Sometimes, numbers just don’t tell the story...imagine a team having this statistical edge:
Shots: 33-23
Shots attempted: 63-47
Hits: 25-19
Takeaways: 9-7
Giveaways: 2-4 (having fewer of them)
Power play chances: 3-2
Faceoffs won: 24-19
You’d think that team won, wouldn’t you....nope. Rangers – the ones with the edge – lost handily at home to Toronto on Saturday, 4-1.
Carey Price still has the biggest dumpload of a backside in professional hockey. J-S Giguere wears Michelin Man chest protectors...Price wears clown pants. But I’d sure like to have him on my team.
NHL.com has in introduced a “real time” window for each game that gives you score, time, and SOG in cute colored graphics...but they’ve mangled the shift chart (they don’t have one anymore), the game summary, and what used to be the “super stats”....the triumph of format over content...welcome to the Internet 2007.
When the season began, the Devils and the Rangers having the same record wouldn’t have been considered unusual...that they are both 3-6-1 is.
And Buffalo’s limping along at 5-5-0, too...whodathunk that it’d be the Islanders leading the New York (plus Jersey) challenge tournament at 5-4-0?
And in that same vein, of last year’s eight playoff teams in the east, only four are playing above .500 (Ottawa, Pittsburgh, Tampa Bay, NY Islanders).
Last year, 26 goalies playing at least 41 games had a save percentage of .900 or better. So far this year, 18 goalies playing at least five games are .900 or better. Just sayin’...
Speaking of which...Manny Fernandez’ save percentage is .832 up in Boston. Guess the Wild kept the right goalie (even though he injured his groin – in practice, no less – and will miss at least Sunday’s game).
Philadelphia was the odds-on favorite to be this year’s most improved team (well, for this prognosticator, anyway). But did anyone have Columbus being 6-3-1 at the 10-game mark? Of course, having a goalie with four shutouts ain’t hurtin’, either.
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