Claude Julien using 'less is more' approach with Shea Weber

The evaluation of coaches in the NHL is a notoriously finicky business. There are always wins and losses to lean on, but that seems overly simplistic as some bench bosses are given state-of-the-art power tools to get the job done while others are gifted Paleolithic-era equipment.

As a result, it’s exceedingly hard to know how to share credit (or blame) between coaches and players. However, one of the best clues we have to sort out the mess is looking at player usage. Perhaps more than anything else, a coach’s job is put his foot soldiers in the best position to succeed.

When Claude Julien took the reigns of the Montreal Canadiens in February, he inherited an interesting player usage conundrum in defenceman Shea Weber. Theoretically, the presence of Weber on one’s roster should not cause much confusion. The accepted strategy with a true “No. 1” defenceman is play them often, play them a little bit more, and when they get truly exhausted throw them out there for another shift. That’s certainly how Michel Therrien saw the situation.

Under Therrien, the 31-year-old averaged the seventh-highest workload in the NHL at 25:30 a night. The former Habs coach also used Weber as the league’s top special teams horse with 6:41 of his ice time coming on the power play and penalty kill. He made it clear the Canadiens’ PP and PK units were going to live and die with Weber.

The results of that strategy were a mixed bag. Behind Weber’s thunderous shot, his team’s power play ranked seventh in the NHL at 21.4 percent and 18 of his 32 points during that period came with the man advantage. On the flip side, the team’s penalty kill ranked 23rd at 79.4 percent.

Though Julien has only been behind the bench for eight games, it’s clear he has a different philosophy when it comes to his top defenceman. Here’s how the way he’s used Weber compares to how Therrien deployed him:

Overall he’s seeing a smaller workload, but interestingly, his even-strength minutes remain exactly the same. The two minutes Julien is shaving off Weber each night are coming specifically from his special teams time – especially penalty kill shifts.

The new sheriff in town clearly doesn’t want to ride his star defenceman the same way his predecessor did. In fact, Weber has only played as much as he averaged with Therrien once under the Julien regime.

At this point, it’s impossible to make definitive statements about how effective the shift in strategy is because the sample is simply too small at eight games. That said, the earliest of returns seem positive.

Weber is playing well of late with six points in eight games under Julien and a sturdy Corsi of 53.1 percent – significantly better than the 50.8 percent he managed earlier in the season. Once again, the sample is too small to attribute it directly to the extra rest – but it clearly isn’t hurting.

Also intriguing is the affect Weber’s eased workload is having on the Canadiens’ special teams of late. The biggest change Julien made was cutting the former Nashville Predator’s penalty kill minutes and the veteran coach has seen that unit come to life lately posting an 88.2 percent success rate during his tenure. On the other hand the power play has dipped slightly to a 18.2 percent mark.

Given that we are dabbling in the wishy washy world of correlations, conclusions are elusive. What we do know is that since Julien became the Canadiens coach he’s made a concerted effort to cut Weber’s minutes — specifically on his special teams. At the same time, the team’s penalty kill has improved significantly and the power play has dipped slightly while Weber has been stronger at even strength.

These facts seem to jell with what we know about Weber as a defenceman who possesses an unbelievable power-play presence and an uneven defensive reputation. Down the stretch we’ll get a clearer picture of whether Julien’s strategy continues to be effective, but for now at the very least it’s apparent he’s got a very different idea of how to use Weber than Therrien did.