The place where these two teams are closest, or at least the hardest to call, is in net. It's pretty hard to compare these two guys whose careers never came close to overlapping. Seth Martin was much more dominant internationally (four top goalie awards to two), but Pekka Lindmark played at a time when the quality of international play was higher.
Stockholm also holds their own in terms of bottom six intangibles. Murphy is a big defensive/physical/leadership advantage over the underrated Pominville, but Mellanby represents the same edge over Billy Gilmour. I don't think there's much to choose from among the other four, in the intangibles departments.
In the departments of coaching, offensive firepower and defense corps, Regina holds sizeable edges.
Jack Adams vs. Lindy Ruff. I shouldn't have to say much more. One is an ATD coach, one is an MLD coach.
On defense, Regina has three pre-expansion players with all-star recognition peaks better than nearly any others in this draft, and three post-expansion players with TOI figures more impressive than most in the pack (in terms of minutes played and the quality of the teams that used them). This table shows all the comparable post-expansion defensemen in this MLD - just look at where these players all stack up. Dailey shows up
very well for Stockholm, but he's on an island.
Turnbull | 74-81 | 27.21 | 1.06 | 27.74
Awrey | 68-75 | 23.93 | 1.39 | 26.68
Dailey | 74-81 | 24.60 | 1.25 | 26.48
Bouwmeester | 06-13 | 26.15 | 1.03 | 26.41
Russell | 74-81 | 25.50 | 1.11 | 26.39
Marotte | 68-75 | 26.60 | 0.91 | 25.78
Kaberle | 00-08 | 24.82 | 1.08 | 25.46
Babych | 81-88 | 26.02 | 0.93 | 25.40
Bodger | 87-94 | 24.95 | 1.05 | 25.35
Dupont | 72-79 | 22.02 | 1.53 | 25.34
Huddy | 83-90 | 23.06 | 1.31 | 25.21
Plager | 68-75 | 24.69 | 1.04 | 25.01
O'Connell | 80-87 | 24.24 | 1.07 | 24.79
Murray | 78-85 | 24.60 | 1.02 | 24.76
Green | 08-15 | 23.49 | 1.15 | 24.60
Brown | 89-96 | 24.54 | 1.00 | 24.54
Hamrlik | 97-04 | 24.78 | 0.97 | 24.53
Engblom | 80-87 | 23.35 | 1.15 | 24.45
Jovanovski | 00-08 | 24.01 | 1.05 | 24.40
Lumme | 92-99 | 23.81 | 1.05 | 24.20
Aucoin | 99-07 | 24.77 | 0.93 | 24.18
Marois | 82-89 | 23.85 | 1.03 | 24.08
Greschner | 75-82 | 24.23 | 0.98 | 24.07
Watson | 68-75 | 22.53 | 1.22 | 24.06
Ellett | 86-93 | 24.81 | 0.91 | 24.05
Roberts | 80-87 | 23.47 | 1.02 | 23.62
Jonsson | 97-04 | 24.12 | 0.93 | 23.55
Tinordi | 91-98 | 23.40 | 1.01 | 23.48
Hamhuis | 07-14 | 22.67 | 1.08 | 23.25
Vlasic | 09-16 | 22.16 | 1.10 | 22.87
Yushkevich | 96-03 | 22.28 | 1.08 | 22.85
Samuelsson | 88-95 | 22.14 | 1.07 | 22.64
Visnovsky | 04-12 | 23.10 | 0.92 | 22.47
Hedman | 11-16 | 22.18 | 1.02 | 22.33
Rochefort | 81-88 | 21.75 | 1.08 | 22.31
Svoboda | 89-96 | 21.05 | 1.19 | 22.29
Rautakallio | 80-82 | 21.53 | 1.06 | 21.95
Streit | 08-16 | 22.45 | 0.93 | 21.92
Norstrom | 97-04 | 21.65 | 0.99 | 21.58
McSorley | 90-97 | 21.36 | 1.02 | 21.50
Ruotsalainen | 82-90 | 20.30 | 1.03 | 20.50
It's important to note that these aren't small differences. The difference between 22 and 25 minutes tends to be the difference between a #1 all-around defenseman and a #2/3, and on average, Regina's defensemen in their primes played that much more, and for typically better teams.
Stockholm deserves credit for building lines that "work" from a skillset standpoint - goalscorer, playmaker, glue guy. But in terms of offensive firepower, Regina's forwards have a massive edge. Here are how our centers stack up in the league:
Yashin | 552
Lacroix | 533
Ribeiro | 519
Smith | 516
Savard | 514
Unger | 513
Broten | 474
Briere | 473
Jordan | 467
Denneny | 467
Irvin | 464
Oliver | 452
Ridley | 452
Chapman | 450
Krejci | 449
O'Connor | 441
Nilsson | 412
Haynes | 411
Haynes is simply unqualified for scoring line duty, and Oliver is far enough behind his Regina counterparts that it has to be considered a mismatch. I'd take Oliver for a 3rd/4th line before Lacroix or Unger, but these are scoring lines. That said, if you look at their newly created bios, Unger and Lacroix deserve some credit for their all-around games - Lacroix in defense and PK, and Unger for physicality. They aren't nearly as one-dimensional as I thought.
Here are the wingers:
Shalimov | 506
Wiseman | 496
Cloutier | 490
Vanek | 481
Bellows | 478
Gagnon | 475
Sullivan | 474
Tardif | 463
Goldsworthy | 463
Sandstrom | 463
Kozlov | 461
Cooper | 456
Cain | 456
Kamensky | 455
Boudrias | 454
Thomas | 450
Hedberg | 442
Courtnall | 432
Lala | 430
Vickers | 410
Henderson | 409
Dornhoefer | 407
Hartnell | 404
Anderson | 394
Hebenton | 392
McDonald | 377
Schmautz | 376
Gallant | 366
Loob | 365
Jirik | 359
Lonsberry | 350
Crowder | 348
Cotton | 346
Wilson | 332
Labine | 330
Bonin | 314
Stockholm has one elite winger - Cloutier - but Regina has one to match him - Wiseman - and one more even better - Shalimov. According to VsX, four of the five most potent wingers in this series are playing for Regina, and there's a large gap from Regina's Hartnell to the other three on Stockholm. With all the intangibles possessed by Hartnell and Boudrias, Regina's scoring lines are just as smartly configured as Stockholm's, only much more proven as scorers.
It's a drastic enough advantage when you're comparing one player to that of an opponent, and there's a 19% scoring deficit. When 19% is the difference between the offensive potential of the entire top-6s of each team, that's a big problem for the one on the bottom.
Regina's offensive edge continues right through the bottom six forwards as well. However, that doesn't matter nearly as much and it's not worth posting tables and comparisons. Suffice it to say, the three worst scorers in Regina's bottom six (Mickoski, Mellanby, and Stemkowski, in that order) compare very well offensively to the three best on Stockholm (Golonka, Conroy, Murphy, in that order).
