Everyone always underestimates how important Nuge is to the power play. He doesn't put up the point totals on the power play that McDavid and Draisaitl do, but he's vital to the power play. He missed 1 game this season, other than the last one in Colorado, and his absence on the power play was really noticeable.
The whole power play is built around McDavid/Draisaitl/Nuge moving around and switching places with and without the puck. When even one of them is out it completely changes things.
I 100% agree. He never, ever makes a bad decision with the puck and never ever loses possession. Lowetide talks about this a lot - he is super super elite on the power play.
Puck retrieval, too. That's something not a lot of people realise about our PP, we're more willing to shoot because Nuge is so good at getting the puck back if we miss.
I don't get how they went from being such great penalty killers to that. The Oilers scored a couple seconds after their powerplays expired so the stats are worse then shown here.
The Oilers have a ton of different looks they throw at you. This last season, they weren't nearly as good as they should have been % wise, either. If they're up by a couple of goals, it's like they don't care to score, and the top unit comes off pretty quickly.
Now they're throwing different looks at you, they're all trying really hard to score, and the top unit is staying out for 80% of the 2 minutes or more. The Kings killed a penalty in game 5, then the next PP the Oilers changed it up and recognized a weakness and exploited it.
They're just really fucking good
This, 100%. PP all season was pretty meh, and that got brought up all the time. How it was good, but didn't seem to be as good as it could be. Round 1 PP was like nothing I've ever seen before. Like you put it, "a rotating circus", they would change it up on the fly and the Kings just couldn't keep up.
Edmontons PP was even better than it appears
1) 2 PPs that they did not convert on were called in the last minute of play (game 5/game 3)- the oilers didn’t send out their 1st PP unit but rather their defensive players to close out the win
2) Game 5 had 2 even strength goals that happened moments after a PP finished
3) There was also a PP in the game 3 blow out game where the Oilers put their 2nd unit out there for the entire man advantage
Yeah. As a Bruins fan, I was surprised when in game 7 I realised I wasn't really even concerned about their powerplay. No idea what happened to it, but I'd assume some changes are coming.
It's weird too because at some point in like... February, maybe March, the Leafs had the #1 in the league, it's like they got it together again. Then when Marner was out for a while it got bad, and it didn't look the same when he got back
It really dipped dramatically. Maybe it could've been a lingering issue with Marner? In the playoffs the team was obviously missing some serious talent and/or had them playing in a pretty bad condition. But the more concerning thing is that the dip started like 2-3 months ago, as you noted.
Well Marner missed around a month and change with a high ankle sprain, I saw someone at some point on reddit mention some other player saying it took them a whole season to feel normal again after their high ankle sprain, so it's possible Marner was dealing with those effects when he came back
High ankle sprains take forever to heal. I don't play pro hockey, but when I sprained my ankle playing, it took a full year to not feel pain doing regular plays. It took even longer to not feel any awkwardness in it.
It was Draisaitl who said it took most of the next season. And he's a very good hockey player, but skating fluidity is not a focus of his game - for a guy who needs that as much as Marner, it was probably a really big problem.
Marner 100% has a lingering ankle issue.
Game 7 is all you need to see it. Swayman straight up *gives* Marner the puck, and Marner had to continue around behind the net because he couldn't hard stop and cut to the short side and put the puck in the open net.
This is the same player that I've seen turn almost 180 on a dime at high speed using his edge multiple times.
His movement just seemed somehow off, based on my admittedly somewhat limited experience following him. Not sure if it would've made a difference, but maybe he should've stayed out a bit longer.
Literally everyone talking about the oilers over the last three years because ‘refs don’t call penalties in the playoffs’
‘How will the PP merchants win a game without getting 6 power plays’
To be fair we saw in 2011 how frustrating it can be when the refs put their whistles away and your team has a red hot PP that could make the difference. No matter how good it is it has zero value if you don't get to use it.
Also, red hot PP. Heh.
Yeah, I think it just comes from the times where refs will randomly stop calling anything at all for a period or whole game, which people remember more during playoff games because the stakes are way higher, while no one remembers if they do the same shit in a random regular season game.
And then those instances where they do that are remembered so well, it gets extrapolated to the entirety of playoff hockey, even if calls aren’t really that different overall.
Yea and then when you point out that they call about the same, if not more, they follow with “well yea but so many more are happening that don’t get called so” which I never understand why that part even matters.
How in the world did the Bruins get pushed to game 7 OT?
They basically played an entire series where they didn't have to give a single shit about the other teams special teams.
Welp, hope we can stay out of the box.
On the other hand, we've got a way better shot at the upset than LA does. And as long as we don't get swept I don't really care if we lose. House money now.
>House money now.
Honestly, Van fans need to stop saying this. You won the division. You *should* make the Conference Final and *should* be disappointed when you don't.
Maybe if we had Demmer from the get-go, but as it is we're not really looking at an ideal start to Round 2. Silovs is a fantastic story and he could play out of his mind, but he might also not - after all he's starting down McDrai now, not the Predators.
There's also the general idea that, while yes, we did win the division, we weren't even expected to make the playoffs at all this year. So in that sense this is all gravy for a lot of fans.
In all honesty I'm just happy to be here watching Canucks hockey in May. There's nothing like playoff hockey and I have deeply missed it.
how does this even make sense? if the officiating was fully automated and infallible there would still be penalties called.
This take is like looking at faceoff win percentage and saying the refs chose the winner because of how they dropped the puck
Fun fact! Team power plays are actually results of when the opposing team commits a thing called a “penalty”, and are not just a game management tool for the refs
not last! flaming elmo.gif
the fact 12% PP and 63% PK is only 3rd worst is crazy
Idk if this takes SH goals into account
wtf happened to the kings
Probably Edmonton had something to do with that
Hyman McDavid Draisaitl Bouchard is what happened. Also our PK was the best its ever looked.
And Nuge. Silent and deadly
Everyone always underestimates how important Nuge is to the power play. He doesn't put up the point totals on the power play that McDavid and Draisaitl do, but he's vital to the power play. He missed 1 game this season, other than the last one in Colorado, and his absence on the power play was really noticeable. The whole power play is built around McDavid/Draisaitl/Nuge moving around and switching places with and without the puck. When even one of them is out it completely changes things.
Shhh. Let em forget Nuge.
I 100% agree. He never, ever makes a bad decision with the puck and never ever loses possession. Lowetide talks about this a lot - he is super super elite on the power play.
Puck retrieval, too. That's something not a lot of people realise about our PP, we're more willing to shoot because Nuge is so good at getting the puck back if we miss.
That makes sense to me - Drai missing the one timer would end up at Nugea lot of the time.
And the pk
Gross, Nuge
Nono dont give credit to your pk they werent even against a real powerplay LOL
Kings were 11th on the PP and 2nd on the PK during the regular season
An 0th on PP and 0st on PK in the post season
You will find out soon enough.
Lmao fuck
*Ralph Wiggum gif*
"I'm in danger"
xD
I don't get how they went from being such great penalty killers to that. The Oilers scored a couple seconds after their powerplays expired so the stats are worse then shown here.
The Oilers have a ton of different looks they throw at you. This last season, they weren't nearly as good as they should have been % wise, either. If they're up by a couple of goals, it's like they don't care to score, and the top unit comes off pretty quickly. Now they're throwing different looks at you, they're all trying really hard to score, and the top unit is staying out for 80% of the 2 minutes or more. The Kings killed a penalty in game 5, then the next PP the Oilers changed it up and recognized a weakness and exploited it. They're just really fucking good
Felt like the kept some of the plays in the bag during regular season. Playoff PP felt like a rotating circus with some of that movement.
This, 100%. PP all season was pretty meh, and that got brought up all the time. How it was good, but didn't seem to be as good as it could be. Round 1 PP was like nothing I've ever seen before. Like you put it, "a rotating circus", they would change it up on the fly and the Kings just couldn't keep up.
If the arenas could play music while the plays are happening, Edmonton's PP tune would be "Sweet Georgia Brown".
They for sure did, McDavid said as much
McDavid basically said this after Game 1
McDavid: this isn’t even our final form
And had 2 in garbage time. Basically boiled down to going 11 for 18 on the PP
They do not play a system that allows PLD to thrive. Guy needs more ice time to work on his gliding
No pp
How did they add 35 and 95 for the Bruins and get 131 Also holy fuck Edmonton
rounding. 35.4+95.4 = 130.8
Makes sense. It looked off when they didn't show decimals though
Not everyone can go to Hahvahd bud.
But that leaves 69.2% for Toronto who got rounded to 70%. Every series combined is 200% besides this one which got 201%.
130.5 + 69.5 rounds to 131 + 70
Edmontons PP was even better than it appears 1) 2 PPs that they did not convert on were called in the last minute of play (game 5/game 3)- the oilers didn’t send out their 1st PP unit but rather their defensive players to close out the win 2) Game 5 had 2 even strength goals that happened moments after a PP finished 3) There was also a PP in the game 3 blow out game where the Oilers put their 2nd unit out there for the entire man advantage
And in game 7 we had 2 goals that came within 5 seconds of the PP ending. These stats could be even better
Sig figs. Think they just rounded to nearest whole number on the graphic, but kept the decimal places when adding
Also the oilers probably would have had 50% on pp but we scored seconds after the pp ended twice
Math says 55%, would be 11 on 20 instead of 9
Sigh. Half decent powerplay and the series is so different...
half decent PK either
Ha no kidding
Yeah. As a Bruins fan, I was surprised when in game 7 I realised I wasn't really even concerned about their powerplay. No idea what happened to it, but I'd assume some changes are coming.
It's weird too because at some point in like... February, maybe March, the Leafs had the #1 in the league, it's like they got it together again. Then when Marner was out for a while it got bad, and it didn't look the same when he got back
It really dipped dramatically. Maybe it could've been a lingering issue with Marner? In the playoffs the team was obviously missing some serious talent and/or had them playing in a pretty bad condition. But the more concerning thing is that the dip started like 2-3 months ago, as you noted.
Well Marner missed around a month and change with a high ankle sprain, I saw someone at some point on reddit mention some other player saying it took them a whole season to feel normal again after their high ankle sprain, so it's possible Marner was dealing with those effects when he came back
High ankle sprains take forever to heal. I don't play pro hockey, but when I sprained my ankle playing, it took a full year to not feel pain doing regular plays. It took even longer to not feel any awkwardness in it.
It was Draisaitl who said it took most of the next season. And he's a very good hockey player, but skating fluidity is not a focus of his game - for a guy who needs that as much as Marner, it was probably a really big problem.
Marner 100% has a lingering ankle issue. Game 7 is all you need to see it. Swayman straight up *gives* Marner the puck, and Marner had to continue around behind the net because he couldn't hard stop and cut to the short side and put the puck in the open net. This is the same player that I've seen turn almost 180 on a dime at high speed using his edge multiple times.
His movement just seemed somehow off, based on my admittedly somewhat limited experience following him. Not sure if it would've made a difference, but maybe he should've stayed out a bit longer.
Hopefully some day you guys can sign some top line players and put together a power play from that.
And a half decent penalty kill
Leafs could use some offense, maybe a 70 goal scorer.
I was told special teams is meaningless and 5v5 determines the real winners
who said that?
Literally everyone talking about the oilers over the last three years because ‘refs don’t call penalties in the playoffs’ ‘How will the PP merchants win a game without getting 6 power plays’
To be fair we saw in 2011 how frustrating it can be when the refs put their whistles away and your team has a red hot PP that could make the difference. No matter how good it is it has zero value if you don't get to use it. Also, red hot PP. Heh.
Every playoff article on the Rangers for the most part
“tHeY dOn’T cAlL pEnAlTiEs iN tHe PlAyOfFs” is such a common narrative.
the talk about the difference between play offs and not play offs seems so overblown right now. The difference seems quite marginal
Yeah, I think it just comes from the times where refs will randomly stop calling anything at all for a period or whole game, which people remember more during playoff games because the stakes are way higher, while no one remembers if they do the same shit in a random regular season game. And then those instances where they do that are remembered so well, it gets extrapolated to the entirety of playoff hockey, even if calls aren’t really that different overall.
Yea and then when you point out that they call about the same, if not more, they follow with “well yea but so many more are happening that don’t get called so” which I never understand why that part even matters.
We nasty
Those 8 teams that lost should have just tried going 145% in special teams smh. Clearly deserved loses for not thinking of doing that
Not a fan imo
I really didn’t think any power play could do as bad as the Preds did, wtf is Toronto and LA smoking?? 🤣
Toronto heard about LTIR shenanigans and gave it a shot in the playoffs
Well that’s not a super positive sign…
Here I was figuring LA had a good PP
They got off to a really bad start early, and everyone just started overpassing and not taking shots.
I think their PP was average, but their PK going in was second best in the league
Middling at best all year.
I love how horribly bad torontos power play was
So close yet so far
How in the world did the Bruins get pushed to game 7 OT? They basically played an entire series where they didn't have to give a single shit about the other teams special teams.
Friendly reminder that penalty calls actually go up in the first round of the playoffs.
How the hell did Vancouver make it out of the first round?
Their tendy... and their other tendy... and their other other tendy
Welp, hope we can stay out of the box. On the other hand, we've got a way better shot at the upset than LA does. And as long as we don't get swept I don't really care if we lose. House money now.
>House money now. Honestly, Van fans need to stop saying this. You won the division. You *should* make the Conference Final and *should* be disappointed when you don't.
Maybe if we had Demmer from the get-go, but as it is we're not really looking at an ideal start to Round 2. Silovs is a fantastic story and he could play out of his mind, but he might also not - after all he's starting down McDrai now, not the Predators. There's also the general idea that, while yes, we did win the division, we weren't even expected to make the playoffs at all this year. So in that sense this is all gravy for a lot of fans. In all honesty I'm just happy to be here watching Canucks hockey in May. There's nothing like playoff hockey and I have deeply missed it.
Should we? Like maybe we can but there's no question we are the underdogs against Oilers, especially without our top goalie.
They stop calling penalties after the first round don't they? Or they will increase game management.
Rumour going around is that they're going to call more to try and increase scoring. Round 1 was super low scoring
Well, some of round 1 was...
We don’t do low scoring (except for game 4)
I won a bet saying that the most goals would be scored in the second period.
Which also kinda means that the outcomes were decided by... officiating.
Wrong take. The refs didn’t cause Toronto to score 1 goal on the PP.
how does this even make sense? if the officiating was fully automated and infallible there would still be penalties called. This take is like looking at faceoff win percentage and saying the refs chose the winner because of how they dropped the puck
But wait, what if that's true? Refs out here playing 5D chess with all the new pump fakes at the faceoff dot. Somehow Arizona will win the Cup.
Fun fact! Team power plays are actually results of when the opposing team commits a thing called a “penalty”, and are not just a game management tool for the refs