This season, the New York Rangers forward Artemy Panarin unrecognizable. He not only scored a hat-trick in the match against Boston, but also scored more than 40 goals in a championship for the first time in his career. How did he do it? What has Khlebushek changed in his 33rd year of life?
Panarin boldly goes to 100 points
We knew Panarin as a brilliant assistant. For example, he could give five assists in a single match. But his statistics depended heavily on his partners. Even the New York Rangers usually placed Panarin on the second line, which did not give him the strongest partners. Oleg Znarok, “my father-in-law,” as Tema calls him, also drew attention to this point. And when Khlebushek was still playing in Columbus, give as many passes as you want, the teammates there are such a low class, and with them it is difficult to become an elite scorer.
That is why Panarin has been playing in the NHL since the ninth season, but until now he has never scored the classic 100 points in a single championship. But this year everything can be improved. Artemy already has 97 points and the Rangers are still 12 games ahead.
What has changed in his game? Why did Panarin add so much? Let’s look at the example of the match with Boston.
Artemy’s easiest hat-trick
Regarding partners: Panarin played on a trio with Alexi Lafrenière and Vincent Trocheck. The guys are good, but not the best. Trocheck is a strong, versatile center who is good at faceoffs and works all over the field. He already scored 75 points during a season in Florida, but mostly had a little over fifty. Although in a trio with Panarin, he is now second among the Rangers’ top scorers (66). Well, Lafrenière (45) needs no introduction. The first pick in the draft, who just can’t live up to his potential. But in trio with Panarin, he had a rather decent season.
The first link is clear: Chris Kreider, Mika Zibanejad and Jack Roslovic who joined them. New head coach Peter Laviolette, who was fired from Washington and moved to New York in the offseason, hasn’t changed anything. But under him, Panarin’s playing time even increased slightly: from 19.36 to 20.02 minutes per game.
The match against Boston (97 points) is not only a match of the Rangers (96) against their neighbor, but also a battle for first place in the championship. The first period was left to the Bruins, and the hosts even took the lead when Jake DeBrusk scored.
However, Panarin scored in the 28th minute. The goal was, as teenagers would say, “easy”, that is to say very easy. Having received the puck in front of the goal after a mistake by Boston defenders, Artemy carefully placed it in the corner, making a weak throw.
And at the end of the second period, Panarin scored again. Once again, Boston allowed Khlebushka to lead the backfield. He launched, but the same Debrusk scored against his side, as if to cancel his goal. The guests were already leading 2:1. At the same time, Artemy scored 40 goals in a championship for the first time in his career. Marching bands could sound there and the Boston sky could be lit up by a magnificent fireworks display.
The Bruins tied the game in the third period, but the Rangers scored two more. Panarin’s third goal was also easy. He ran into space and put the puck into the empty net. In general, we can say that it was the easiest hat-trick in Artemy’s career.
But something else is interesting here: this season he has already scored three hat-tricks. Before that, he scored three goals against Tampa (December 30), and even earlier, he scored three goals against San Jose (December 3). That is, Khlebushek put them into service.
Tema created a “place of power” near Valdai
Panarin has already broken his personal scoring record: he has never scored 97 points in the league (two years ago, it was 96). And he didn’t score 41 goals (the record is 32).
What else has changed? At that point, Artemy had already had 248 shots on target. Last season there were 204. That is, Khlebushek, to put it simply, began to take more initiative. You need to believe in yourself, not in the fact that you will take your partner into a deadly position, and he will decide.
But at the same time, Panarin’s accuracy rate (goals/shots ratio) even increased, from 14.2% last year to 16.5%. By the way, if we take the top seven scorers in the league, everyone has a lower figure than Artemy – and these are Nikita Kucherov (15.4%), Nathan MacKinnon (12.6%), Connor McDavid (11.7%), David Pastrnak. (12.9%), Mikko Rantanen (15.9%), William Nylander (14.1%). Auston Matthews is posting crazy numbers (20%), but everything is going wrong for him, and he has already scored 57 goals this season. It can be safely removed from the supports. But Alexander Ovechkin (10.1%) misses less than we are used to.
What is the problem? Why did Panarin become so precise and aggressive? Let’s start with when the Rangers were leading 2-0 in the first round against New Jersey, but managed to lose it 3-4. The club’s top scorer in the regular season, Panarin, scored a measly 2 (0+2) points in seven games during these playoffs. He only shot 15 times and scored nothing.
And burning with shame, he shaved his beautiful curly hair. Don’t forget we’re on they even gave the news, citing sources close to the hockey player, that this is how Panarin drives away evil spirits? There is some truth here. In addition, you should know how superstitious Artemy is – he does not take such moments lightly.
Next, I will give the floor to Panarin’s friend and manager – Artem Gavrilov told me some simply grandiose things.
“As a witness to the pre-season preparation, I will say that the changes happen in the head. Firstly, Artemy has already become a father twice. It’s very influential. He matured, became even more serious and experienced.
Second, it’s telling that Panarin cleared his mind, abandoned social media and opted for just a phone.
Thirdly, during the training process, even in the summer, he began to pay a lot of attention to throws. We have set up a nice throwing area for him, within walking distance there is a farm with animals. It has a gym on the farm itself. Tema perfected his throws and bulked up. I went back to America and sanded it again. And over the summer, he really started taking a lot of shots. This is probably also being felt.”
I even got interested: what kind of farm is this? Where is he?
It turned out that in Russia it was closer to Valdai. There, Panarin and his friends had chickens, goats, rams, and soon there will be a cow. In the morning – mowing, in the evening – milking. There are special bees with which you can regain strength.
In other words, Panarin has created a “place of power” for himself, where he spends a little over a month out of season. He throws the puck in the shooting zone from morning to evening. He drinks natural milk, eats honey, mows the grass and walks barefoot in the dew.
Guys, it really works! This is how you can win the Stanley Cup! We are closely monitoring Panarin and his Rangers!
Source : MatchTV
I’m Emma Smith, a dedicated journalist and avid storyteller. I have been writing for news websites for the past 5 years, reporting on hockey news and delivering in-depth analysis of the sport. In my current role as Author at Athletistic, I write about hockey events from around the world to keep followers up-to-date with what’s happening in the sport.
