Are We Seeing The Real Daniil Tarasov?
The word is Daniil Tarasov was supposed to play between 55-65 games last season for the Cleveland Monsters. But injuries derailed his season in a big way. Instead of playing 55-60 games, he was limited to just 28 games, with only 11 of those being played with the Monsters. Due to injuries to Elvis Merzlikins and Joonas Korpisalo, he was forced to play more games in Columbus, which totaled 17. Still not a lot. Experts have said that because of last season, his development was derailed, which isn't too far from the truth.
Going into this season, Tarasov was expected to battle for the starting position with Merzlikins even though he was basically missing that crucial year of development after last year's disaster. Due to his contract status of not being waiver-exempt, the Jackets hand was forced; Tarasov had to play in the NHL. He missed the first couple of months due to injury this season, so he got a late start, and it didn't go well.
Daniil Tarasov started slow this season to no one's surprise. Through his first 11 games, he went 3-6-2 with a GAA of 3.90 with a save % of .870. In those 11 games, he gave up 3 or more goals eight times, including giving up 4 or more seven times. He'd also gone 2-1-1 when he gave up 3 or fewer goals on those 11 starts.
On February 13th against the Ottawa Senators, the bottom fell out for Tarasov. He gave up 5 goals in a 6-3 loss and looked very bad doing it. He wouldn't start again for another week after the Ottawa game, and it came against the Anaheim Ducks. He looked very good in that game. Something changed for Tarasov.
Since that Ottawa game, Tarasov has made six starts. And although his record is only 3-3 in that span, the losses can't be pinned on him for poor play.
In those six starts, Tarasov is 3-3 with a GAA of 2.33 with a save % of .933. He's given up 3 goals twice, and 2 goals four times. He's also made 203 saves in that span averaging 34 saves a game, including his last game, which in a loss, saw him make 47 saves. In his three losses, his team only averaged 1.3 goals scored, so run support was the issue with the Jackets, not Tarasov.
Daniil Tarasov has played well as of late, and Head Coach Pascal Vincent agreed in his post-game press conference after the Nashville loss. Vincent also made it sound like Tarasov will be getting a lot of work for the rest of the season. The Columbus coach also spoke to the toughness of Tarasov, who apparently took a puck to the head and neck area in practice and had to spend some time with a doctor but refused to not play against the Edmonton Oilers. “I want to play this game," said Tarasov.
Are we finally seeing what the final Daniil Tarasov product is going to look like? With only 18 games left, how many will we see with Tarasov as the starter?
If this is what Daniil Tarasov is going to look like in the future, CBJ fans should be very excited.
What's Next - The Jackets hit the road to play the Montreal Canadiens next Tuesday.
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