Pius Suter returns with the ZSC Lions: is too much talent becoming a curse?

Meanwhile, the Zurich team has not only brought Pius Suter back to the team. With 19 year old talent Marco Rossi, they have signed a second forward who spends his waiting time in Zurich for the start of the NHL. Why this change of opinion? Quite simply: ZSC Lions train players in an exemplary way, including Pius Suter and Marco Rossi. But at the top of the performance pyramid, with the first team, only victory counts. So everything is done for victory. Then Pius Suter and Marco Rossi are called up temporarily.

This uncompromising attitude characterizes large sports organizations. It is not very different at Bayern Munich either. After the two shameful defeats against Zug (3: 6 and 2: 8), Sven Leuenberger has no choice but to bring Pius Suter and Marco Rossi to the team. Had he not done so, he would have ignored the winning mentality, the DNA of his organization.

So far Pius Suter has kept fit with the GCK Lions (6 games / 5 points). This commitment was limited to the end of October. The official reason for Sven Leuenberger’s move to Hallenstadion sounds like this: «Now Pius has expressed his desire to return to play in the National League to prepare even better for the NHL season. And since he’s one of us, we’d like to see Pius in the ZSC shirt again. “

Since the beginning of time, sports directors – in the NHL the general managers – have repeatedly succumbed to the allure, seductive eroticism of offensive talent. What the ZSC Lions were in the fall of 2020, the Colorado Avalanches were in the fall of 2003. A delightful and informative comparison.

Colorado won the Lord Stanley’s Cup in 1996 and 2001. In the spring of 2003, a shameful first round elimination against Minnesota followed and the resignation of titan goalkeeper Patrick Roy. But now it should be enough again for the final triumph. It’s the last season with a free market economy and unlimited shopping possibilities. After the 2003/04 season, team owners will apply the wage restriction.

Colorado General Manager Pierre Lacroix has put together the best ensemble in club history. The already formidable storm with longtime captain Joe Sakic, Alex Tanguay, NHL top scorer Peter Forsberg and NHL top scorer Milan Hejduk is rounded off by superstars Paul Kariya and Teemu Selänne. More offensive firepower is not possible. The Canadian and the Finn don’t move from Anaheim to the Rockies for money. The two friends want to win the Stanley Cup first. Paul Kariya accepts 88% less salary than before in Anaheim. The hockey bible “The Hockey News” writes about the team’s strengths: “Offense, offense and more offense”. The power game is even lauded as “the best of all time on paper”.

This offensive update is meant to compensate for the one weakness: while the offensive received the maximum score of “A +” from “Hockey News” and the defense is still “A”, to goalkeeper David Aebischer, successor to Patrick Roy , only a nominal “C” was assigned. Incidentally, ZSC Lions will also make Ludovic Waeber, a goalkeeper trained at Gottéron, number 1 in autumn 2020.

Today we know: it didn’t work. In the playoffs, the lights go out in the second round against San José. David Aebischer is not the problem (playoff catch share 92.20 percent). The much-lauded storm is just a light breeze against San José with 7 goals in 6 games. One game is lost 0: 1, one is won 1: 0. Teemu Selänne and Paul Kariya are playing the weakest season of their fantastic careers, not scoring a single goal in the playoffs and leaving Denver after just one year. Colorado have never come close to the Stanley Cup since and have lost the playoffs eight times to date.

What was the Colorado of that time, the ZSC Lions are even more so after the temporary hiring of Pius Suter and Marco Rossi: an almost incredibly equipped offensive team, which wants to return to champions even three years after the last title. Yes, never since the introduction of the playoffs (1986) has so much offensive talent been gathered in a locker room. Not even in Lugano.

A first-round draft of the NHL, 11 forwards of the Swiss national team (7 of them with World Cup experience) plus three first-class foreign forwards. A “dream team”. “The Hockey News” would say the same about quality as it did then on Colorado: “Offense, offense and more offense”. 15 stars who have to share twelve places in the ZSC attack. At first glance, an enviable situation for coach Rikard Grönborg. In fact, having too much offensive talent is more likely to drive a manager into despair than too little. With so much talent, who still has a sense for game systems, tactics and discipline? As soon as.

So the Colorado example, 17 years later, explains a little of the current challenges facing SAC Lions. An offensive orientation that is too strong can seriously upset the already difficult balance between attack and defense, between play and work, between discipline and creativity, between self-confidence and arrogance and between selfishness and team spirit and therefore chemistry in the locker room. Even with an impeccable work ethic.

In Colorado, maximum offensive armament didn’t work nearly 20 years ago. Different times, same problem: at the Hallenstadion, at least in autumn 2020, it doesn’t even work: four defeats and a negative goal difference after 11 games. 3.27 goals conceded per game. It was 2.48 last season. And things aren’t better up front either: 3.18 shots per game. It was 3.32 last season. The curse of too much offensive talent.

We do not know if the 2020/21 season can be played to the end. If all goes as planned, Pius Suter and Marco Rossi will move to the NHL in Chicago and Minnesota in December. What will your performance as a guest bring to ZSC Lions? First: regardless of sporting success, an enrichment for the whole championship, an increase in the value of entertainment and second, a cheap excuse. If the Zurich team does not win the title, he can say: if Suter and Rossi had stayed until the end of the season, we would have become champions.

And fans will love to believe it.