Arizona Coyotes’ early winless record doesn’t tell full story

In sports, there are often two narratives: the one told in the box score, and the one you see with the “eyeball test.”

For the Arizona Coyotes, those two narratives are pretty different right now.

Looking at the NHL standings, the situation in Arizona looks bleak. Four games in, the Coyotes are winless and have just one point — a point they earned by going to overtime with the Vegas Golden Knights in the home opener. But in watching the games, even the most novice of spectators may at least have noticed that the Coyotes have had a lead in three of the four games they’ve played.

A 4-1 lead in their season-opener at Anaheim quickly vanished. A lengthy 1-0 lead became a 1-1 score in the third period in game two. And while game three was a blowout in an emotional Vegas home debut, game four was more of the same: A promising battle that didn’t end in victory.

Even before the Coyotes took the ice on Thursday and fell late to the Detroit Red Wings, defenseman Adam Clendening said the team had come close to getting a few points.

“Especially the first two games, I thought very easily could have gone our way, as an observer,” Clendening said. “But I think just little details. We’re very close. We’re not very far away. It may look like it on the stat sheet, haven’t won a game yet. But I don’t think we’re very far away.”

The Coyotes didn’t look like a winless team on Thursday night. They made clutch passes, drew penalties and pressured Red Wings goalie Jimmy Howard, appearing as though they could be on their way to their first win of the year.

“I thought we had them there for a bit,” Tocchet said after the loss. “We didn’t get rewarded after the first, I thought we had a really good first period. Their goalie played great tonight. Howard was really good tonight.”

Not only is it a shorthanded 2-on-1, it’s a game-winner for the @DetroitRedWings. pic.twitter.com/css1peTkGW

— NHL (@NHL) October 13, 2017

And while injuries are never a valid excuse, it may be some consolation that the Coyotes have come within an arm-length of their first win without sophomore defenseman Jakob Chychrun (lower-body) and, at times, starting goaltender Antti Raanta (lower-body) and forward Brendan Perlini (upper-body).

Louis Domingue started in net in the opener in Anaheim and played most of Thursday in relief of Raanta, who left the game at first intermission with an undisclosed injury.

He’ll be the first to tell you that coming “close” to victory each night isn’t good enough.

“It’s not good. It’s really not good,” Domingue said. “You look back at the end of the year and we’re going to look at those four games and we have one point. It’s not good enough. We’re close, but close is far from being good enough. We know that.”

It’s as they say: Trust the process. For the Coyotes, the process is a system implemented by coach Rick Tocchet. In the long run, the ‘Yotes figure it will pay dividends.

“You win by inches,” Tocchet said. “We had opportunities to win games, close the game out. It’s hard to do the right things all the time. You have to do it.”

UP NEXT

The Coyotes host the Boston Bruins on Saturday night at Gila River Arena, looking to kick a team while it’s down. Boston, after winning their first game against Nashville, lost two straight games to the Colorado Avalanche by a combined score of 10-3.

As of Friday, it wasn’t known whether top-line Bruins center Patrice Bergeron would be ready to go in Arizona.

Puck drop on Saturday is slated for 6 p.m.

Follow @mattjlayman