Round 1 of the 2023 NHL playoffs is behind us. Carol Schram examines the offense, defense, expected goals and more to see which better predicted the winners.
Round 1 of the 2023 NHL playoffs is behind us. Carol Schram examines the offense, defense, expected goals and more to see which better predicted the winners.
Everyone's bracket is busted, and one of the most thrilling first rounds in Stanley Cup playoff history is now in the books.
Going forward, a big theme will be fresh faces.
We saw the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Washington Capitals have their playoff-appearance streaks snapped before we even began. Now, we're also missing the most recent Stanley Cup Champions, this year's Presidents' Trophy winners, and the team that had won 11 of its last 12 series and navigated the post-pandemic playoffs better than anybody.
The Edmonton Oilers are the only squad from last year's final four that's still alive. The Carolina Hurricanes and Florida Panthers are also second-round returnees. The Toronto Maple Leafs and Dallas Stars are through after Game 7 eliminations in the 2022 first round, and the New Jersey Devils and Vegas Golden Knights are making the most of their returns to the dance.
We've also got the Seattle Kraken making history as the first expansion team to dethrone the defending champs in their first-ever playoff series.
We've got the Toronto Maple Leafs in the second round for the first time in Connor Bedard's lifetime — how's that for perspective?
And we've got the Carolina Hurricanes prevailing not only as the highest-seeded team remaining in the 2023 post-season but also the club with the most recent Stanley Cup win on its resumé — back in 2006, when Rod Brind'Amour was not the coach but instead, the team captain.
And despite the unpredictability of the first round, regular-season position did prove to be important. The Bruins got bounced, but the second-through-sixth-ranked teams on the league standings all advanced, as did the eighth. Just two true underdogs prevailed: the Kraken (12th overall) and the Panthers (17th).
Let's look a little closer at some key numbers to help explain why we've got Hurricanes versus Devils, Leafs versus Panthers, Golden Knights versus Oilers and Stars versus Kraken up next. You'll notice none of the stats are the be-all and end-all, and there are always outliers, but some categories correlated better with a series win than others.
There's no time to waste: Round 2 kicks off on Tuesday.
Offense
Of course, the teams that scored the most stood the best chance of advancing — but it's not as cut-and-dry as you might think. Three of the eight teams to reach Round 2 landed in the bottom six in terms of average offense in the first round. The Devils ended up tied with their opponent, the Rangers, in 14th place at 2.43 goals per game each. The Kraken were 12th at 2.57 goals per game, and the Hurricanes finished 11th, at 2.67.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, Boston's 3.86 goals per game were more than any team except the explosive Edmonton Oilers (4.17). But they came up one tally shy of keeping their season alive in Game 7 on Sunday.
Defense
Defense wins championships, they say. But once again, the correlation in this year's playoffs is a little shaky. The Stars had a sharp first round, giving up just 2.33 goals per game, and the Devils' Game 7 shutout tied them with the Rangers for second-stingiest, thanks to breakout star Akira Schmid in net.
The Hurricanes also outduelled Ilya Sorokin and the New York Islanders with just 2.50 goals allowed per game, including a one-goal night for Frederik Andersen in his return to action in the series-clinching Game 6 overtime affair.
The Kraken and the Golden Knights also paved their path to the second round with solid GAAs of under three goals a game — made that much more impressive by the fact they each stuck with one goalie and that those goalies were Philipp Grubauer and Laurent Brossoit.
Most notably, keeping the puck out of their net was not enough to advance the Rangers (tied for second, 2.43 goals against per game), the Avalanche (fifth, 2.57 goals against per game) or the New York Islanders (sixth, 2.67 goals per game).
And the Panthers are still alive despite averaging 3.86 goals per game, only better than the Los Angeles Kings. Somehow, Sergei Bobrovsky has an .891 save percentage and 3.94 GAA but is still a giant-killer, at 3-1 so far in the playoffs.
Goaltending
Speaking of goalies, 24 of them saw action across the first round. No team has used more than two so far. Eight teams used just one stopper — but only three of those clubs advanced. The other five used two, with the Devils and the Panthers (and maybe the Hurricanes?) making a wholesale change of direction partway through their series.
In terms of goals saved above expected as calculated by moneypuck.com, the Rangers' Igor Shesterkin is back at the top of the list. Schmid, Jake Oettinger and Grubauer rank next-highest among the goalies that are still alive.
Other keepers whose strong performances weren't enough to advance their teams were Sorokin (3.7 goals saved above expected) and Filip Gustavsson of the Minnesota Wild (2.4 goals saved above expected).
Special Teams
The old rule of thumb is that if your penalty kill and your power play together add up to more than 100 percent, you're doing all right.
Let's take a look at how the 16 first-round teams stacked up, with the Round 2 teams in bold:
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Five of the eight teams that finished over 100 were able to punch their tickets.
The top and bottom of this list are a study of how stats sometimes don't tell the full story. The Winnipeg Jets matched the Edmonton Oilers in special-teams efficiency but did not get anywhere near the same positive outcome. And Vegas has advanced despite the worst combined special teams in the first round — a decent 18.8 percent on the power play, but only 58.3 percent on the penalty kill against Winnipeg.
The difference between these teams' fates becomes apparent in their 5-on-5 numbers — and luck played a factor. True to their roots, the Golden Knights had the best PDO in the first round, at 1.065. That stat combines shooting percentage and save percentage at 5-on-5, and average luck is 1.00.
The Jets had the lowest PDO in the first round, at just .935. And the Panthers, Oilers and Kraken all enjoyed a little bit of luck. But PDO numbers were higher for both the Rangers (1.028) and the Islanders (1.020). Neither could parlay a slight situational advantage into a tickets to the second round.
Expected Goals at 5-on-5
Looking at the numbers on an analytics site like naturalstattrick.com, a team's expected goals rate (xGF%) is a little more nuanced than metrics like Corsi or Fenwick. Expected goals models assign a 1-to-100 percent value to every shot that is taken, based on the likelihood of scoring from that spot on the ice. High-danger scoring chances count for the most, naturally, while the lower-danger perimeter shots count for less.
Expected goals give a sense of how hard a team is making life on their opponents. And the xGF% rate compares the effectiveness of both teams. Anything more than 50 percent means that side has an edge in controlling play at 5-on-5.
So let's take a look at how the 16 teams' expected goals rates broke down in Round 1:
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The big takeaway here is that there is almost no difference between the middle eight — just two percentage points separate the fifth-best team, the Lightning, from the 12th-best team, the Leafs. There was only nine-tenths of one percentage point difference between Colorado and Seattle.
Of those four series, two were won by the team with the better expected goals rate, and two weren't. Basically, they were pick 'ems. And that speaks, again, to the parity in today's NHL and how well coaches are able to play their match-up games.
But the teams that could build a decisive expected goals advantage were able to feast. And three of those four teams were also able to finish their series relatively quickly.
It's also interesting to note that this is a trait that carries over from the regular season. Seven of the teams that are still standing finished in the top 12 in expected goals rate during the regular season. Vegas was lowest but still in the top half, ranked 16th.
A good possession game won't necessarily guarantee a long playoff run. But not having one more-or-less is a near-certain road to an early-spring tee time.