4 ways Golden Knights changed under Pete DeBoer

Golden Knights coach Pete DeBoer wasn’t exactly handed the keys to a fixer-upper when he agreed to take the reins in January, but his new team was in need of some TLC.

The Knights’ foundation was fine. But problem areas needed touch-ups, as evidenced by the team’s 24-19-6 record and minus-1 goal differential.

Enter DeBoer with a hammer, nails and fresh coat of paint.

The coach had the team cruising before COVID-19 paused the season. The underachieving squad suddenly looked like the Stanley Cup contenders everyone had expected to see.

That wasn’t all thanks to DeBoer, but he does deserve credit. Here are four areas he tweaked before the NHL shutdown:

1. Breaking out is (not) hard to do

Breaking out of the defensive zone in hockey is like boxing out in basketball or backing up a throw in baseball.

It isn’t fun. It isn’t flashy. Yet it’s crucial to any hockey team’s success.

The Knights’ breakouts were inconsistent when DeBoer arrived. So he made them a major focus.

“We wanted better support coming out of our zone,” DeBoer said. “To be honest, the guys surprised me with how receptive they were to all of it. They really bought into what we wanted right away.”

DeBoer didn’t try to revolutionize the team’s breakout patterns. He did, however, drill them over and over in his first practices to make them sharper. He wanted each player to know exactly where to be in the zone, and what path they should take out of it.

His goal: Getting the Knights to exit the zone together, and with the puck. That way the team could spend more time in transition and less time defending. It’s helped the Knights get back to the speed-based game they had established under former coach Gerard Gallant.

“Both coaches had a philosophy of being fast and doing things where your team is moving the puck and guys know where it’s going,” defenseman Nate Schmidt said. “We don’t want ‘take it low and slow.’ That high-octane feel to it has transitioned well. They both like to play that style of game.”

2. Blue streaks

DeBoer’s first focus didn’t make many highlight reels. Another one did.

The Knights’ defensemen, thanks in part to the cleaner breakouts, have become more aggressive under DeBoer. They’re joining the rush and jumping off the offensive blue line more often to make plays.

It’s a style change that’s gone beyond blossoming star Shea Theodore. Even steady veterans like Nick Holden and Alec Martinez have started making plays below the faceoff circles.

The Knights’ defensemen have gone from scoring 1.63 points per game (which would rank 29th in the NHL) to 2.40 (fifth) since DeBoer was hired.

The trend holds even removing Theodore from the equation. The shift has been felt throughout the lineup.

“We want to be a tough defensive team every shift that blocks shots and yet makes sure our (defensemen) are activated into the attack,” DeBoer said. “None of those things are new concepts, but they’re critical pieces to how we want to play.”

3. Times are changing

DeBoer, in addition to affecting the action on the ice, is tweaking who’s on it.

The new boss is deploying his players differently than Gallant did. He’s playing his top defensemen (Theodore, Schmidt, Brayden McNabb) more and his bottom pair less. It’s an inclination he showed at previous stops in New Jersey and San Jose.

The same isn’t true for forwards. DeBoer has spread their playing time more evenly. Top-line players have had their ice time reduced slightly, while the fourth line is playing more than ever.

That’s in part because DeBoer is shuffling through lines more quickly than his predecessor. He called short shifts one of his “non-negotiables” at his introductory press conference, and he’s shaved the Knights’ average shift length from 0:49 to 0:47.

He wants his forwards playing hard and fast, but in shorter bursts to keep them fresh. There’s evidence that it’s worked. The Knights outscored opponents 33-24 in the third period under DeBoer, compared to 47-45 with Gallant.

4. Upside-down kill

One thing DeBoer hasn’t changed for the better yet is the penalty kill. In many ways that’s not surprising, because he’s tried to invert the Knights’ previous philosophies on the fly.

The team used apply pressure outside the defensive zone, but back off within it to have a consistent defensive shape. DeBoer has flipped that. He’s asked the Knights to let their opponents come to them and contest entries at the blue line in the hopes of forcing a turnover.

Then, if opponents do gain the zone, the team has been aggressive chasing the puck to goad opponents into mistakes. The approach has worked for DeBoer before, as his Devils and Sharks teams had excellent penalty kills.

The Knights haven’t had the same results. Their penalty kill ranks 29th in the NHL at 70.7 percent since the coaching change. It could just be growing pains, but the team can’t afford those if it wants to make a playoff run when play resumes.

“We’re going to improve our PK,” DeBoer said. “There is no doubt about that. It hasn’t been good enough. It does take time to learn all the details of new concepts in that area and the guys competed hard to improve on it. We were really good at it some games and really poor at it in others. But it was the most inconsistent part of our game prior to the pause.”

Contact Ben Gotz at bgotz@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BenSGotz on Twitter.