In March EOTP held a contest where the person to come up with the best "narrative" surrounding Subban returning to form offensively. The winner would get a P.K. Subban Montreal Canadiens 'shirsey' (t-shirt).

The winner of that shirt is Adam Mills, EOTP commenter subdoxastic with this entry:

I think this counts as one entry,

Obviously, the idea of ‘respect’ (noted by others above) is going to play into any psychodrama explanation for PK’s resurgence next season.

My addition or refinement to the respect narrative is to add a dash of the ‘experience’ meme (also referenced above), but in particular in relation to the losing season.

I’m betting that we’ll be regaled with stories about how playing through tough times both personally (1)depressed offensive stats, 2) benchings, 3) altercations in practice) in conjunction with tough times experienced by the team as a whole (with the specific examples of 1)worst showing in years, 2)seeing a coach get fired, 3)seeing other players dealt, and finally and most importantly 4) disappointing the fans) means that P.K. was forced to reevaluate his approach to the way he played the game and his commitment to working as a member of a team.

It’s nearly perfect, it allows for a tacit acceptance of the blatantly dishonest ‘respect’ dogwhistle that’s been floating around for the past two seasons, by showing how P.K. learned his place and is now a better player (and the Habs a better team) for it.

I think I just puked a little in my mouth.

Congrats to Adam and as soon as I get his size, I'll be sending that off for him.

A couple weeks ago I was talking with Pension Plan Puppets contributor Stephen Burtch on twitter and he stated that he felt the Habs weren't in a good position moving forward because no one scored more than 65 points on the team this year. After pointing out that the Stanley Cup winning Bruins of 2010-11 didn't have a 65 point scorer, and only two 60 point scorers to the 28th place Habs three, he didn't relent. However I had a feeling that despite Burtch's criticism, Pacioretty's point totals this year were misleading. Basically after watching both players all year and diving into advanced stats, I felt Pacioretty at 65 points was actually better than Kessel at 82.

Before Habs fans scream "Kessel sucks!" or Leafs fans say "Kessel is WAY better!", Stop for a second and hold your biases at the door. Both players have strengths and weaknesses that will play into this comparison. It's a complicated question. Max Pacioretty has the advantage of being a year younger than Kessel, but Phil Kessel has four straight 30 goal seasons to Max's one. Both are great players and this isn't a Kessel hit piece.

Outside of statistics, there is a key difference between the two left wingers. Pacioretty is a bigger player than Kessel, and much more physical. Kessel is more creative and Pacioretty is more brute force. Which one is better long term is up for debate.

So who's going to be better moving forward? This was Pacioretty's breakout year if we're going to use full seasons, his last attempt at becoming an impact player was cut short by a guy who somehow still has a clean suspension record. What should work best as a comparison base will be to use this season for Pacioretty and compare it to Kessel's numbers at the same age (23). I'm going to include Kessel's numbers from this year as well just to add another layer of comparison.

If you have questions about the terms being used, please refer to the new glossary.

Continue reading this post »

More and more often fans are looking for simple, to the point explanations of the terms we use regularly on the site. I figured it was easiest to write an article and have it linked on the main page for easy reference.

• Shots % - refers to the percentage of total shots on net that were taken by a player's team while he is on the ice, or in total for a team.
  
• Fenwick - is a +/- statistic for a player/team that measures how many shots and missed shots were directed for and against the team/player being measured per 60 minutes.
  
• Relative Fenwick - is a measurement of a player's Fenwick success relative to his own teammates per 60 minutes.
  
• Fenwick % - refers to the percentage of total shots and missed shots that were taken by a player's team while he is on the ice, or in total for a team.
• Corsi - is a +/- statistic for a player/team that measures all shot attempts, including misses and blocked shots, directed for and against the team/player being measured per 60 minutes.
  
• Relative Corsi - is a measurement of a player's Corsi success relative to his own teammates per 60 minutes.
  
• Corsi % - refers to the percentage of total shot attempts that were taken by a player's team while he is on the ice, or in total for a team.
• On ice shooting % - refers to team shooting success while a player is on the ice.
• On ice save % - refers to the goaltender's save percentage while a player is on the ice.
• PDO - an addition of on ice shooting % and on ice save % to create a number that quantifies a team's variable success. Over time, this number will always trend towards 100%
• Offensive zone start % - is the percentage of total shifts a player starts in the offensive zone, not including neutral zone shifts.
• Offensive zone finish % - is the percentage of total shifts a player ends in the offensive zone, not including neutral zone shifts.
• Quality of competition - a measure of the relative +/- score of the opponents a player faces on average, weighted against ice time played against each player.
• Quality of teammates - a measure of the relative +/- score of the teammates a player plays with on average, weighted against ice time played with each player.
• Corsi quality of competition - a measure of the average Corsi score of the opponents a player faces, weighted against ice time played against each player.
• Corsi quality of teammates - a measure of the average Corsi score of the teammates a player plays with on average, weighted against ice time played with each player
• Relative Corsi quality of competition - a measure of the average relative Corsi score of the opponents a player faces, weighted against the ice time played against each player
• Relative Corsi quality of teammates - a measure of the average relative Corsi score of the teammates a player plays with, weighted against the ice time played with each player.
• True +/- - similar to traditional +/-, but removing shorthanded goals against and empty net goals against. Essentially it is even strength +/-.

After staving off elimination at the hands of the Washington Capitals in Washington, the Boston Bruins face elimination again tonight, along with the chance to move on themselves.

Tyler Seguin finally broke the goose-egg in scoring the overtime winner, and that's just bad news for Washington. Seguin has been maligned in the media in this series, but has been far and away Boston's most dominant offensive forward, he just hadn't got any results up to that OT.

On the other side, Alex Ovechkin seemed to awake from his slumber last game towards the end, but the question becomes whether or not Hunter will play Ovechkin more than Jay Beagle or Matt Hendricks in game 7?

Another problem for the Capitals is that Braden Holtby no longer looks invincible. Holtby has let in 3+ goals in 3 of his last 4 games, and 3 goals is usually enough for the defensive minded Bruins to squeak out a win.

Hopefully the Bruins will be a bit worn out tonight, as this is their 4th game 7 series in just over a year. Outside of the series against Philadelphia last year, the Bruins really don't make it easy on themselves.

Follow along at the SB Nation sites for the Washington Capitals (Japer's Rink) and the Boston Bruins (Stanley Cup of Chowder)

Who would have guessed it? The 7th place Washington Capitals who've been outplayed in every game of the series have a chance to elimate the Stanley Cup champion Boston Bruins at home this afternoon.

Tied late in the third in yesterday's game, Tim Thomas whiffed on a Troy Brouwer shot with under 2 minutes left, sealing a victory for Washington.

Oddly enough, Washington is winning this series despite Alex Ovechkin playing terrible. Ovechkin has the second worst relative Corsi on the Capitals in the series at -21.6 despite a favourable 55.3% offensive zone start ratio. The true star for Washington continues to be Braden Holtby, who made this excellent save on Tyler Seguin to preserve the lead yesterday.

Alexander Semin has also been excellent for the Capitals, bucking the lazy narrative that he's a playoff choker. Semin has a near opposite possession score to Ovechkin at a positive 21.3 relative Corsi, and that is despite starting only 40.4% of the time in the offensive zone. Semin has also chipped in 3 goals for the Caps, including a game winner.

On the Boston side of things, Brad Marchand seemed to have woken up last game, and it's only a matter of time until Seguin and Patrice Bergeron begin to produce. Then again, Holtby only needs one more great game to make Habs fans everywhere gleeful.

Follow along on the SB Nation sites for the Bruins (Stanley Cup of Chowder) and Capitals (Japer's Rink).

The series between the Ottawa Senators and New York Rangers wasn't supposed to be close. The Rangers were considered the beasts of the East nearly all season, and Ottawa limped down the stretch, falling from 6th place to 8th. But surprising to almost everyone, Ottawa has outplayed New York from a shots perspective, outshooting the Rangers 134-116 through 4 games.

With the series tied 2-2 after Kyle Turris' overtime winner last game, tonight's game is obviously pivotal. Both games Ottawa has won went to overtime, so no doubt the Sens are comfortable if they can manage a regulation tie.

Daniel Alfredsson is likely to remain out, recovering from his concussion at the hands of Carl Hagelin. Tonight is also Hagelin's final game of his suspension.

World Junior Championship star for Team Canada Mark Stone may be set to make his NHL debut tonight for the Sens.

Both teams have played chippy, bordering on dirty games in the series, with Brian Boyle being the center of attention most times, and Chris Neil getting into it almost as often.

Follow along on the SB Nation sites for the Senators (Silver Seven Sens) and Rangers (Blueshirt Banter).

The Pittsburgh Penguins and Philadelphia Flyers have had no trouble scoring in the 4 games played in their series thus far. It's the highest scoring first four games of any series in NHL history if TSN's stats guys are right.

Pittsburgh posted it's first win two nights ago, staving off eliminated by scoring 5 goals against each Flyers goaltender.

Neither starting goaltender has played well in the series, although Ilya Bryzgalov has been slightly better than the miraculously criticism immune Marc-Andre Fleury.

James Neal returns from suspension tonight, which should serve to boost Evgeni Malkin even further than last game, where he returned to his dominant self.

Sidney Crosby has manager 2 points per game in the series but still hasn't looked dominant to the extent that he usually is, overshadowed by Claude Giroux

Pittsburgh is looking to prevent their elimination once more and send this chippy series back to Philadelphia.

Which goalie will let in 5+ goals tonight? Which team will injure more players? Who will get suspended? Tune in to TSN at 7:35 to find out!

For the first time in these playoffs CBC has the Washington Capitals and Boston Bruins as their headline game. The reigning Stanley Cup champions have a great opportunity to grab a stranglehold on Washington, who have been outplayed pretty severely in the first three games when Nicklas Backstrom is in the lineup.

The aforementioned Backstrom will be sitting this one out, serving a one game suspension for a crosscheck to the face of Rich Peverley. It's an ironic suspension given that Backstrom seemed to be defending himself, and the Bruins have been blatantly targeting his head all series.

Tim Thomas and Braden Holby have both been solid for their teams in the first 3 games, this series is the anti-Pens/Flyers.

Boston won the last game, but it seems that in the process Alex Ovechkin may have awoken from his offensive slumber. The Capitals will need him to be at his best, along with Alexander Semin, in order to have a chance in this series.

While being neutral is all well and good, I'm pretty sure everyone who visits this site regularly wants the Bruins to lose in epic fashion, so Go Caps Go!

Check out the SB Nation sites for the two opponents for the Capitals (Japer's Rink) and the Bruins (Stanley Cup of Chowder).

Since everything was explained rather exhaustively in our previous reviews as well as part 1 on this review, I'm going to forgo the long intro and jump right into the analysis.

In case you need a refresher however, here are links to the original primer on advanced stats, the first quarter review, the half season review, and part 1 of the third quarter review which contains the table explaining what stats we're looking at for this quarter.

All statistics used are gathered from timeonice.com, behindthenet.ca, NHL.com, enattendantlesnordiques.blogspot.com, and boucherscouting.com

If you would like to follow the people involved in this project (either directly contributing or by supplying statistics) on twitter you can follow Chris Boyle (@ChrisBoyle33), Olivier Bouchard (@oli_bou), Christopher Boucher (@chrisboucher73), Gabe Desjardins (@behindthenet), and myself (@AndrewBerkshire)

Erik Cole has performed way beyond fan expectations this year, no doubt part of that is due to him taking on a role with fewer tough minutes to play than he did in Carolina, but this has still been a career year for him. Cole ranks just behind Max Pacioretty in possession numbers, although he had less of an uphill climb as far as zone starts go. Most strikingly for Cole though, is that he had the best scoring chance numbers of any Habs player. This likely lead to him also having the highest true +/- on the team. Cole's one weakness at even strength was his risk reward rating, which was below the team average and placed him 3rd among the team's right wingers.

While it took some time for Jacques Martin to give Cole powerplay minutes for some unbeknownst reason, he flourished there this season. Only Desharnais and Subban were on the ice for more scoring chances on the powerplay this season. Cole's 11 powerplay goals are 6 more than the next best player on the team (Tomas Plekanec and P.K. Subban tied with 5). Cole ranked 3rd among Habs forwards who played regularly during the year in scoring chance differential, which should put him back on the first wave of the PP next year.

First Quarter Grade: 9/10

First Half Grade: 9/10

Third Quarter Grade: 9/10

Continue reading this post »

The people in charge of the NHL from the ownership, to Colin Campbell, to Brendan Shanahan are all decidedly "old school". A large portion of fans and media are as well. And by old school I mean they don't want, as Mike Milbury would put it, "the pansification of the game".

The line trotted out by the Milburys and Don Cherrys of the world is always the same, they don't want officiating (or in this case, suspensions) deciding the outcome of games. But here's the great irony in this line of thinking, if you don't officiate and suspend, the games still aren't being decided by who's better at hockey, but who's better at cheating the system, and who's better at hurting the other team's best players.

This year's playoffs have been embarrassing for hockey fans as we see incidents like Shea Weber slam Henrik Zetterberg's head into the glass, and the only response is him losing 0.03% of his yearly salary.

Since that moment it's been pure chaos all over the place from the Bruins going after recently concussed Nicklas Backstrom's head, to the Penguins going after any Flyer they can find, to Raffi Torres tonight putting Marian Hossa in the hospital with a late hit that had no business being made.

The NHL avoids creating standards for suspensions like it's the plague, because they want to have ways to avoid suspending players. When Zdeno Chara broke Max Pacioretty's neck, the league was adamant that they couldn't prove intent, and that was all that mattered because accidents happen. When Weber slammed Zetterberg's head into the glass, intent didn't matter because there wasn't an injury. I look at this absurd sliding rule of what matters with regard to suspensions, and feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

Carl Hagelin gets 3 games for a high hit on Alfredsson, yet a few shifts before that, Chris Phillips laid a perfect carbon copy of that hit on Ryan Callahan and didn't even get a call from Shanahan.

Even worse than the inconsistency is the new regime's reluctance for severe punishment. Nearly every suspension since the season began has been either 1 or 3 games. James Wisniewski the only person unlucky enough to be punished for the crime he committed, but that was in preseason, before Shanahan lost his courage.

The dirty little secret of all this is that long suspensions work. Matt Cooke got smacked down hard last year, he knew that he was one stupid act away from saying good bye to the NHL forever, and he's been an altar boy this season. With all the garbage that's gone down in the Penguins/Flyers series, Matt Cooke has really been uninvolved. And guess what, he's still been an effective player.

Whether it be Shanahan, or someone else, the NHL needs to grow some intestinal fortitude with suspensions. Being a star player does not allow you to hurt people with impunity, and as Bruce Boudreau said on Hockey Night in Canada this week, "Either suspensions will start deciding games, or concussions will". Make your choice NHL.

With the Habs out, EOTP has decided to do a couple 'Game of the Night' threads so people can comment on the goings on. Feel free to comment on other games here as well, but the game I'll be watching tonight is Game 4 between the Nashville Predators and Detroit Red Wings.

To get pumped up for the game, while having a skate at the Bell Centre on Sunday my wife decided to "Weber" me:

As we all know, Shea Weber wasn't suspended for the incident with Henrik Zetterberg, so I doubt my wife is set to face disciplinary action. I doubt the NHL could prove intent anyway because she seems so happy there, it must have been an accident.

The EOTP crew will also be recording the season review podcast tonight, so look for that in the next couple of days.

You can watch the game on CBC.ca's stream if you'd like, and be sure to check out the SB Nation blogs for the Predators (On The Forecheck) and the Red Wings (Winging It In Motown).

Ever since Ed Willes published this article in The Province in March, I've been wondering if there was a way to make his analysis less subjective so we could actually have a breakdown of how each of the 30 NHL teams has fared in the draft over the 10 years from 2000-2009. The Canadiens actually ranked first overall according to Willes' study, which rankled a few people who are intent on believing the Habs suck at drafting, but are the Habs really the best team at drafting?

From the start I decided that WIlles' method of ranking players with his "slugging average" wasn't good enough.

Here players are graded on a four-point system: Four going to a superstar (Evgeni Malkin); three to an impact player (David Backes); two to an NHLer (Justin Abdelkader); and one point to a guy who makes the show without establishing himself as an NHLer (remember Jason King?).

What you can see there is that there's no cut off for games played for one point, and that lead to our own Bruce Peter finding flaws in Willes' numbers because there's not enough information given to find out how he arrived where he did. There's also the issue that drafting a player like Evgeni Malkin would only net you 4 times the points that an AHL call up gets you.

Willes also didn't take into account draft positioning. Should a team really get a ton of credit for drafting Sidney Crosby when he's the consensus #1 pick? Surely they get a bump for grabbing him, but not full credit. I came up with a different methodology to rank draft success based in large part around Jonathan Willis' post on Canucks Army where he shows the difference between a 1st line player and fan perception of one.

After the jump I'll break down my methodology and rank all 30 teams by this new criteria.

Continue reading this post »

The Montreal Canadiens kicked off the day by announcing officially that Carey Price is done for the year with a 'mild' concussion as diagnosed by Dr. Mulder, which means Peter Budaj will be the man between the pipes tonight and possibly all three remaining games.

However the Canadiens kick off a back to back tonight against teams that hired two former coaches from within the organization, and the back to back includes travel, so there's a slight chance that recently called up Robert Mayer may get the start tomorrow in Carolina.

Mayer has begun to make a bit of progress in the AHL, putting up a .916 save percentage since the end of November and a .916 save percentage the last month while he took over starting duties from Nathan Lawson.

Budaj get's the Tampa Bay Lightning tonight however. Budaj has recorded a .923 save percentage in his last 3 games but his team hasn't been able to eek out a win for him.

According to Renaud Lavoie, Ryan White may also be suffering from a concussion after his fight with Erik Gudbranson. I said at the time of the fight that White needs to learn to pick his battles, hopefully he does so in the future because he's a solid depth player.

Pint sized pest Gabriel Dumont has been called up to take White's lineup spot after Petteri Nokelainen also went down with injury last game. Dumont acquitted himself well in training camp this year but has struggled to produce in the AHL with just 22 points in 55 games and a -14 rating.

Somehow J.T. Wyman is the leading scorer for the Lightning against the Canadiens with 3 points and a +3 rating in 2 games, while David Desharnais has been the player to hound the Lightning with 4 points in 3 games.

Continue reading this post »

For anyone who was hoping to see Carey Price get a shot at dominating the World Championship for Canada this offseason, it's not going to happen. Radio Canada is reporting that Price sustained a concussion in practice last Thursday and will be shut down for the year.

The Canadiens organization has not confirmed their goaltender as officially having a concussion, only stating that Price has been suffering from headaches, and will undergo further testing.

It's getting to the point where you almost have to laugh this season. Very few players have made it through the season unscathed, and some of the ones who have are being dragged through the mud by fans and media.

Peter Budaj will take over the reigns for Price and likely start all three remaining games. Budaj's play has gotten markedly better throughout the season after some great work by goaltending coach Pierre Groulx, which is encouraging for next season.

It's unclear as of yet who will get the call up from Hamilton, but Robert Mayer has been getting more starts than Nathan Lawson lately. Either way Peter Delmas is likely to get some starts for the Bulldogs down the stretch.

On the bright side, this gives the Canadiens a better shot at wrapping up that 2nd overall draft pick.

There haven't been many teams that the Montreal Canadiens have dominated this season. The Ottawa Senators are one, and the surprising other is the New York Rangers who sit atop the Eastern Conference. After a brutally officiated first period in the first meeting between the two teams, the Canadiens have outscored the Rangers 11-3 (11-2 if you don't count empty netters).

Unfortunately for the Canadiens however three players who were dominant in the season series are injured or traded; Scott Gomez, Brian Gionta and Mike Cammalleri were all point per game players or better against the Rangers.

Fortunately the Canadiens' top 3 scorers in the season series are still playing in Max Pacioretty, Erik Cole, and Tomas Plekanec.

This years' Rangers are basically the exact opposite of this years' Montreal Canadiens. After a brutal start in terms of possession where they got absurdly lucky and won like crazy, the Rangers slowly got better and better.

It's pretty depressing to see the Rangers have a whopping 20 more wins that the Habs, but hopefully it'll be a good tilt!

Ryan White is a late scratch with the flu.

Continue reading this post »

Since Pierre Gauthier was fired by Geoff Molson and Bob Gainey stepped down, talk in Montreal has been dominated by speculation from fans about who will be the next GM and PR campaigns from certain media members for their friends to get the job. Molson will be hiring the next GM of the Montreal Canadiens with the help of former Habs legend and general manager Serge Savard.

It's unclear how big of a role Savard will have to play, but considering he was contradicting Molson's hiring process mere hours after the press conference announcing Gauthier's dismissal, I have a hunch that it will not be a decision making role.

Luckily for us, Gauthier's dismissal has been rumoured all season so we already have a large list of names to speculate about, and others have already done a lot of work in researching them. We're going to feature some research work here, but before that I'd like to do a preemptive knock on one 'candidate' in Pierre McGuire.

As many know, I wrote about how poor I felt McGuire would be for the job in February, and I also wrote about how set the next GM was to be universally praised. This is a unique situation in which the Canadiens should be attracting the best possible candidates. There's no reason to be settling. Anyone worth their salt can see the potential in Montreal, and we don't need a situation like this arising.

Harkening back to that point, frequent commenter at EOTP, 'Roke (@p_guay on twitter)' did some research last night and found the jobs that were held by every current NHL GM before they held their current job:

Can’t sleep so I’m taking a look at the last (non-media) job GMs had before becoming General Managers. I’ve only gone through the current guys (and Gauthier) but…

• 17 guys were Assistants in some capacity – Counting Yzerman as an assistant to Holland even though his title had "Vice President" in it.
• 7 guys were GMs elsewhere.
• 1 guy (Rutherford) was an OHL exec- though he was part of the ownership group that bought the Whalers and he stepped right in as GM.
• 1 guy (Lamoriello) came over from the NCAA (Commissioner of Hockey East, Athletic Director at Providence).
• 1 guy (Gillis) was a Player Agent.
• 1 guy stepped downstairs (Bob Murray).
• 1 guy stepped upstairs from Coaching (Bryan Murray).
• 1 guy was an NHL/AHL goaltender.

Going by this list, only one NHL GM held a job less related to managing an NHL team than McGuire potentially would, and that person is Garth Snow. That's hardly the kind of direction I'm sure fans want this franchise to go. The Canadiens have their pick of the litter here, and the cream of the crop will be taken.

After the jump we'll look at the available candidates as broken down by the venerable Jonathan WIllis of the Edmonton Journal ESPN, Hockey Prospectus, and the Nation Network.

Continue reading this post »

Since everything was explained rather exhaustively in our previous reviews as well as part 1 on this review, I'm going to forgo the long intro and jump right into the analysis.

In case you need a refresher however, here are links to the original primer on advanced stats, the first quarter review, the half season review, and part 1 of the third quarter review which contains the table explaining what stats we're looking at for this quarter.

All statistics used are gathered from timeonice.com, behindthenet.ca, NHL.com, enattendantlesnordiques.blogspot.com, and boucherscouting.com

If you would like to follow the people involved in this project (either directly contributing or by supplying statistics) on twitter you can follow Chris Boyle (@ChrisBoyle33), Olivier Bouchard (@oli_bou), Christopher Boucher (@chrisboucher73), Gabe Desjardins (@behindthenet), and myself (@AndrewBerkshire)

Max Pacioretty continues to be a dominant power forward and put up big numbers in spite of the team struggling. Shortly after the cutoff point for this review he became the Montreal Canadiens' first 30 goal scorer since Alex Kovalev in 2007-08. Max is still the best possession player on the Canadiens, and this is made even more impressive by the fact that he gets the toughest assignments of the players on his line, including not getting favourable zone starts. He has the second most scoring chances for next to Erik Cole and recorded the best ES risk/reward rating among all forwards. Put simply, Pacioretty has blossomed into a 1st line power forward who ranks among the top ten left wingers in the NHL. The most encouraging thing about Pacioretty's season is that he hasn't even been lucky. His production is sustainable and he has likely usurped Tomas Plekanec as the team's best forward.

On the powerplay Pacioretty has been equally dangerous, although his shooting luck hasn't been great there. Of players who've played more than 1 minute per game on the powerplay Pacioretty has the best Corsi on the team. Among forwards he also has the second best scoring chance differential per 60 minutes on the powerplay. Where Pacioretty can improve on the powerplay is his risk/reward rating. It's very good but not where you would expect him to be 3 Habs have better ratings. Pacioretty can be and will be better.

First Quarter Grade: 9/10

First Half Grade: 9/10

Third Quarter Grade: 9/10

Continue reading this post »

Chris Boyle and I are changing things up a little bit this time around for the review of the Montreal Canadiens. In order to get content out quicker and to make the reading process a bit easier, we're splitting the breakdown up by position. We've also changed the statistics that will be counted slightly differently and changing out one statistic for another. We'll also be doing something new in that after 62 games, we can branch out into special teams to get a broader scope of the contributions of each player.

For explanations of the statistics that are being carried over, check out the first quarter and first half reviews.

After twice looking at luck based statistics like on ice shooting percentage, one ice save percentage, then putting them together for PDO scores, we decided that in order to get a better look at how lucky or unlucky a player is, we would factor in all even strength ice time instead of just time played while the score is close.

We're also going to be splitting up Christopher Boucher's risk/reward rating into even strength, powerplay, and shorthanded situations.

The only other change to even strength statistics is that we're getting rid of +/- based quality of competition because we feel Corsi Relative Quality of Competition is a better measure of competition and we likely don't need both. To fill this empty space we'll be adding in a Relative Corsi score for each player that will add extra context for possession. This way we have a measure of how each player performs at even strength overall, and not just while the score is close.

As mentioned we'll be adding in special teams to the equation. For the powerplay we'll be measuring raw Corsi and Corsi Quality of competition. risk/reward ratings, scoring chances for and against, and in an effort to measure which players are most effective, scoring chance differential per 60 minutes of powerplay time.

For the penalty kill, we'll be using those same statistics and throwing in zone starts and finishes to measure how well players clear the zone and force faceoffs outside the defensive zone when down a man.

Continue reading this post »

Amidst the gentle euphoria of the first home game the Montreal Impact played as an Major League Soccer club, there has also been sharp negativity. While there's the classless people who cropped pictures of the opening ceremony to make it appear that the Impact supported separatism, that's not what I want to write about.

What I'm talking about is the opinion supported by Max Harris (@maxtheguru), among others, in his recent guest spot on Cowehide and Rubber (found here). Namely that the Impact shouldn't be supported by people who wish for the Expos, or more accurately an MLB team, to return to Montreal.

I took issue with this sentiment on twitter and I'll explain why, but first I want to admit that unlike Max, I'm a life long soccer fan. I grew up playing the beautiful game, even though I wasn't that good, and one of my greatest childhood memories is winning the city championship in my hometown of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan with a ragtag group that lost more than half their games in the regular season. Soccer is near and dear to my heart, so now you know where I'm coming from.

I understand if someone doesn't like soccer and therefore won't put time into the sport. That's fine. I understand if someone is a purist and doesn't like the quality of MLS soccer so views it as a waste of time, but pleading for people to not support the team in the name of a defunct team that played a different sport is illogical.

Continue reading this post »

For the purposes of argument, let's ignore the possibility that Saku Koivu wanted to move on from being the captain of the Montreal Canadiens. Also ignore the emotional connection to Koivu, because for the purposes here, we should approach this as a business and hockey move. Did the team improve by dropping Koivu and trading for Scott Gomez? Also ignore what was given up to obtain Scott Gomez. We know the trade was bad, but strictly as a player for player swap, who's the better player the last three years?

An important component is also salary. While there's no guarantee that cap space will be meaningful, or that you can find a place to spend it, the opportunity to have said cap space is a potential boon. The potential cap space saved by employing Koivu instead of Gomez would have been $4,107,143 in 2009-10, and $4,857,143 in 2010-11 and 2011-12.

After the jump we'll go through all three years since Gomez replaced Koivu extensively and break it down.

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The coveted 15th place spot in the Eastern Conference is up for grabs tonight as the New York Islanders come to Montreal to face the now streaking Canadiens. Yes folks, the Canadiens are on a hot streak of sorts, or as much of a one as can be imagined for a lottery team. The team is 3-0-2 in it's last 5 games, taking 8 of a possible 10 points.

This Islanders meanwhile have seemingly hit a wall, going 2-5-3 in their past 10 games and lost 5 straight, plummeting them to 15th in the conference. Their record now matches their goal differential, which is a conference worst -48. If the Canadiens win tonight it may all but assure that the Isles "win" the 3rd pick in the draft lottery as tonight is the first game of a 5 game road trip that could bury the team.

It's been a high scoring season series between these two teams, with Montreal winning the last two games by a combined score of 9-5. Max Pacioretty has done the most scoring with 4 goals and an assist in 3 games.

Odd Fact: Six of the nine Habs players to score against the Islanders this season are either injured or no longer with the team.

Carey Price is 2-0-0 with a .923 SVP and 2.50 GAA against the Islanders this season but Peter Budaj is likely to get the start after Price played in Ottawa last night.

Judging by the offensive effort, or lack there of, the team should be fresh tonight, but after playing 15:27 shorthanded last night, many Habs are likely exhausted.

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Two nights after the Montreal Canadiens handed the Ottawa Senators their 3rd loss in the 4 games played so far in the season series in Montreal, the Habs visit the Sens in Ottawa for a rematch.

The last game featured brilliant goaltending from Carey Price and Ben Bishop. Price got the last laugh on Wednesday as he was the first goaltender to stop Daniel Alfredsson in a shootout this season. Both goalies get the start in tonight's rematch.

Erik Karlsson has lit the league on fire in recent weeks but has struggled against the Habs this season with just 2 points and a whopping -7 rating.

The big scorers in the season series have been Erik Cole for Montreal with 3 goals and 1 assists in 4 games, and Jason Spezza for Ottawa with 2 goals and 2 assists.

Montreal's recent winning ways have threatened their lottery position in the impressively bad Eastern Conference. The New York Islanders have already taken over the coveted 28th overall spot, and a win tonight for the Habs would put them into a tie for 26th with the Carolina Hurricanes, just one point behind the collapsing Toronto Maple Leafs for the final lottery position.

Andrei Markov is being held out of tonight's game due to a surprise upper body injury, but many suspect that the organization is just being cautious with back to back games since Markov is still fresh off of a near 2 year absence.

Blake Geoffrion is a late scratch to make way for superstar Mike Blunden.

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Readers of EOTP know that we've been saying Montreal Canadiens defenseman P.K, Subban hasn't been having a "sophomore slump" since day one, but suffering from poor shooting luck while taking on the toughest job of any young defender in the game and excelling.

Recently Subban's luck has begun to turn, with 4 goals in his last 8 games. Many are already searching for ways to explain why he's begun to put the puck in the net, but we see that it's simple regression to the mean.

Likewise, it's very likely that Subban has a stellar year next year offensively. What we're asking here, is for you guys to submit what you think will be the prevailing narrative surrounding Subban's resurgent goal scoring. EOTP members aren't included in the contest but will be judging the winner based on how often we hear a similar explanation in the media.

A winner will be chosen after the conclusion of the 2012 NHL playoffs and we'll send you an email asking for your size and address to send you a P.K. Subban Habs T-shirt.

Put your entry in the comments section! One entry per person.

Fans and media across the NHL have decided it's as close to guaranteed as a hockey move gets that Pierre Gauthier is relieved of his duties when the regular season concludes. While the hyperbole surrounding Gauthier's tenure, usually on the negative side, is fairly inaccurate, I don't think fans or media can be blamed for assuming he will be fired or wanting him gone.

He has a demeanor that puts people off and he has made his fair share of blunders or moves that had no effect or a negative one:

-Trading for Brent Sopel

-Trading for Petteri Nokelainen

-Trading for Paul Mara

-Firing Jacques Martin

-Hiring an English coach and then issuing an apology for it

-Firing Perry Pearn moments before a game

-Advising Gainey on trading Mike Ribeiro for Janne Niinimaa

-Advising Gainey on trading Ryan McDonagh and Chris Higgins for Scott Gomez and Tom Pyatt

And some moves that are divisive but inconclusive in results as of yet:

-Trading Mike Cammalleri and a 5th round pick for Rene Bourque, Patrick Holland and a 2nd round pick

-Trading Jaroslav Spacek for Tomas Kaberle

-Trading Matt D'agostini for Aaron Palushaj

So operating under the premise that he will be gone sometime around April, what can we expect from the next general manager of the Montreal Canadiens? A lot of fans want sweeping change, but not only is that not likely, it would be a terrible decision. This is because the next GM of the Habs is already set up to be universally praised.

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Coming into the season the folks at EOTP were measured in what they expected from Louis Leblanc. Some of us were thrown by the scouting reports that came out that projected him as a good 3rd line winger at best. None of us expected him to play much time for the Montreal Canadiens this season, much less nearly force his way into the lineup with solid play.

After having out expectations adjusted, most of us were happy with the idea that Leblanc may become a solid top 9 forward who can pot 15-20 goals every year. But should we expect a bit more from Louis? And I don't mean "because he's a 1st round pick" or "because he's French", I mean because his play has been indicative that he might be a gamer.

There are some limitations for Leblanc's game, skating and muscle mass being key ones, but he's a very hard worker and could likely improve those enough to make the comparison I'm about to make a bit more legitimate.

I've been pouring over Behind The Net the last while for a project with Concordia University, and going through those numbers I discovered something interesting; Louis Leblanc has had a very similar 20 year old year to rising star Max Pacioretty.

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Sunday evening 4 members of the EOTP crew got together with Ellen Etchingham of The Score's NHL blog Backhand Shelf and Laura Saba of The Active Stick. You can follow Ellen on twitter at @theoryofice and Laura at @theactivestick.

Chris Boyle wasn't able to make the podcast but Bruce Peter, Kevin van Steendelaar, Stephan Cooper and I were good to go as we discussed the trade deadline deals, Martin vs Cunneyworth, the future of the team and how annoying PR is in general.

We had some feedback problems in recording so bear with us a bit.

EOTP's March 2012 Podcast (via HabsEOTPsbn)