Ez jó:
Why hasn't your team met expectations from this summer?

This is one of the questions I ask Wilson as we sit inside his second-floor office at the MCC later that afternoon. For a nanosecond, he eyes me suspiciously. Then he sits forward in his chair.

"I guess even my own expectations were a little bit higher," he says. "But in looking back, maybe unrealistically so."

Wilson talks about sophomore jinxes, free agents struggling to blend together, inconsistent play and the death-rattle panic that can disfigure the trajectory of a game when a young team makes a mistake that leads to more mistakes. (See last night's third period.)

When people take aim at Wilson, one of the sharpest arrows in their critical quiver is special teams: Why has the power play and penalty kill lagged for much of his tenure in Toronto?

"Our special teams were great the first month of the season, especially our penalty killing," he says. "We didn't change anything but a couple of people got hurt. Dion got hurt and Colby Armstrong got hurt. And we had a period of about three weeks where we lost all confidence in our penalty kill and the things that we were doing. We were expecting bad things to happen.

"I think we're over the hump there but, you know, in our league you have one disastrous month and the overall picture of your special teams gets a little bit out of whack."

Contrary to what his detractors say, Wilson defends his special teams with a stat.

"If I told you now that the other team has only scored two more goals on their power play than we have, you wouldn't believe that. We've given up 28 and scored 26. So the difference in our power play and penalty kill is only two.

"So our power play has actually been better than we get credit for, especially with the type of team we have. And our penalty killing on most nights has been adequate. But on some nights, if it goes south, it goes completely south and it ends up skewing our numbers."

The trade rumours are now swirling. Burke says he is open for business. But transactions in the new NHL are easier said than done. So I ask Wilson a simple question: Do you have confidence you can win with this team without player personnel moves?

There is a pause.

"Well, I don't look at this like we've got to win 30 games in a row," he says. "We've got a young team that we're building for the future. And there's where all the misconceptions come from about our team.

"We are the youngest team in the league. The second youngest is below us in the standings and that’'s Edmonton. And Edmonton is looked at as being totally young, all these rookies in the lineup, yet we're younger than Edmonton.

"So Edmonton's expectations are rock bottom – to suffer with a young team and let them grow. Our expectations appear to be we have to make the playoffs even though we have the youngest team in the league.

"I think we can win. I'm perfectly content with our team as long as it's showing signs of growth. And I think most of our young players are showing signs of growth. The Grabovskis and the Kulemins, Luke Schenn on defence. We're getting some real good goaltending from young, inexperienced people. Reimer has played really well."

He talks about inconsistency and how difficult it is for a young team to deal with adversity: "A bad moment happens in a game and it turns into a bad four or five moments."

He talks about how veteran teams can block out these bad moments and carry forth, a quality he strongly believes his team will eventually learn. (See last night's final score.)

But all of this raises another question: Were expectations too high at the start of the season?

"No, no," he says. "No. What I am saying is, did everybody have us going from the second worst team in the league to Stanley Cup champion? By actually going from (average age of) 28 years old down to 25 years old?

"Our goal is still to try and make the playoffs and put together a string of games where we can climb back in. But the only expectations I have are to try and improve every day."

And you're satisfied with this improvement?

"Well, to an extent. I'm a very competitive person and I would prefer to win every single game. Period. That's what you're in this business to do. Try and win every single game. If you get frustrated, you get frustrated because you are doing everything you can and some nights you can't win a game."
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Hát...nem lehet egyszerű.:-((
Kiemelte azt a három fiatalt, akivel tényleg remek munkát végzett. Grabovski egy állat idén, nem csak pontokban, hanem mindenben. Kiteszi a szívét a jégre, védekezik, forecheckel...Kulemin mostanra már az egyik alapja ennek a csapatnak és idén féltávnál 15 gólnál jár..ha a 30 nem is lesz meg, egy 25+ szinte biztosam, ha egészséges marad. Emellett meg a legjobb two-way forwardunk. Schenn egyszerűen csak a legjobb védőnk, többet nem nagyon kell mondanom szerintem.