With the Los Angeles Kings defeating the Anaheim Ducks last night, that Western Conference semifinals matchup has reached Game 7 — the last game of the second round. But with 12 games already played by the West in Round Two, and 14 by the Eastern Conference teams, a lot of data and details are available to scrutinize.
Here are the “winners” and “losers” of the second round (drawing on some first-round specifics, too). Obvious winners, like P.K. Subban, are not the subject here. The Canadiens’ defenseman now might become the highest paid defenseman in the NHL, and he did so while catalyzing his team to the conference finals. Things could not have gone better for P.K. – but what follows are choices that are a little more under the radar.
Winner: The 2010 Draft Class
Before the playoffs started, Intelligent Hockey conducted a re-draft of the 2010 NHL Draft in which each team selected the best overall player based on what is now known about the players in this draft class. Some of the marquee names at the top of the re-draft had just completed first-rate seasons, and it was already apparent that 2010 would be a memorable class.
Many of these young stars were about to participate in the upcoming playoffs, some of them for the first time, and some growing pains were expected. Well, this did not come true, even remotely. The Minnesota Wild trio of Nino Niederreiter, Mikael Granlund, and Charlie Coyle were terrific. (Niederreiter was only given an honorable mention in the re-draft, which underscores the amazing depth of 2010. In hindsight, he should have been in the top 14.)
One of the Wild’s most effective plays in the postseason was passing the puck to Granlund, and then letting him create. Like a great artist, his strokes were graceful and authentic, knifing through coverage and seeing the entire landscape with his eagle-eye vision. Coyle was very good also, providing an aggressive north-south game and strong play on and off the puck below the circles. But the biggest winner may be Niederreiter, who showed the full array of size, skill, and edge that made him a top-five pick. All three players look like top-six forwards and they are 22 or younger.
The St. Louis Blues are at a similar stage in their maturation as the Wild. In Vladimir Tarasenko and Jaden Schwartz, they have two top-six forwards from 2010 who are dripping with star potential, but neither was good enough to help them overcome the Chicago juggernaut. The Blackhawks are a team rich in elite players, while Tarasenko and Schwartz are still on their way there.
Of the teams in the conference semifinals, the defensive anchors/aces are as follows: New York (Ryan McDonagh), Boston (Zdeno Chara), Montreal (P.K. Subban), Pittsburgh (Paul Martin), Los Angeles (Drew Doughty), Chicago (Duncan Keith), Minnesota (Ryan Suter), and Anaheim (Cam Fowler). Subban recently turned 25, McDonagh turns 25 in June, and Doughty turns 25 in December. But Fowler? He turns 23 in December. He is a full two years younger than the next youngest player, and a lot younger than some of the others.
Fowler is accruing invaluable postseason experience, and he has played better in the second round than he did in the first. He has the smooth skating, playmaking, recovery speed, and composure that project him to be one of the best defensemen in the NHL in the future. If he can improve his shot, he has a serious chance at the Norris Trophy some day.
Finally, Ryan Johansen and Tyler Seguin handled themselves very well in their playoff series, and Brendan Gallagher is proving himself to be an impact player on every shift for Montreal – Gallagher is sixth in the playoffs for points per 60 minutes. What an unbelievable collection of talent in one draft class.
Losers: Brad Richards and Rick Nash
New York Rangers center Brad Richards did score in Game 7 on what would be the game-winning goal, but he looks frayed in these playoffs. He no longer has his dynamic speed, his shot does not have the same accuracy, and his defense has been rudderless. It was conceivable that, if he had an enormous impact during the playoffs, he could salvage his fate of a compliance buyout, but that seems highly unlikely.
Factoring in the recapture penalties that are latent in his long-term contract, it would be a fool’s errand to keep him. He is no longer a difference-maker, and he is now the third best center on his team. Also, his winning goal against Pittsburgh came on an unbelievable pass from Martin St. Louis. Too many times Richards has struggled to bury those shots in the slot, and he no longer possesses the ability to create that kind of opportunity for himself. Fortunately, the Rangers’ power play is not good anyway, so his absence from the point will not be missed much. (Ryan McDonagh and Derick Brassard are two players who would be more than capable at filling in at that quarterback role.)
Rangers’ winger Rick Nash has a very good Relative Fenwick, and has accumulated a lot of shots on goal during these playoffs. Those are the positives. The negatives are many. He lacks the explosion that he possessed earlier in his career, and his puck skills do little to provide him with separation from his opponents. Too often, Nash is content pivoting, stopping and starting, and juking, or even just using his backside to back players down before stepping laterally and whipping a shot in the direction of the net.
This did not work on the Penguins’ Marc-Andre Fleury, so the chances are slim they will work on Montreal’s Carey Price, or any future playoff goaltender. Nash still can achieve the successful zone entry, and has dispensed some hits and defensive pressure on the puck-carrier during these playoffs, but his inability to score in these tight-checking contests cannot solely be attributed to lack of puck luck.
The reality is that Nash is almost 30 years old (his birthday is in June). There is a precipitous drop off for players of Nash’s type. As hockey analyst Eric Tulsky put it after researching the effects of age on forwards, “a passer is a better bet for a multi-year contract than a scorer, and a shooter is a bit more reliable than a sniper.” Nash shoots a lot, instead of relying on a precise shot on fewer attempts, but his inability to create space for himself because of diminishing speed does not bode well for his future.
Winner: Corey Crawford and a different way to engage Chicago
There is danger in reading too much into Crawford’s success for the Blackhawks in the first two series. Goaltending is volatile, and Crawford’s .931 save percentage could drop significantly in the next series because he has faced only 377 shots in the playoffs – a very small sample size.
The Wild were able to generate chances off the rush and on the cycle, and Crawford denied them consistently. Chicago is a hyper-aggressive team that is confident blitzing in the offensive zone; their players are usually good enough that they can manufacture high-end scoring opportunities from this. Only the best teams can counteract their gamble.
But the Wild are a good skating team and were able to get behind Chicago’s defensemen multiple times, and the recognition and implementation of the stretch pass led to breakaways and odd-man rushes. But Crawford stood tall, again and again. The Blackhawks are explosive and talented enough to gamble for steals, although when they missed, Minnesota fired away. The Wild used their speed at times in ways the Blackhawks could not nullify.
For the winner of Los Angeles-Anaheim, there are things to extract from Chicago’s first two series. When the Blackhawks’ transition game is disjointed, and it has been to a surprising degree in these playoffs, it allows an opponent to snatch loose pucks. The Wild did a good job at attacking the offensive zone with speed, and Chicago had trouble establishing consistent territorial zone time.
Minnesota did a very good job at converging on the net on the forecheck, spacing themselves well, and coming in layers from multiple angles. Minnesota was able to move the puck from strong side to weak side skillfully, opening up quadrants of space. St. Louis was able to hem the Blackhawks in the defensive zone, and had some success, like Minnesota, forcing quick exits when Chicago made their offensive zone entries. But the Blues’ two best players at creating with speed were Tarasenko and Schwartz. Minnesota had more speed at forward, and some of their best chances came from their speedsters on the third line, like Erik Haula.
Winner: Nathan MacKinnon
The Wild just did a phenomenal job bottling up Chicago’s firepower in the conference semifinals, but they were shredded by the Colorado Avalanche’s Nathan MacKinnon one series earlier. And it was not like Colorado had several players making dynamic plays on a shift-to-shift basis — it was only MacKinnon! Minnesota has a very good defensive group, who were excellent at their best. But MacKinnon made them look overmatched.
The Wild forwards are two-way players who track and assail the puck-carrier. Yet, MacKinnon was able to catch them flat-footed time and time again. He was able to jump on the loose puck near the blue line in his own zone and go from blue line to blue line, skate laterally, and then identify — and thread — a pass to a cutting forward. Or after making the zone entry, he just unleashed a missile into one of the corners.
In the conference semifinals, the only forward who was able to make Minnesota’s defensemen look bumbling was Patrick Kane in Game 1, and then the Wild did a very good job stymieing the Blackhawks’ attack after that. Honestly, no one knows what MacKinnon will do next season. But the bar is very high because his rookie season was ridiculous.
Loser: Drew Doughty Appreciation
When the Norris Trophy finalists were announced this postseason, Los Angeles Kings’ defenseman Drew Doughty’s name was not mentioned. This was a misstep. There are a throng of sensational defensemen in the NHL, but Doughty is possibly the best. He has yet to win a Norris Trophy — though after every tournament, he is remembered as the very best NHL defenseman, or at least among the top three. (For stretches of games in Sochi, Doughty was the best player on Canada.) Despite being a dominant force for the Kings all season, Doughty struggles to get the Norris Trophy finalist nomination.
During the last two playoffs, Doughty has been arguably the best skater for the Kings. During these playoffs, on five on five, 57.4 percent of the shot attempts have gone the Kings’ way when Doughty is on the ice. He is one of the best defensemen in the NHL at exiting the zone, leading the transition and stunting opponents in the neutral zone, and entering the offensive zone and identifying what is the best course of action for the team.
The prevailing theory for why Doughty gets overlooked is that he does everything so effortlessly, and his offensive stats are not gaudy enough. There are players with slightly better advanced statistics and conventional statistics – although Doughty’s are very good. But considering the burden that is placed on him, along with how much ice time he logs, he is probably the most valuable defenseman on his team. And considering the Kings’ run of success the last few years, this should count for a lot.
Winner: Montreal Defensive Structure
Carey Price had a ludicrous .944 even-strength save percentage, and the Bruins had unbelievably terrible puck luck — but Montreal’s ability to protect the middle was praiseworthy in this last series. Their ability to seal off the passing and shooting lanes, and repel the Bruins physically when they tried to navigate into the slot, was impressive. Montreal’s five-man units displayed accountability and a triage-like assessment of how to take away the most palatable scoring option — whether that was a backdoor play or the triangle forecheck off the faceoff win.
Not only did Montreal keep the Bruins to the perimeter more than Boston may have anticipated, but they maintained layers in their defensive coverage and rotated precisely, recognizing their shifting defensive assignments. Moreover, any concession of the puck was flipped into a game-changing scoring chance with their speed on the transition.
And it all started from that on-a-string defense.
