Post-Game Talk: Habs beat NY Islanders 3-1 | Lars Eller making a very late push for the Art Ross

[Lshap]

It's pretty accurate actually. Habs and Flames are the only teams below 50% in possession to be in PO spot.

While 5 out of 19 teams above 50% are in not in a playoff spot.

Considering only 16 teams make it, some +50% are bound to miss it, but your odds improve incredibly if you are over 50%.

Right now, 14 of the 16 playoff spots are occupied by teams who possess the puck more than 50% of the team. The chart above tells a similar story.

Not sure if we're talking about the same thing. The chart you posted predicts each team's proximity to the Cup, based on possession numbers. The chart shows Arizona and Philly in the Conf. Finals, and Vancouver in the SCF -- how can that reflect this season?

 

[Michelangelo]

Not sure if we're talking about the same thing. The chart you posted predicts each team's proximity to the Cup, based on possession numbers. The chart shows Arizona and Philly in the Conf. Finals, and Vancouver in the SCF -- how can that reflect this season?

Not this season. If you sum up the number of cups, the chart reflects 5 seasons.

From inference, this chart seems to reflect the seasons from 2008-2009 to 2012-2013 since it doesn't include last year's LAK - NYR final.

Mike

 

[Andy]

Not sure if we're talking about the same thing. The chart you posted predicts each team's proximity to the Cup, based on possession numbers. The chart shows Arizona and Philly in the Conf. Finals, and Vancouver in the SCF -- how can that reflect this season?

No it's not a predictor, it's where teams have finished from 2007-2008 to 2012-2013.

 

[Smokey Thompson]

The sad part is MB has put together a team that can play a modern possession style of hockey a la Detroit Red Wings or Chicago Blackhawks.

The problem is his coach insists on playing a flawed trap game, where his defensemen let opposing forwards gain the blue line with zero pressure (as opposed to holding the blue line and forcing a dump in, where his mobile D could quickly spring a counter attack). Despite having a smallish forward group, his forwards never have close puck support. The puck carrier is usually left alone and easily controlled by 3 defending players

 

[Lshap]

Not this season. If you sum up the number of cups, the chart reflects 5 seasons.

From inference, this chart seems to reflect the seasons from 2008-2009 to 2012-2013 since it doesn't include last year's LAK - NYR final.

Mike

No it's not a predictor, it's where teams have finished from 2007-2008 to 2012-2013.

Ah-hah! Thanks - that makes more sense!

 

[Yep]

I realize it kind of comes out this way but man, the numbers are very one sided. It's almost crazy how one sided they are. We can't point to anything not involving goaltending from a statisitical standpoint that looks good for MT. The analytics are bad, the heat maps are bad, the goals and PP are bad...

If you want to dismiss the numbers altogether fine. If you want to appeal to the standings fine. But the numbers hold water with a lot of us. And quite frankly I'd say the eye test lines up with the numbers as well.

It's not about dismissing numbers or not. They're there, I've seen them and I understand them fairly well.

For illustrative purpose, let say 95% of the available stats points toward our beloved club overachieving and/or relying a LOT on an exceptional goalie having an exceptional year.

How much of a team performance or team results will be explained by these stats while the rest depends on conditions/factors not measure by stats (players complementarity, motivation, work ethic, work conditions and environment, confidence, trust, resilience, luck, any specific context, etc.) ?

I'm not a pro-Therrien AT ALL, but I'll always leave a window open. Too much stuff we don't know in the equation.

 

[Hope Of Glory]

The problem is in deciding which numbers are attributable to which person. There's no real debate over the stats themselves -- our shot-metrics are bad, our record is good; our scoring is low, our goaltending is sky high; good possession when behind, awful possession when ahead, etc. -- but how much of each stat can be directly attached to Therrien versus the players? Games/periods/plays can't be neatly divided into "Performance" or "System", so we extrapolate from what we've seen and make educated guesses on what caused what. Was it Therrien's system that handicapped the players, or was it poor execution that handicapped the system?

That's the grey area that keeps this debate going... and going. None of us are stupid, we all understand what the numbers tell us. But the numbers don't tell us why they happened in the first place.

Thanks for the answer. I just rarely see any Pro-Therrien making arguments in favor of him, they are more rebutting arguments from the other camp. I guess an army of Therrien "haters" will keep you busy for a while.

I can understand why some people think that Therrien is good, after all the record is indeed impressive. But personally, the arguments against him are so overwhelming, especially if you consider his screw up with a really talented Pittsburgh team half a decade ago, it becomes hard to roo for the guy. His total inability to adapt and his clear double-standards are hard to take game after game. Anyway, this has been discussed in length around here, and it still is, so I'll let that to the professional debaters.

 

[Hackett]

Thanks for the answer. I just rarely see any Pro-Therrien making arguments in favor of him, they are more rebutting arguments from the other camp. I guess an army of Therrien "haters" will keep you busy for a while.

I can understand why some people think that Therrien is good, after all the record is indeed impressive. But personally, the arguments against him are so overwhelming, especially if you consider his screw up with a really talented Pittsburgh team half a decade ago, it becomes hard to roo for the guy. His total inability to adapt and his clear double-standards are hard to take game after game. Anyway, this has been discussed in length around here, and it still is, so I'll let that to the professional debaters.

I don't even consider that to be a pro MT argument.

It's a pretty neutral outlook.

 

[Hope Of Glory]

I don't even consider that to be a pro MT argument.

It's a pretty neutral outlook.

Oh, I agree with that. I don't actually think it's an argument in his favor. But I still understand that some people could think he's good because of that.

 

[Hackett]

Oh, I agree with that. I don't actually think it's an argument in his favor. But I still understand that some people could think he's good because of that.

Yeah, that's true. If somebody was all over me constantly for my work and dishing out insults, I'd probably take that outlook as a compliment, lol

 

[Jigger77]

Same opinion.

PP was one of habs strengh 15 month a good and 5 vs 5 was more then bad. At less now we are good at 5 vs 5 and PK.

Yeah the PP is definitely something I'd love to see this team improve. Otherwise I think they're playing pretty solid hockey overall with obviously some inconsistencies which I attribute to youth (and aging strangely enough) and lack of pure offensive talent. A lot of players outside of Pacioretty, Subban (even him in the early season) and Price and I would say Markov have been on a bit of a roller-coaster ride as far as their performance this season. Then some of the vets, Plecky lately hasn't played like he can, Eller, though both had strong games last night. Pretty much everyone, really.

When they play well like last night they look good for the most part, but yeah haven't been able to find any kind of consistency.

Then of course there's the PP.

The interesting thing about that is that if you look at the few teams worse than the Habs on the PP, two of them are Nashville and Minnesotta and Anaheim is basically as bad as Montreal. All of those teams score considerably more goals than the Habs in general. So it's not isolated to the Habs. The trend on here of course is to follow the easy route of pointing the finger to one guy, who isn't even on the ice, but for the sake of thinking a little further than that it would be interesting to try and figure it out. Markov's been a part of this team when it routinely had the best PP in the league, same for Plecky. I'm sure they've been asked about it by now. What's the difference? For sure imo some of that has to do with lack of snipers. When the Habs had those lethal PPs they had Cammy, Kovalev that Markov loved to feed with the cross ice pass to the faceoff dot. You don't see that anymore. Is it because of coaching or because they don't have that option? Other teams figured Markov out? Who knows, but it is interesting.

Imo though 5 on 5 this team is much better than those old versions that relied on the PP to beat Boston for example.

 

[Tyson]

Man if Pleks-Parenteau-Galchenyuk can start clicking! That would be huge.
Parenteau needs to seize his chance.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

It's not about dismissing numbers or not. They're there, I've seen them and I understand them fairly well.

For illustrative purpose, let say 95% of the available stats points toward our beloved club overachieving and/or relying a LOT on an exceptional goalie having an exceptional year.

How much of a team performance or team results will be explained by these stats while the rest depends on conditions/factors not measure by stats (players complementarity, motivation, work ethic, work conditions and environment, confidence, trust, resilience, luck, any specific context, etc.) ?

I'm not a pro-Therrien AT ALL, but I'll always leave a window open. Too much stuff we don't know in the equation.

I'll reply in the Therrien thread.

 

[Jigger77]

a

One of the best posts I've read on this forum in a long long long....did I say long...time.

Why thank you sir, nice of you to say.

I appreciate you taking the time to defend your position. I can at least respect that you've put some thought into it, even if I disagree.

While most teams do use some dump and chase, without looking at the numbers, I feel the Habs do it a lot more than your average team, and zone entries through simply carrying the puck seem non-existent. And I completely disagree about the 'in-your-face' brand of hockey without the puck, as I'd describe them as very passive without it. The opposition is given the blue line, and once they gain the zone are basically given free reign in the territory about the faceoff circles.

Some compare the Habs to the Jersey teams of the late 90s, early 00s, a team that waits for the opposition to make a mistake and then capitalize on it, relying heavily on an all-time great goalie and a solid defensive system. The big difference here is that the Devils would never let you gain offensive zone so easily, and capitalize on turnovers in the neutral zone. The Habs basically let other teams set up in the o-zone, let Price do his job, and after the onslaught is over get an odd man rush the other way. It works because Price is unreal this year, otherwise this team would be in trouble.

It would be nice to get more goals from the Habs actually wearing down the opposition from sustained pressure in the offensive zone. That seems to be a rare event. Barring that, if you're going to emulate the Devils at least don't give the opponent such an easy time about it.



I agree with these statements to a degree. It's unrealistic to expect the Habs to play a perfect 60 minutes every night, and in the past I've argued you'll rarely see a perfect 60 minutes all season. But that's different than what we're seeing from this team. They are visibly (and I mean just by watching, not through advanced stats mining) outplayed on a regular basis, and still find themselves high in the standings. It's anomalous, and mostly attributable to Price.

And I do agree the team has bought into the system, because they are doing exactly what Therrien wants them to do. I'm glad they're confident in themselves too, because they'll definitely need it, as I think the more talented players (again, mostly Price) are dragging this team along through sheer will.



I didn't want Therrien when he was hired and he hasn't shown me anything to want him not to be fired. It's not panic. I have zero confidence that he can help this team win long-term, and it would be a shame to waste the best years of some of our players' careers on a guy who just isn't good enough.

Thanks for that Bill, it's refreshing to see someone who disagrees and is able to converse objectively despite that.

First about the in your face brand of hockey. I should specify two things. I meant more that they aim to play a style that limits space for the puck carrier at all times. They obviously don't always achieve this, but when they play well, like last night for example, I tend to think that they do play a brand of hockey that limits space and time for other teams.

Secondly, I see the same issues everyone else brings up, but I don't think they are coaching/system related and where I strongly disagree is that they are constant, ever-present or anywhere near catastrophic levels. Price has been record-setting phenomenal, and no they wouldn't be 1st overall without him but I think for the most part, this team plays solid hockey 5 on 5 and that yes, they are prone to moments where it falls apart on them. I think that is attributable to player execution rather than systemic. but I believe that they have more good moments than bad and that the issues brought forth in this forum are largely exaggerated for a number of reasons that have nothing to do with hockey.

I am one of those who has compared this team to the 90s-2000s Devils. The difference between the Devils of then and the Habs of now though, is that the Devils were allowed to basically ride guys in the neutral zone, set pics, basically free to do as they wished as far as what we all refer to as "clutch and grab". This is a different era. All teams are excellent, and you can't just shut down teams for 40 minutes after you get a 2 goal lead like the Devils used to do. Now you have to keep playing that same high octane, first to pucks, get pucks deep and win battles etc kind of game to play that kind of hockey. In a nutshell, shutting down teams now is much harder than it was then.

I personally think that if the Habs tried to play run and gun hockey against the Lightning, the Pens, The Isles etc they would get absolutely schooled. Maybe I'm underestimating our players, but I just don't see how we have a team that can play wide open back and forth hockey against those teams, no matter where the ever-hated best friend of the coach is in the lineup and who's playing where. It just would be disastrous. Carey Price is the Habs best player, and Subban probably the second. Outside of Pacioretty there isn't much pure offense on this team imo. Good solid hockey players who have character coming out the yin-yang but naturally gifted creative offensive players are a rarity.

 

[Kriss E]

You've mentioned this and I've noticed the same thing at times -- forwards too far out expecting those frikkin stretch passes -- but that's a small part of a bigger issue, IMO. I've mentioned this before too: We often have trouble getting the puck to begin with, and then controlling it. The book on the Habs defence is to pressure them hard, because they don't punish the opposition. We get hemmed in because guys like Markov, Gilbert, Gonchar, even Beaulieu, rely on fast stickwork rather than imposing their bodies to recover the puck. We lose a large percentage of puck battles in our zone, or it takes a lot of time and energy to get it back.

Meanwhile, our forwards are usually there, backchecking to help out. But by the time our skaters have collectively gained possession and made it out of our zone, our forwards are exhausted and forced to dump it in. They spend most of their shift helping our D and have nothing left for a rush. I know brute force isn't the simple answer here, but it is part of the answer. We're seeing how much faster/better our transitions can be with Petry and even Pateryn, two guys who can outmuscle the opposition and make a solid first pass without a 10-minute wrestling match in the corner. What a difference if they settle in! With Emelin, that gives us what I think we need most -- talented PMDs with some beef to clear space for them to maneuver.

Did you ever think our strategy is part of it? We collapse in front of Price, that's why we have issues winning battles, covering the point, and getting to the pucks.
We have some decent size guys, we don't have anybody on defense that is weak, they're also good skaters, so if we always have issues retrieving those pucks, maybe it's something a little deeper than just being pushovers.

Even when we do recover the puck, we just dump it out of the zone. Our guys are constantly being pressed. Maybe if we held on to the puck longer, then our Ds wouldn't have to be stuck in our zone chasing and battling.

Chicago doesn't have a bigger D than ours, it's actually pretty similar, and yet they don't struggle like we do.

 

[Fish on The Sand]

Not this season. If you sum up the number of cups, the chart reflects 5 seasons.

From inference, this chart seems to reflect the seasons from 2008-2009 to 2012-2013 since it doesn't include last year's LAK - NYR final.

Mike

That goes until 2012. It doesn't include the Boston/Chicago final either.