Ramblings: Who’s up for some overtime hockey? (April 18)

Neil Parker

2017-04-18

Mike Hoffman - USA TODAY Sports Images

 

I ran a list of all the forwards with at least 40 games this season ranked by high-danger scoring chances per 60 minutes at five-on-five. Sidney Crosby and his most frequent wingers, Connor McDavid and his two wingers and Auston Matthews, Zach Hyman and William Nylander weren't shocks to see among the leaders.

I won't flood the page with the list, but if you want to peek through yourself, here's a link to the starting point.

 

Seeing Patrick Maroon sitting eighth in the league obviously has more to do with his assignment next to McDavid than his own play, but that's why we owned Maroon in fantasy in the first placet this season, right?

Roto results don't discriminate should become a go-to fantasy saying.

 

Here were some of the surprising leaders in high-danger scoring chances per 60 minutes from this season.

 

Jordan Staal: The center has remained healthy in consecutive seasons and posted 48 and 45 points, respectively. It's encouraging that Staal is surrounded by an emerging core of talented young scorers and an excellent young blue line. He's nothing more than a fringe asset in shallow leagues, but his significant role provides a reliable floor in deeper settings. Additionally, Staal's a valuable asset in leagues including faceoffs.

Brendan Gallagher: It's been a disastrous two-year stretch for Gallagher, but this season's 10 goals and 5.3 shooting percentage stand out as unsustainably low marks. It's also encouraging to know that he was on the ice for so many high-danger scoring chances. Still only 24 years old, Gallagher is just beginning his prime offensive years, and he should return to a more consistent — and favorable — role for our fantasy purposes.

Jordan Eberle: It's easy to overlook Eberle's respectable campaign after he blew what looked like a golden fantasy opportunity to skate on Connor McDavid's flank. However, the wigner's 20 goals, 51 points and 208 shots are solid marks, and he also logged fewer minutes and posted the worst shooting percentage of his career (9.6). Even the potential of playing with McDavid should provide an uptick in interest for Eberle entering 2017-18. There's a better than zero chance he does spend some time playing with McDavid, after all.

Mika Zibanejad: After consecutive 20-goal seasons with 161 games played, the first-year Blueshirt was limited to just 56 contests this year. Zibanejad continued to flash tremendous offensive upside but was also extremely inconsistent with 30 pointless outings. However, it was still the best point-per-game return (0.66) of his career, which will likely go over looked as he heads into his age-24 season. Another modest step forward next year is within reach.

Anders Lee: Noting the John Tavares boost is important from the onset, and Lee also posted an unrepeatable 17.8 shooting percentage. However, he wasn't a power-play standout with just nine goals and five helpers with the man advantage, and he also provides help in the PIM (56) and hits (172) columns. It's unlikely Lee draws the ire of your leaguemates when you pluck him late, but often the boring players in their prime provide the roster stability to gamble on upside at the end of drafts and throughout the season.

Jakob Silfverberg: What's most impressive about Silfverberg is that he consistently played against the opposition's best players while starting just 37.4 percent of his five-on-five shifts in the offensive zone. And while that role limits his fantasy upside, he did show modest growth in all offensive categories this season with 23 goals, 49 points and 227 shots. He's in the heart of his offensive prime and saw an uptick in ice time this year, too.

Radek Faksa: There is a lot to like about the long-term upside of Faksa, and it was surprising to see him so high on this list. The obvious concern is that a lot of his shifts were against soft opponents, but 2016-17 was also his first full season in the league, so it's a bit of a wash. Considering the talent in Dallas, he's a top-six role and consistent power-play time away from flirting with 50 points.

 

***

 

Don Cherry is going a little overboard with his troll job of Nikita Zaitsev.

Perhaps, Evgeny Kuznetsov should tune in to Coach's Corner more frequently, though.

 

 

***

 

It was pretty amazing that all four games went to overtime, and I was able to watch the majority of three of them. Unfortunately, the boxscore will have to tell the story of the Boston-Ottawa bout.

 

Ottawa drove the possession and scoring chances, and the stars from the Senators showed up.

Mike Hoffman netted his first two goals of the playoffs, and Derick Brassard recorded his second consecutive multi-point game. Erik Karlsson's first-period pass was pretty, and he's now logged over 30 minutes in consecutive games.

Interestingly, Bobby Ryan continued to play a limited role with the fourth-fewest minutes (13:49) among Ottawa forwards, but he collected the game-winning tally. He was also on the ice for five high-danger scoring chances, which tied with Brassard for tops on the team. Only two of those HDSC came at five-on-five for Ryan, though.

With Karlsson on the ice, Ottawa held Boston to just 10 shot attempts and five shots over 20:45 at five-on-five. That's incredible, and especially since close to half of his ice time was against possession-wizard Patrice Bergeron.

 

Turning to Boston, Bergeron owned his matchups against Cody Ceci and Dion Phaneuf, and the Bruins have a difficult decision ahead about their go-to center's usage. In order to generate more offense, trying to separate Bergeron from the matchup against Karlsson could pay off. However, you also run the risk of letting the star defenseman run wild even more against inferior competition.

It's worth adding, while Karlsson did own the possession battle against Bergeron, the scoring chances and high-danger chances were even.

Ottawa also just slipped up for a brief second-period stint (which I did see), and David Pastrnak was the only go-to Bruin to mark the scoresheet. Brad Marchand has been held pointless in two consecutive games, and David Krejci was ineffective over just 14:37 of ice time in his return.

The Bruins certainly have bounce-back potential, and Boston did wake up after a horrible first period, but Ottawa is healthier. The Sens' scoring depth should continue to cause problems for Boston's patchwork blue-line corps.

 

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Exactly what every Toronto fan feared and non-Toronto fan expected happened in the first five minutes of Game 3 between the Caps and Leafs. Washington scored on its first two shots, Nicklas Backstrom had a goal and an assist, Alex Ovechkin scored, T.J. Oshie had two helpers, and the rout was underway.

It just didn't go down that way, though. Toronto had six comeback wins following the trade deadline and drove the possession battle at even strength in all three periods.

One tidbit crystallized about Auston Matthews after he threw a hit Monday. He rarely throws his body around, which is absolutely fine, because he typically attempts to gain an advantageous body position to create a turnover. Additionally, he's usually successful in keeping his feet moving and not getting caught off balance or out of the play. His takeaway skills are impressive, but as he grows into his body and becomes more comfortable in the league, it wouldn't be shocking to see him add a more physical element to his game. He picked his spot well Monday, too.

There were only five shot attempts and two shots registered by the Caps over William Nylander's 12:52 of five-on-five ice time Monday, and Toronto attempted 23 shots and registered nine, including six high-danger chances. It might have been Nylander's best game of his career, with what's at stake in mind, of course.

The confidence Morgan Rielly is building during this playoff run will translate into his true breakout campaign next year. He needs to see more consistent power-play time to make it a true fantasy breakout, but you can see the game slowing down for Rielly. There is 50-point potential if everything breaks right, but banking on him meeting the 40-point mark is more realistic. He's using his speed more effectively and picking his spots more successfully. The high-scoring supporting cast helps, too.

 

It's difficult to pinpoint any shortcomings with the Capitals. Going 0-for-3 on the power play stings, especially with a two-minute, five-on-three advantage, but that was in the second period with a 3-1 lead.

Braden Holtby's .857 save percentage is also an eyesore, but how do you fault him on any of the four goals? Additionally, his gusty dash at Mitch Marner saved what could have been a promising chance and clear-cut breakaway.

Ultimately, though, what was once a seed of doubt is now a budding Maple tree.

 

***

 

Nashville is the fastest team in the league. The Preds have oodles of straight-ahead speedsters, but their team speed is best seen in their ability to transition, and keep the defense on its heels with quick, short-range passes while also spreading them out and creating soft spaces in all three zones.

Time after time, Nashville utilized a soft dump that would have qualified as an icing, but a Nashville forward beat a Chicago defender to the puck to create a lasting possession in the Blackhawks' zone. There always seems to be two open options, and like coaches hope to draw it up, there are two-on-one and three-on-two opportunities all over the ice to make life easy. When in need, Nashville is also able to lay the puck into open spaces and rely on their speed to retrieve it. They're in synch.

 

The key for Nashville winning this series was for its depth to out produce Chicago's, and that's certainly been the case. Patrick Kane was dangerous Monday, and Marian Hossa had his moments. But with the game on the line in the third period and overtime, the Hawks had just six scoring chances and two high-danger chances compared to Nashville's 20 and six.

The Filip ForsbergRyan JohansenViktor Arvidsson line all had Corsi For percentages above 70 at five-on-five, and so did Kevin Fiala. Whereas Trevor van Riemsdyk's 46.34 mark paced the Hawks, and Duncan Keith, Hossa, Nick Schmaltz, Artem Anisimov and Jonathan Toews were all under 35 percent. That's just not good enough in April.

For a stretch, it looked Chicago was going to climb back into the series. And with a two-goal lead entering the third period, it seemed like the Hawks could hold on. Corey Crawford did his part and made a number of solid saves. After all, the first goal was pretty fluky, and while it wasn't goalie interference on the game-trying tally, he was bumped. After stopping 46 shots, it checks out as another playoff gem from Crawford. He did his job.

 

It's shaping up to be a second-round matchup between St. Louis and Nashville, and with the Blues generating just 6.04 high-danger scoring chances per 60 minutes through it's first thee games of the playoffs, the Preds should be prove difficult to stop.

 

***

 

Calgary never took control of Monday's game. They dominated the first two periods but allowed a goal late in each frame to let Anaheim hang around. Brian Elliott stunk up the joint, whereas Jonathan Bernier was perfect after entering at the midway point. It's simplistic, but that really was the difference.

Turning to Bernier briefly, dating back to mid-February, he sports a 14-3-2 record with a .927 save percentage and 2.16 GAA. The pending unrestricted free agent should be popular on July 1, as he proved to be a capable stopgap and backup/1B option this year. It wouldn't be overly surprising if Bernier returned to Anaheim, either. This was a successful season for both.

Obviously, the Nate Thompson — Anaheim's third — goal appeared to be deflected in with a high stick. Calls don't always go the way you hope, though, and while a momentum killer, Calgary still had the lead. Good teams rally in those situations.

It's also got to be difficult to know that Thompson factored in on all three goals to sink your season. What a showing from the 32-year-old veteran. Additionally, while Shea Theodore picked up two goals to up his point total to five through three games for the postseason, neither tally should have gone in. Hampus Lindholm chipping in offense is also encouraging for the Ducks going forward. His play will have a significant impact on the depth of Anaheim's run this spring, and especially with the Ducks' blue line dealing with multiple injuries to key cogs.

Back to Elliott, though. He just had to be tougher and fight through bodies to make those saves. Anaheim is big and ensures there is always a net-front presence. It's not supposed to be easy, and instead of upping his game with the season on the line in the third period and overtime, he made it easy for the Ducks.

Bernier was perfect to backstop a comeback, and Elliott allowed five soft goals.

 

***

 

Thanks, Dobberheads.

 

 

5 Comments

  1. pdupuis 2017-04-18 at 05:16

    One shortcoming with the Caps, their playoff history.

    • Stu Campaigne 2017-04-18 at 21:30

      That’s rich, considering their opponent

  2. Marc-Olivier Fortier 2017-04-18 at 08:56

    Can’t spell Ovechkin without C-H-O-K-E…

  3. NHLGodfather 2017-04-18 at 09:49

    Just a simple fans observation. The Caps have to start hitting them, and hitting them hard to slow those kids down. Then those inexperienced kids will start to make mistakes. The Leafs are buzzing all around the rink like hornets. The Leafs are having too much fun.

  4. lcbtd 2017-04-18 at 16:33

    Great stuff Neil!

    Just heard on the radio 51% of Canadians watched hockey these playoffs. All the Canadian content is making life easier for the networks here.

    The U.S. is doing well too with the marquee teams playing (Pitt, Chi, NYR).

    The NHL must be pretty happy.

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