Arizona Coyotes’ Shane Doan: We need consistency to compete in the West
Sep 19, 2014, 8:13 PM | Updated: 8:13 pm
Weeks before the start of his 19th season, Arizona Coyotes right winger and captain Shane Doan is ready to see his team get back to the top of the conference.
Doan was a guest on Bickley and Marotta on Arizona Sports 98.7 Thursday, and the veteran harped on the Coyotes’ need for consistency this season, which he claimed held the team down last year. Doan spoke about Arizona’s talent and ability to compete with the best of the Western Conference.
“San Jose was one win away from eliminating the Stanley Cup champions, and looked amazing in doing it. Obviously L.A. wins the Stanley Cup and Anaheim wins the President’s Trophy, and yet we can compete with them. We played L.A. last year, I think we finished 3-3 against them. We can compete against anyone.”
Despite their ability to win against these teams, Doan acknowledges that Arizona’s weakness is playing at their best on every night.
“It goes back to that consistent level of us having to do it constantly and what [Head Coach Dave Tippett] requires of you is to do it every night. And we have less room for error than probably some other teams, which is fine. It’s a tight rope that you have to walk, because we don’t have necessarily the skill. But we’ve proven in the past that we are capable of doing it, and we are going to do it again.”
With a top-notch defense, Doan sees an opportunity to get back to the success they had in previous years.
“Our defense is as skilled as anyone has in the league. [Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Keith Yandle] have been talked about for the Norris trophy in the past. We need them to be talked about in the Norris Trophy this coming year.”
He also praised goalie Mike Smith and the team’s need to excel on that side of the ice and reach their full potential.
“The year we went to the conference finals, I wouldn’t have picked a single goalie over [Mike Smith]. He was amazing, he was phenomenal. So in order for us to be good, that group has to be as good as they’re capable of doing.”
The Coyotes finished last season with seven players who had 15 or more goals, but no player was able to reach 25 in that category. Rather than being a weakness though, Doan is optimistic that Arizona can succeed with this spread out scoring.
“I think Mikkel Boedker’s going to be kind of the guy that steps into that role, being our go-to goal scorer. We’ve got a whole bunch of guys that have scored 25 goals and I think there’s eight guys that have scored 20 and a couple guys that have got 30 and we are going to have kind of do the same thing. That’s been the way we’ve done in the past and we are going to have to do it again.”