Detroit iced the puck seven times in with the Buffalo net empty yesterday. Here's more on the theory behind a deliberate approach to killing off games at five-on-six
Detroit iced the puck seven times in with the Buffalo net empty yesterday. Here's more on the theory behind a deliberate approach to killing off games at five-on-six
On Sunday afternoon, the Sabres—trailing 3-1—pulled goaltender Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen with a bit more than three minutes to play. In those remaining minutes, looking to kill the game by netting a fourth, Detroit iced the puck seven times, and that's no accident. Instead, it's a deliberate strategy for managing six-on-five situations.
When the Red Wings lead by two or more, they'll fire away at the empty net with no fear of the icing that might result. If there were a one-goal lead to protect, Detroit would be more frugal in its shot selection. They didn't get the empty-netter they sought yesterday, but their efforts—killing off at times just six seconds at a clip—were enough to get the 3-1 result over the finish line.
As coach Derek Lalonde explained on Friday, two days before the game, the Red Wings developed that approach in response to internal research. "Actually the analytics team helped me on this—what's the best odds and percentages," Lalonde recounted. "We kinda have an unwritten rule: any time you have some time and space, you wanna be smart with the puck. Two goal leads or more, you got a good look, go for it. That one goal lead, I think it's a recipe for disaster if you give them a free face-off. It's tough; I think it's circumstantial, but we do talk about it."
He added that the debate over when it's appropriate to shoot at an empty net from your own end and thus risk a defensive zone face-off if it turns into an icing is an ongoing one around the NHL. "It's a good question because it's something you can see throughout the league: Some guys head down, hammering it, and then O zone face-off," Lalonde noted. "Some teams are really disciplined about it where it's gotta be in the neutral zone; you wanna avoid that face-off...It's something that I think is being talked through throughout the league."
Defenseman Ben Chiarot—who played a major role in his team's five-on-six defense yesterday until a roughing minor with 1:02 to play ended his night—told The Hockey News that he's seen the thinking around shooting at empty nets evolve over his own playing career.
"When I was growing up, it was more about just keeping it out of your end as opposed to taking the chance of shooting it down and it going for icing," Chiarot said last Friday. "I think that thought process has changed a bit. You see more teams go for it." To Chiarot, an increased willingness to shoot at an empty net makes sense in the context on the league's growing emphasis on attack. "I think everything's just geared a little bit more toward offense now, and you can kinda take that risk and hope you win that face-off back in your zone," he pointed out.
If the Red Wings are to earn a playoff spot over the five games left in the season, chances are they will have to ward off a few more five-on-six situations along the way. With that in mind, what goes into succeeding when the opponent has pulled its goalie beyond the to-shoot-or-not-to-shoot question from the defensive zone?
Per Lalonde, scoring with the net empty comes from creating chaos around the crease, so for the defending team, denying access to the slot becomes even more of an imperative than it is at five-on-five.
"Last year, we led the league in six-on-five goals scored, and I thought it was because of our mentality," he said. "It's not going to be set plays. It's not gonna be the pretty seam one-timer goal. You have to get pucks and numbers to the net, so you gotta defend against that too. Never give them the middle of the ice, and don't get out-numbered at the net. If you look back at a lot of the goals scored, usually it's just a puck to the net and a rebound."
Chiarot offered a similar message, saying "As a defenseman, you just want to stick close to your net. You don't wanna get too far from your net, because obviously we're out-numbered at our net, so you wanna stay close, box guys out, be able to clear any loose pucks."
Per Moritz Seider—who blocked 10 shots yesterday, two of them in the end-of-game five-on-six (as Lalonde said of the young German defenseman in his post-game presser, "no one eats pucks like him")—positioning becomes more important than marking an individual man with the opposing net empty.
"Just trying to be in the right spots," he told THN Friday, when asked about his own five-on-six priorities. "Obviously, a lot of the five-on-six goals get scored right around the net. We try to be there. You don't really wanna get boxed out with one guy. You try to stay loose, just cover more space than a single person, and you try to eliminate danger zone areas more than tying up a stick or tying up a body."
"You really just gotta pick your moments when to pressure," he continued. "I think a lot of the times, you get so stressed out, you stay back, stay back, and you give their skill guys a little bit too much time and space, and all of a sudden, it's in the back of the net. For us, I feel like it's finding the right spots, when to jump a guy, maybe when he's fumbling the puck, maybe when he has his back turned. That's the moments where we come together as a unit and really try to force the puck to the outside."
As for the question of when it's worth the risk to try for an empty-netter, Seider said, "I know for a fact teams have rules with that. Once you're up two goals, no one is scared of shooting at the empty net from your own zone. If you have an icing, you still have a chance to get the puck out and clear it, but I think with a one goal lead, you just try to get it out and then go. We just don't want to cheat for anything. We want to create offense ourselves by staying underneath the puck, chipping it, chipping it, and then we'll get our chances out in the neutral zone and try to finish the game with an empty-net goal."
While veterans like Chiarot, Dylan Larkin, and J.T. Compher all played central roles in yesterday's empty net defense, Lalonde also leaned on his youth to slam the door on the Sabres. As he put it, "We're playing for our season last night, and we've got [Lucas] Raymond, Seider, and [Simon] Edvinsson out to protect the lead. That's organic, and that speaks volumes of them."
If the season is going to end with the playoff berth Detroit fans crave, Lalonde will more than likely need his Red Wings young and old to repeat yesterday's empty net effort a few more times.
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