• Slug: Sports-Coyotes woes. 750 words
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By PERRY COHEN
Cronkite News

GLENDALE — After Thursday night’s loss to the Dallas Stars, the Arizona Coyotes are off to their worst seven-game start in team history.

The Coyotes scored four goals coming from two players, Derek Stepan and Clayton Keller. It was not enough, however, to contain the Stars who scored five.

Arizona now ranks last in the NHL in point percentage (.071) and goals against per game (4.29).

Despite being bit by the injury bug and the Coyotes’ early season struggles, the confidence level in the locker room is still high.

Forward Stepan said even though the team has yet to win a game, they have continued to progress.

“We haven’t taken any steps backward,” Stepan said. “You can see in the game, our game is starting to be more of the picture Tocchet wants, and more of the 60-minute hockey.”

Coach Rick Tocchet believes his team is starting to build chemistry on the ice and the top line is performing better each game.

“Clayton (Keller) is what, a 19- or 20-year-old, and he is going against Jamie Benn,” Tocchet said. “He’s a hell of a player. This is a learning process and Clayton delivered. He did a nice job. Thought Stepan played well. …It was a good line for us.”

Keller, the Coyotes’ rookie forward, shined in Thursday night’s loss.

He registered two of the team’s four goals in addition to an assist on one of Stepan’s goals.

Keller said the team’s woes are credited to mental mistakes and the inability to protect in their own zone.

“It’s all in our head,” Keller said. “We just want to get it in deep and have a good shift and sometimes it doesn’t work out that way and you end up in your own zone and it’s just what happens sometimes.”

The Coyotes have struggled with zone protection all season. Tyler Seguin’s goal at 8:20 in the third period was the eighth time the Coyotes allowed their opponent to score within two minutes of scoring their own goal.

Defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson doesn’t know why it keeps happening.

“We score a goal and two shifts after, they score another one,” Ekman-Larsson said. “That’s something we’ve got to work on and be able to hang in there for a couple shifts and a couple minutes until it settles down a little bit.”

Tocchet said his team needs to learn to handle the pressure of a post-goal offense.

“I think a couple times we get it and we just throw it away,” Tocchet said. “That play when you can make that short, nice little pass. I think on the two goals they got we threw it away right in the slot.”

One of these passing errors came from forward Christian Dvorak. However, Tocchet said he will continue to put Dvorak on the ice during these situations, as it is a situation from which he needs to learn.

The number of injured Coyotes certainly does not help the team’s struggles. They currently have four players fighting through injuries, including starting goalie Antti Raanta and defenseman Jakob Chychrun, who has yet to see the ice this season.

With Raanta out, rookie Adin Hill made the second start of his young career.

Although the Coyotes suffered through another loss, there were some positive that came from the defeat.

Max Domi’s assist to Stepan extends his point streak to seven games. Additionally, Clayton Keller’s two goals put him at the top of the rookie leaderboard.

“There’s good things that are coming with this group,” Stepan said. “We just got to find a way to outscore the other team one time, and just kind of relieve the pressure of not getting a win.”

Stars coach Ken Hitchcock noticed the Coyotes have made slight progressions since the beginning of the season.

“What they did is they scored in the zone,” Hitchcock said. “They didn’t score off the rush. All their offense this season until tonight has been off the rush, but today they got on the grind and stayed on the grind and when they are like that, and they are willing to work for their chances they are pretty dynamic.

The Coyotes host the Chicago Blackhawks Saturday at Gila River Arena. The Blackhawks have three players on their roster that are currently leading both teams in points.

The game Saturday will mark the first time Niklas Hjalmarsson will face off against the team he was with the first 10 years of his career.