Reply To: Choosing Forward lines and D partners for your team.

[Kevin Capie]

I know this is late to the party, but I wanted to throw this out there for discussion. It sort of ties the points Tom and DaveM made together.

I'm not 100 percent positive, but I think it was Ken Hitchcock talking once about not thinking in terms of 3-man lines, but rather in pairs. He liked to find two players that had good chemistry and then fit in a complementary piece.

I like that theory because it's sometimes easier to find three or four pairs of players that match-up well together than maybe even just two sets of three. It's still possible to come up with the "ideal" playmaker-scorer-grinder combo this way, but it allows for some flexibility if there isn't enough of one type to go around.