Off day for Habs. Hopefully no fine
by Kevin van Steendelaar on Apr 24, 2011 9:43 PM EDT
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PrintApologies for no post game write up last night. Holiday dinners, and wedding plans kept me away from the good ole laptop for the night and most of today.
Arguably Saturday's 2-1 loss in double OT was the best of the series thus far. It's a series that could easily be over for the Bruins after five games. Game Five however was a Bruins win largely in part to Tim Thomas. The Bruins goalie is clearly not collapsing further as the series progressed. In fact, he may be getting better.
Carey Price was equally brilliant, but his defensive coverage played the key breakdown in both Bruins goals.
The Montreal Canadiens had Sunday off as they made it back to Montreal to face the Boston Bruins Tuesday. Players were not available to the media, but coach Jacques Martin did speak to them.
There is a report circulating via RDS that the Habs were fined $10,000 for making their players unavailable to the press last Tuesday. Neither the NHL or the Canadiens have confirmed this.
I suspect the report is false, as four Habs could have made it more worth the ten grand by flipping the bird at the TD Banknorth crowd on Saturday.
There is also speculation that David Desharnais suffered a knee injury during the overtime. Desharnais was brilliant playing alongside Brian Gionta and Scott Gomez.
Sean Gordon on the Habs facing stress
Joe McDonald on the Bruins struggling power play
Pat Hickey on the Habs missed opportunities
Dave Stubbs on Max Pacioretty's tweet about Brad Marchand.
History doesn't favour the Habs
Michael Ryder's back home road hockey skills pay off in Game Five
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Boston has gotten...
every lucky break, near-sighted ref, biased league official, & fluke bounce. You’d think Karma would even things out & maybe she is. I know how the Caps & Pens felt last year when things seemed always to go the Habs way.
I’m sure Jacques Martin will have the boys “fired up” for tuesday night. Probably the way an accountant is fired up about an audit, doesn’t have a good feel.
Nothing Is Fool proof if you have the right fools.
According to Olivier
The scoring chances are 91-89 for the Bruins through 5 games (83-79 at even strength).
http://enattendantlesnordiques.blogspot.com/
This is coming down to bounces/health folks.
And since the Bruins have been the luckiest club in the league all year while the Habs have struggled to even buy a goal… sigh
It’s unfortunate given that the Habs do look like they are the better club, if not by much. Guess we shouldn’t complain too much, they lived by that sword last year…
Yeah, we can’t complain after the improbable run in 2010 as the Habs laughed in the face of probability for 14 games.
by Chris Boyle on Apr 25, 2011 10:32 AM EDT up reply actions
How do you quantify luck? Just what makes Boston the luckiest club? (seriously asking)
Ironic since I would say Boston is the better club given the fact that their top line has yet to produce.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 10:40 AM EDT up reply actions
PDO, basically. It’s a measure of the addition of save percentage (variations of which have some skill element but are still pretty luck-driven) and shooting percentage (variations of which, at the team/season scale, are almost entirely luck).
Boston has ridden the percentages all year, surfing on an historic run by Tim Thomas (which marked a pretty grim defense: second-most shots allowed in the entire league, really?) and some very fortunate shooting (4th best in the league). This, not surprisingly, gives them the highest 5-on-5 PDO in the league by far at a whopping 1024. By comparison, Montreal, despite a very solid goaltening performance, had New Jerseyesque bad luck with their shooting and managed to fall under 1000, making the playoffs largely on the strength of their control of the play with Carey Price’s heroics making up for their unfortunate shooting.
PDO regresses very strongly to 1000 over time. Goaltending is a skill and can make a difference, but it will be a smaller one than this; Tim Thomas’s performance is truly exceptional and unlikely to be duplicated, by him or anyone, anytime soon. And the Bruins’ shooting is very likely to regress back as well (case in point, they were the unluckiest shooting team last season, pretty much on par with this year’s Canadiens).
This, incidentally, tells you how little analysis most mainstream media analysts actually do. Because they had all those goals and because Tim Thomas stood on his head for half the season, Boston was bombarded a Cup contender and a team headed for, at least, the conference finals. From the underlying numbers, one could argue they’re the third-best team in their division at carrying the play, let alone the conference (mind you, this ignores special teams, drawing/taking penalties, and so on.)
Boston are much better than last year’s Habs and wouldn’t need nearly as much luck as that team to make it deep, but should they get past the Habs, they’re still going to be underdogs in pretty much every other matchup they participate in.
You may want to check your data. Boston’s shooting percentage is 9.06, 16th in the NHL 244 goals on 2698 shots)
As for Thomas’s performance being exceptional and unlikely to be duplicated, I do believe the same exact thing was said about him two seasons ago when he finished with what was then the second best ever shooting percentage.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 11:18 AM EDT up reply actions
I’m looking exclusively at 5-on-5 data; special teams are a different animal. Here’s a link to the venerable, terrifying Gabe Desjardin’s site, with the teams sorted by ES shooting percentage this year (expressed as opposing save percentage):
Never was a fan of the site simply because it is so unwieldy… hard to decipher what the columns actually mean and thus determine their importance.
Also not that using the same PDO that Pittsburgh was a 1020 two years ago and still captured the Cup.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 11:47 AM EDT up reply actions
Very true. Just pointing out that is not necessarily indicative of postseason failure.
BTW, if the stat were extended to playoff stats (using all shots since PP shots aren’t available) then it would be Boston who is slightly the unlucky one and Montreal the slightly lucky one (1005). However, that number is close enough to the expected 1000 as to be meaningless.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 12:22 PM EDT up reply actions
And about Tim Thomas, his performance was literally historically good. That makes it extremely unlikely not to be a performance high. If this year’s performance is his true talent level, then he is by far the best goalie in NHL history in a way that should not allow debate. My thinking is that this is extremely unlikely.
I realize his performance was phenomenal… but its not like he had never approached that level before. He neared it two seasons ago as well and based on this seasons performance, one must wonder how well he would have performed last year if not for the hip injury.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 11:41 AM EDT up reply actions
My thinking is that this is extremely unlikely.
Safe bet.
by Chris Boyle on Apr 25, 2011 11:41 AM EDT up reply actions
case in point, they were the unluckiest shooting team last season, pretty much on par with this year’s Canadiens).
Only if you consider .820 comparable to .754… seems like a significant differential to me.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 11:19 AM EDT up reply actions
And how indicative is PDO truly? From what I can tell from doing the math (save % + shooting %) Chicago and Philly were 21 and 22 last year.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 11:23 AM EDT up reply actions
Luck is the offspring of effort. The Habs have had their fair share of good luck in the series. There were several times the puck found it’s way out of the crease with Price having no idea where it was. The hooking call on Bergeron in game 3 was total BS. I will admit with the exception of game 5, the series has been horribly officiated, but the calls have gone both ways.
I will admit with the exception of game 5, the series has been horribly officiated, but the calls have gone both ways.
As I see it, the best way to know officiating is even is when fans of both teams are complaining about officiating.
And I agree, game 5 was called as well as possible.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 1:25 PM EDT up reply actions
Still whining about that hooking call? It was something that had to be called.
Follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/andrewberkshire
by Andrew Berkshire on Apr 25, 2011 2:24 PM EDT up reply actions
Tell that to the Washington Capitals. They outchanced the Habs 189-126 over 7 games last spring and lost. It isn’t because the Habs had better snipers or all-world goaltending.
The Habs were fortunate and any Hab fan who says otherwise is in denial.
The Bruins have had a little more fortune than the Habs have. THAT is why they are up 3-2 and not down 3-2.
PS. A hooking call is not bad luck, lifting the puck over the glass when you are trying to hit the glass is bad luck.
Patch's Tweet
This is just a guess, but I suspect the only people that had a problem with Pacioretty’s tweet about Marchand were Habs management. It seems a shame that something as harmless, yet funny, as that tweet caused a stir. To me it was completely harmless and very funny. I suspect even Bruins players, including Marchand, thought it was funny. It would be great if some good natured ribbing continued back and forth for the rest of the series. I thought it was great, but some uptight people somewhere have decided to muzzle Patch. Too bad.
There were some Bruins fans on SCOC that were obviously annoyed by it. One guy called Pacioretty the most classless injured player ever.
Follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/andrewberkshire
by Andrew Berkshire on Apr 25, 2011 2:25 PM EDT up reply actions
and no one chimed in to support that assertion. We’re all pretty much of the mind that it’s amusing chirping
Agreed. Was far from insulting and didn’t come anywhere close to crossing the line. To me its comparable to Ference’s salute… amusing and ultimately meaningless.
by BobbyOrrsBastard on Apr 25, 2011 3:38 PM EDT up reply actions
I figured that, I haven’t checked in a couple days though.
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by Andrew Berkshire on Apr 25, 2011 4:12 PM EDT up reply actions
Pacioretty's comments
While there is bound to be a few fans that over react to everything every Bruins fan I’ve talked to found this funny. Heck, I heard Andrew Ferrence on a Boston radio show this morning and when informed of the tweet he laughed out loud. Its all in good fun, besides Marchand does have one heck of a schnoz.
Marchand has more nose than face.
Follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/andrewberkshire
by Andrew Berkshire on Apr 25, 2011 7:53 PM EDT up reply actions
I heard a story, second hand, earlier today so I’m not sure of the particulars, but supposedly earlier this season when the Bruins played the Rangers, Marchand was involved in a close off-sides play, and Sean Avery yelled that Marchand was offside “…by a nose!…”. It apparantly got a big laugh by everyone on the ice, on both teams.
Something tells me that Scott Gomez has made a few on-ice remarks towards Marchand that were far worse than Pax’s tweet as well.
Kevin van Steendelaar
http://www.twitter.com/kvansteendelaar
but don't forget...
http://www.twitter.com/HabsEOTP
by Kevin van Steendelaar on Apr 25, 2011 9:01 PM EDT up reply actions
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