Why do President Trophy winning teams almost never win the cup?

[Filthy Dangles]

16 teams make the playoffs. presidents trophy team represnets 1 team. luck and random variation.

 

[Fire Benning]

For the most part, because that notion isn't really true. 8 cup winners out of 31, is still tied for most common outcome for President's Trophy winner.

Playoff outcome	# of times outcome has happened for Pres Trophy winner	Percentage
Lost 1st round​	6​	19.3%​
Lost 2nd round​	8​	25.8%​
Lost 3rd round​	5​	16.1%​
Lost Final​	4​	12.9%​
Won cup​	8​	25.%​

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Before the Caps lost in the 2nd round last year, the most favorable outcome for the President's trophy winner was winning the cup, and now it's still only tied for the most frequent outcome.

Since the President's Trophy has been created, 8 of the Cup winners have been #1 seeds overall in the league, the next closest is the #3 seed at 5 cup wins.

So historically the team who President's Trophy chances at also winning the cup are actually pretty favorable. Yes it doesn't happen maybe as much as one might expect but in reality the Playoffs are a tournament where luck and bounces can factor greatly into the outcome of a series, and the times that a non-Presdient's trophy winning team wins the cup, the majority of the team it's another top seeded team in the league so the fact that it doesn't happen as frequently as some might think shouldn't come as a huge surprise.

Like the 95/96 Red Wings were hands down the best team in the league, but they just happened to run in to the Roy lead Avalanche who got hot and beat them in the conference finals, same thing happened with the Caps in 2010 when they faced the 88 point Canadiens who probably didn't even deserve to be in the playoffs based on their season, by almost every metric essentially skated them off the ice took a 3-1 lead but then Jaroslav Halak was out of this world in games 5-7.

It happens. The playoffs are wacky.

That said, not only is the President's Trophy a hard trophy to win (not trying to say it's harder to win than the Stanley Cup) given you have to win upwards of 55 games out of a grueling 82 game schedule, but the so called curse attached to it is for the most part a fallacy and can be easily overblown.

 

[Stimpythecat]

Winning is so very hard to do. And it's not like the #2 and #3, etc. teams are far behind the PT winner quality wise. Often it's just a couple points in the standings.

 

[UnrefinedCrude]

26% winning rate and over 30% Cup appearance seems like it's a pretty high success rate. It's not like the team that finishes first and wins the PT is 30 points ahead of second place. They are usually just a nose ahead of a couple other teams.

1/4 of the PT winners going on to win the Cup and 1/3 getting to the finals is a good winning percentage in a league with more than one or two good teams.

 

[ClydeLee]

It's still small sample sized but I saw it mentioned in the current Playoffs format starting in 13-14 no division winning team has won the cup.

 

[trick9]

Parity and pressure among other things.

 

[EXPECT THE LEAFS]

Because being the regular season champs doesn't mean much in the playoffs... actually it probably just puts a bigger bullseye on your back.

 

[winnipegger]

Because hockey has a ton of luck and the level of parity is insane. I would say that the better team wins the series maybe about 65% of the time. So if you're the better team in all 4 series, you still only have a ~18% chance of winning it all. And that 65% figure is probably generous. Not sure what the home win rate is in the playoffs but I'd be surprised if it was higher than that number I just pulled out of my ass.

nah man, 7 game series? I think it's in the 80 - 90% range. You can't rattle off 4 lucky wins in 7 games too often. When there is a clear underdog anyways. The problem is nowadays there are rarely true underdog series.

 

[AvroArrow]

Because the NHL is one of the only leagues where there is actual parity and any of the 16 teams in the playoffs have a legitimate chance of winning.

 

[Tage2Tuch]

Well 16 teams make the playoffs meaning that each has a 6.25% chance of winning the Cup.

You just told us that PT winners have a 26% win rate, 4x that of any other team going in. I would say that is pretty damn impressive given the randomness of the POs

EXACTLY MY THOUGHTS.

I also when seeing 8/31, thought WOW THat's actually a lot more then I would of figured.

How many of those were DYnasty Mini-Dynasty teams though. Probably a lot.

 

[Tage2Tuch]

I remeeber in 06 while the Red Wings won the P Trophy the Sens won the East and were SEEN as THE TEAM to BEAT with Heatley-Alfredsson-Spezza-Havlat-Chara-Hasek, and our Sabres who finished 5th in the East took them out in 5. Even though Emery played that series.

Then Buffalo won the Presidents Trophy in 2007 and what happened? The Sens came back and did the same thing to Buffalo in 5, eliminating us at HOME in overtime, the same way we did them the year before..only this was in the ECF, where-as we beat them in the 2nd round.

My point...when a team goes up against the favourite, they have a US AGAINST THE WORLD feeling and therefore the guys always pull up there socks and play there hearts out.


Look at how often an 8 seed beats a 1 in first round. I mean it's not SUPER often but enough that it gives some thought.

I would make the list but I'm fuzzy on so many . I'll I'm going to say is the 7th seed beats the 2nd seed more then any other for upsets. I know the Kings over Wings, 01 DUcks Over Wings 03, Oiler over Wings 06....then all the Caps losses, 08 to Philly...

etc etc.

It's hard to win the Stanley Cup.

Momentum is a strong thing and if a goalie gets hot, all you need to do is win 1 or 2 games and all of the sudden if your down 2-0, you now have to win 4/5 games. That's HARD.

 

[Anisimovs AK]

1) There is no shootout or 3v3(/4v4) OT in the playoffs, but those two things affect the President's Trophy

2) The President's Trophy is mostly just luck. PDO dominates NHL results.

Your 2nd point is wrong. Completely