NHL analysis

Game Predictions, beginning with tonight, now use team offence and defence, as well as power rankings, to determine predicted winners.  Power Ranks are multiplied by the ratio of offence (average shots plus goals taken per game) over defence (average shots plus goals allowed per game).  Power Ranks, team offence and team defence stats are kept and used separately for home and away games.
Away            Home                   Prediction

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Carolina         Atlanta                Carolina
Colorado       Columbus             Colorado
NY Rangers   Anaheim               Anaheim
Toronto        Tampa Bay           Tampa Bay
Pittsburgh     Los Angeles          Pittsburgh
Calgary         Detroit                 Detroit
St. Louis       Dallas                   Dallas
Nashville       Edmonton             Nashville

The closest prediction is Tampa Bay or Toronto.  The widest gap between team strengths is Dallas over St. Louis.  Neither of those are surprising, as both Tampa Bay and Toronto have been inconsistent and Dallas has obviously been a better team than St. Louis.

Carolina over Atlanta should be a very interesting game, and one where I would be tempted to vote against my prediction.  Atlanta should be upset with themselves over their game in Toronto, and should come out flying.

Pittsburgh over Los Angeles is a closer call than you might think.  Pittsburgh has been giving up far more shots than it is taking.  If Marc-Andre Fleury gets injured or just hits a cold streak, Pittsburgh could be in serious trouble.

I’ve posted expected final standings (link is along top).  These standings show both points that each team is on pace for (i.e. the points they will finish with if they maintain their current win percentage throughout the rest of the season) and their expected final points (which takes into account their power rank and their remaining schedule difficulty).

It’s worth pointing out that the predictions are still fairly inaccurate.  There is simply no way even the best teams can continue the pace they are on, meaning it’s ridiculous to think Buffalo will finish with 147 points, or Detroit with 154 (a perfect season is 164).  Detroit has already lost 9 points off of a perfect season.  Clearly they are not going to go 70-0-1 for the remainder of their schedule.

I’m posting these so early despite the obvious limitations because I think that even now, these predictions offer a clearer picture of how teams rank up than the standings based purely on points.  Those standings don’t take into account games played, for once thing.  I’ll probably post the standings sorted by the winning percentages in the near future, as well.

New Power Rankings are up (see link along top of page). Here are some notables:

1. Buffalo Sabres (+14 from last week): The statistics finally agree with the general assessment - the Sabres are the best team in the league. While their schedule has still be easier than the league average, their winning percentage, even though I don’t give them full credit for their three shootout victories, is unbelievable.

13. Pittsburgh Penguins (+13): If I take their offence vs. defence into consideration, the Penguins drop dramatically. However, they’ve taken advantage of a very easy schedule and the play of their youngsters is frightening to their opponents.

19. Chicago Blackhawks (-12): The loss of Michal Handzus, Martin Havlat and Nikolai Khabibulin have hurt the team tremendously. Can the rest of the team bounce back? Doesn’t look like it so far, as they failed to score even against Robert Esche and the struggling Flyers.

20. Boston Bruins (+7): Beating the Ottawa Senators helped. Their very difficult schedule helped, too. Zdeno Chara, Marc Savard, and especially Hannu Toivonen need to step up if this team has any hope of making the playoffs. Their schedule isn’t going to get any easier, either.

28. Columbus Blue Jackets (-14): Ugly drop (worst in the league). Giving up too many shots and not taking enough. Time of Nikolai Zherdev, Rick Nash, Anson Carter and more to step it up a notch. Or several.

30. Phoenix Coyotes (0): 30th in the league in anything is not where you want to be two weeks in a row. Will Yannic Perrault make a difference? Probably, not probably not enough.

Check out the full listing by clicking the tab above.

Last night of my warm up for game predictions. Let’s hope for a good one!

Away             Home                     Prediction

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Nashville         Vancouver              Nashville
Chicago          NY Islanders           Chicago
Ottawa           Montreal                 Ottawa
San Jose        Florida                    San Jose
Ottawa versus Montreal should be an excellent game to watch.  The two teams are statistically very close, although Ottawa’s recent success suggests they’re actually by far the stronger team.

An even closer game statistically, believe it or not, is San Jose over Florida.  Florida has been pretty solid at home, and San Jose has not been as good on the road as they could.  However, Florida has been inconsistent, from their goaltending through their forwards, and that’s never a good thing for a hockey club.  In particular, San Jose’s deep offence should prove to be far too much for whoever gets the call in net for the Panthers.

The easiest game to call should be Nashville over Vancouver.  Vancouver has played pretty well, but the loss of Willie Mitchell hurts and they still need to find scoring depth.  Nashville has really come on after a slow start, helped by Jason Arnott’s excellent play.

Too much pressure. That sums up the problems of the Calgary Flames.

It’s not that they lack scoring depth. It’s not that they lack a number one centerman to play with Jarome Iginla. It’s not that they rely too much on Miikka Kiprusoff.

Calgary, from head-to-toe, is under intense pressure from the media, from the fans, from themselves, from everyone. The early pressure has focused mostly on newcomer Alex Tanguay, who was apparently supposed to turn last year’s third lowest scoring team (the worst two were the Chicago Blackhawks and St. Louis Blues, who finished 28th and 30th overall) into an offensive powerhouse. Pressure!

The pressure has also been focused on Iginla, despite having 9 points (5 goals 4 assists) in 9 games. In fact, Iginla generally starts off very slow, picking his pace up more and more as the season progresses. If that trend continues, Iginla could have a career year. But when the team ain’t winning, the captain can expect to face pressure no matter how well he’s doing.

The pressure has especially been focused on new headcoach Jim Playfair, who walks into really unfair circumstances. Is there anyone out there who would want to follow up a Suter? Even worse than his predecessor (and still boss) is the expectations he faces. With his team “expected” to compete for the Conference title, not to mention the Stanley Cup, what can Playfair do but disappoint?

Calgary will improve. They’re too stingy and too deep on the blueline for anything else to happen. And Kipper has proven himself to be the steadying influence every team wishes it could have between the pipes. But the team will improve faster if the expectations weren’t so high. The division, the conference, the league that Calgary plays in is tough! Very tough! And they are quite simply not a powerhouse. I still wouldn’t want to face them in the playoffs.

And that may be the best thing anyone can say about any team in the NHL these days.

Five games tonight:

Visitor             Home                     Prediction

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Chicago          Philadelphia              Chicago
Anaheim         St. Louis                  Anaheim
Washington    Calgary                    Washington
Atlanta           Toronto                   Atlanta
NY Rangers     Los Angeles             NY Rangers

Five games, five road victories predicted.

Chicago has an opportunity to get itself back on track when it faces the struggling Flyers. They were looking great until three of their top players went down in rapid succession (Havlat, Hadzus and Khabibulin). The Flyers were looking great until… OK, so they haven’t looked great in years.

Toronto dominated their recent game against Montreal but only managed a shootout victory after giving up two goals late in the third period. Tonight they face a much tougher challenge in the form of a visit from the Atlanta Thrashers. The Thrashers have been phenomenal on the road (everywhere really) and the Leafs will have their hands full. Hopefully they give their fans a better showing than their usual home play so far this season. This game is statistically the widest gap between team strengths.
Statistically the closest game is the Rangers over the Kings. The Rangers have been mostly mediocre (thrashing the Coyotes doesn’t count), though they have the talent to be much better.

Calgary could really use a win against Washington, but their home record so far this year doesn’t suggest they’ll get it. The Capitals are slowly improving but they’re really just not a very good team - yet. The 14 first-round picks on their roster suggest great potential, and Alexander Semin’s emergence this year gives them a secondary scoring threat that should take some of the pressure off of Alexander Ovechkin - as if the attention seems to slow him down any. On the other hand, Olaf Kolzig is used to facing plenty of rubber and the Flames aren’t very good at generating offence. That’s a bad combination for a struggling Calgary team.

Last night was an excellent night for my predictions. I missed only 2 games out of 13: Toronto beat Montreal in a shootout, and Ottawa’s offence, so good against the Leafs just days before, shot blanks and lost a very winnable game against the Boston Bruins.

2 games for tonight:

Home Away Prediction

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San Jose Tampa Bay San Jose
Minnesota Colorado Minnesota

Two relatively straightforward predictions. San Jose and Minnesota have been superb, while Tampa Bay and Colorado have been mediocre at best, even at home.

October is almost done, and my predictions have been getting steadily improved results. Hopefully that will only continue as the season progresses.

Wow, what a night of hockey we have tonight.  I can’t believe I have to miss the Leafs-Habs game!

Home                Away                        Predictions

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Toronto             Montreal                   Montreal
Florida               NY Islanders              NY Islanders
Atlanta               Buffalo                     Buffalo
Ottawa              Boston                      Ottawa
Pittsburgh          Philadelphia               Pittsburgh
Detroit              St. Louis                   Detroit
Los Angeles       Dallas                        Dallas
NY Rangers        Phoenix                    NY Rangers
Tampa Bay        Carolina                    Carolina
Columbus          New Jersey                New Jersey
Anaheim            Chicago                    Anaheim
Washington       Edmonton                Edmonton
Nashville            Calgary                    Nashville

The Toronto-Montreal game should be a gem (they always are).  The statistical difference I have between these two teams heading into tonight’s game is 0.004.  Just to give you an idea, Pittsburgh has a current away power rank that is 0.489 higher than Philadelphia’s home power rank.

I almost hate to predict against Buffalo, even if they are poised to break one of the records currently held by the Leafs.  Should they win tonight, that’ll make 11 straight wins to open a season.  Should the new record have an asterisk because of their three shootout wins?  I say no.  Although 3 years ago those three wins would have been ties, the Sabres still won.  And the NHL standings aren’t decided by regulation victories, but by points.  And I should point out that I’ve predicted against Buffalo four times this year, and they’ve won all four of those games.

Los Angeles is a team I’m more confident predicting against.  They’ve managed to win only a single game that I predicted they would lose.

Check back early in November, because I’ll be posting power ranks and more.  A few tidbits:

- I currently have Buffalo, Minnesota and Dallas listed as the strongest three teams.  If team Offence and Defence are factored in, however, Detroit jumps to the number one spot, mostly due to their unbelievably stingy defence.  They’re averaging just over 23 shots plus goals allowed per game (the NHL average is over 33).

- When factoring in remaining schedule difficulty, Minnesota is currently my favourite to win the President’s Trophy.  Of course, since they’ve played 10 games and have 72 remaining, plenty will change, so take that with a grain of salt.

- A few teams that are statistically overachieving (on pace for more points than expected based on their remaining schedule difficulty) are the Calgary Flames, New York Rangers and Buffalo Sabres.

- A few teams that are statistically underachieving are the Detroit Red Wings, Chicago Blackhawks and Carolina Hurricanes.

- Detroit has had the most difficult schedule to date so far.  Pittsburgh has had the easiest.