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You’ve seen playoff projections from both Tom Awad and myself over the past week. Two’s good, so why not make it three? Sure, in a couple of weeks, it’ll be much easier to see the remaining playoff picture at a glance, but for now, it’s nice to lean on some enlightened stats to sharpen our focus. The projections in Tom’s Power Rankings column are based on the level of play you can expect from teams based on their season-long goal scoring and goal prevention abilities. My approach didn’t delve down to scoring rates like Tom’s did, but simply adjusted each team’s level of play (winning percentage) based on remaining strength of schedule (average of opponents’ winning percentages) for their remaining games.
That seemed to be a pretty good estimate, but it just didn’t sit 100 percent right with me as I pondered it over this week. For instance, we know that—even with the Cam Ward injury and the trades of Matt Cullen and Joe Corvo—Carolina is not the fantastically horrible team of the beginning of the season (an NHL worst .343 winning percentage through December 20th), nor a Jekyll and Hyde average of the best and worst of their season (.471), but actually one of the more dangerous teams you could meet at this stage of the season (.606 since December 20th, fourth best in the Eastern Conference). We also remember the great second half runs of St. Louis, Carolina and Pittsburgh last season—runs that carried the Blues to the playoffs, the Hurricanes to the Conference Finals and the Penguins all the way to the Stanley Cup. What’s that teach us? That there definitely is some value to a “What have you done for me lately?” approach to looking at potential postseason contenders.
To get an idea of how the fortunes of teams have changed over the course of the season, we can look at winning percentages before and after December 20th—roughly the halfway point of the season thus far. Further, we can use those “second half” records to refine our projections, utilizing each team’s winning percentages over the past 33-35 games coupled with their remaining strength of schedule (opponents’ winning percentages over that period).
Legend:
Current: Current number of points
Opp%: Average win percentage of remaining opponents
GR: Games Remaining
PRJT: Projected number of points
Projected standings - Based on winning percentages since December 20th
Total Thru 12/20 Since 12/20
Eastern Conference Current Win% Win% Win% Opp% GR PRJT
Washington Capitals 101 0.732 0.694 0.773 0.509 13 122.7
Pittsburgh Penguins 87 0.630 0.708 0.545 0.544 13 101.4
Buffalo Sabres 82 0.612 0.662 0.561 0.519 15 99.9
New Jersey Devils 85 0.625 0.750 0.500 0.531 14 99.6
Philadelphia Flyers 76 0.559 0.471 0.647 0.506 14 95.8
Ottawa Senators 79 0.572 0.571 0.574 0.535 13 94.4
Montreal Canadiens 76 0.543 0.473 0.621 0.524 12 91.7
New York Rangers 71 0.514 0.500 0.529 0.519 13 85.6
Boston Bruins 72 0.529 0.574 0.485 0.552 14 85.6
Tampa Bay Lightning 68 0.500 0.471 0.530 0.556 14 82.7
Carolina Hurricanes 64 0.471 0.343 0.606 0.559 14 80.7
Florida Panthers 64 0.485 0.500 0.466 0.568 16 78.5
Atlanta Thrashers 67 0.493 0.574 0.412 0.573 14 78.1
New York Islanders 65 0.471 0.458 0.485 0.566 13 77.3
Toronto Maple Leafs 58 0.420 0.458 0.379 0.531 13 68.2
Average - East 0.544 0.547 0.541
Average - All Teams 0.558 0.565 0.551
Hot and Cold—Eastern Conference
Of the top teams in the East, only the juggernaut that is the Washington Capitals has played at a consistently elite level throughout the season. Pittsburgh (.545), Buffalo (.561) and especially New Jersey (barely back to .500 with their win against Boston on Monday; playing worse than any other projected playoff team) have been very, very average for months now, and hold onto the high seeds in the Eastern Conference only by virtue of their scorching hot starts. Along with the Hurricanes—whose surge starting too late after playing too poorly this season——the hottest teams are Montreal (.621) and Philadelphia (.647), teams to definitely watch in the second season.
Bubble teams—Eastern Conference
Montreal is a postseason lock, on a roll and facing below average .524 opponents for their last 12 games. They will likely safely slot into the seventh seed, an interesting matchup for reigning champions Pittburgh — an upset is not out of the question. And don’t look now, but the New York Rangers project in a dead heat with Boston for the final playoff berth. While giving a point in the standings and a game at hand to the Bruins, the Blue Shirts’ modest .529 clip is outdoing Boston’s lousy .485 rate, while New York’s strength of schedule is an easy .519, as opposed to an average .552. The projections, of course, know nothing of Marc Savard’s season-ending injury, which further hamper the Bruins’ chances. Tampa Bay and Carolina project to fall short, as they have even more points to make up than New York, and against slightly above average opposition. Florida and Atlanta also face above average competition; more importantly, they’re playing poorly (.466 and .412). It’s hard to remember how well the Thrashers started the season (.574).
Legend:
Current: Current number of points
Opp%: Average win percentage of remaining opponents
GR: Games Remaining
PRJT: Projected number of points
Projected standings - Based on winning percentages since December 20th
Total Thru 12/20 Since 12/20
Western Conference Current Win% Win% Win% Opp% GR PRJT
San Jose Sharks 96 0.706 0.671 0.742 0.554 14 116.7
Chicago Blackhawks 94 0.691 0.721 0.662 0.554 14 112.4
Vancouver Canucks 89 0.645 0.556 0.742 0.579 13 107.4
Phoenix Coyotes 89 0.645 0.611 0.682 0.557 13 106.6
Los Angeles Kings 85 0.625 0.618 0.633 0.554 14 102.7
Colorado Avalanche 84 0.618 0.622 0.613 0.592 14 100.0
Detroit Red Wings 80 0.580 0.569 0.591 0.505 13 96.8
Nashville Predators 81 0.587 0.653 0.515 0.571 13 93.9
St. Louis Blues 73 0.537 0.515 0.559 0.529 14 89.3
Calgary Flames 77 0.558 0.629 0.485 0.625 13 88.1
Minnesota Wild 72 0.529 0.529 0.530 0.544 14 87.1
Anaheim Ducks 70 0.515 0.500 0.530 0.537 14 85.2
Dallas Stars 71 0.522 0.586 0.455 0.594 14 82.8
Columbus Blue Jackets 67 0.479 0.486 0.471 0.582 12 77.7
Edmonton Oilers 49 0.355 0.486 0.221 0.595 13 54.3
Average - West 0.573 0.583 0.562
Average - All Teams 0.558 0.565 0.551
Hot and Cold—Eastern Conference
Unlike the East, most of the elite teams in the West have played consistently well throughout the season. That’s actually saying a lot, as many of us experts were picking some subset of early surprise teams Phoenix, Los Angeles and Colorado to falter. In fact, the Kings and especially the Coyotes have actually played better. Wow. To tell you how good the Western Conference is, the Bryzgavlov-led Coyotes have only been the third hottest team (.682) — San Jose (.742) and Vancouver (.742) have actually been much better. Conversely, the two biggest drop-offs have been Nashville (.653 to .515) and Calgary (.629 to .485), which brings us to the…
Bubble teams — Western Conference
It’s been a long, long time since Vancouver and Calgary were neck and neck, vying for the Northwest Division lead. The playoff hopes of the Flames continue to dim — Since their impressive road win against Detroit last week, Calgary’s recent losses, poor .485 winning rate and NHL’s toughest schedule (eight of their remaining games are against Washington, San Jose, Chicago, Vancouver, Phoenix and Colorado) give them little chance of making the playoffs. On the other hand, the Detroit Red Wings are heading in the opposite direction, winning at a .591 clip. With hockey’s easiest remaining schedule (.505), they’re a lock. While Nashville has the inside track, don’t count St. Louis out quite yet. The Blues are playing better hockey (.559 to .515) and have a significantly easier schedule (.529 to .571). Further, St. Louis has a game at hand and have the benefit of meeting Nashville three more times. But those who say the Blues must win all three games are probably overstating it a bit. A minimum acceptable record against their rival might be two wins and an overtime loss, splitting the points 5 to 2. While Minnesota’s in nearly the same boat as St. Louis, they’re just a bit worse off in every facet — enough to consider them already outside the race.
Timo Seppa runs the statistical hockey site Ice Hockey Metrics. Follow Timo on Twitter at @timoseppa.
Timo Seppa is an author of Hockey Prospectus.
You can contact Timo by clicking here or click here to see Timo's other articles.
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