puck carrier and the other attackers will have a 3ft "demilitarized" zone where the ref's would likely not call offsides as long as the puck carrier got in there before the others skated out of there, and that defensemen manning the point will have a better shot at keeping a handfull of pucks in that formerly cleared the blue line by an inch or two (or twelve in this case).

That really doesn't sound like a way to solve the leagues ills.

Move the nets back - just ask gretzky.

[Don]

I remember watching my brother play Atom hockey before they would call two line passes. With the puck in deep in team A's end, they would still have some drip floating out on team B's blue line. Team A had a choice to make. Play 5-on-4 and hope/pray there was no outlet pass, or put a D back to cover and play 4-on-4 in the zone. They chose the 4-on-4, but also chose to go with 3 forwards and 1 D (so there was always 1 point not covered). Of course, this was 12 year olds, so I'm sure at the NHL level there wouldn't be any floaters. 'Cept Jagr. (-: