Archive for September 11th, 2007

Great Time To Be A Ranger Fan…

Posted by inferno272 on September 11th, 2007

Let’s ignore for a second that our team is the strongest it has been since 1994. The New York Rangers prospect squad is seconds away from going a perfect 4-0 in the Traverse City Prospect Tournament, en route to a dominating championship performance.

You may recall this post here where I list the prospects and put the ones I am most interested in, in a nice bold font. To refresh your memory, here was the list…

Anisimov
Barnes
Bourret
Dubinsky
Dupont
Hillier
Korpikoski
Owens
Pyatt
Busto
Potter
Staal
Sauer
Sanguinetti
Lafleur

So, how did the team do? Here are the official stats:

Player
Games
Goals
Assists
Points
Plus/Minus
Dubinsky
4
3
4
7
+3
Bourret
4
3
4
7
+5
Owens
4
3
0
3
+1
Anisimov
3
2
1
3
+2
Sauer
4
1
2
3
+5
Skokan
3
0
3
3
0
Staal
4
2
0
2
+6
Korpikoski
4
2
0
2
-1
Sanguinetti
4
1
1
2
+1
Kveton
4
1
1
2
+3
Dupont
4
0
2
2
-1
Hillier
4
0
2
2
+1
Zaborsky
4
1
0
1
0
Barthel
4
0
1
1
-2
Lee
3
0
1
1
-2
Potter
4
0
0
0
+1
Pyatt
4
0
0
0
+1
Busto
3
0
0
0
-3
Barnes
2
0
0
0
-1
Bohunicky
2
0
0
0
+1
Player
Games
Wins
Losses
GAA
SV%
Goals Allowed
Lafleur
2
2
0
2.00
.892
4
Wiikman
2
2
0
3.00
.850
6

As you can see, the key players not only delivered in spades, but flat out dominated. With the exception of some shaky goaltending (The save percentages are putrid, though there is no way to know what that means since its possible they faced a high percentage of quality scoring chances, or that they just sucked) the Rangers squad dominated offensively and defensively.

Next, how about Shots on goal?

Opponent
Rangers Shots
Opposition Shots
Difference
Tampa Bay
31
25
+6
Atlanta
30
19
+11
Detroit
24
15
+9
Columbus
32
18
+14
Total:
117
77
+40

Now that is the telltale sign of excellent coaching. When you not only get a lot of shots on goal, but when you are giving up very few yourself. Excellent numbers there folks, excellent for sure, and don’t take your eyes off of that +6 for Marc Staal for a second, I am sure that is a huge reason the shots allowed are so low for the other teams.

The final stat I want to look at are the quality of penalties taken. How many were majors, how many were aggression penalties (roughing, boarding, charging, etc), and how many were “lazy” penalties (too many men on the ice, hooking, holding, interference, tripping, etc)

Opponent
Rangers Major Penalties
Rangers Aggression Penalties
Rangers Lazy Penalties
Opposition Major Penalties
Opposition Aggression Penalties
Opposition Lazy Penalties
Tampa Bay
0
0
6
0
0
7
Atlanta
1
2
3
2
3
2
Detroit
0
3
3
0
0
7
Columbus
1
3
1
1
3
5
Total:
2
8
13
3
6
21

There is another great stat guys, the Rangers took far fewer “lazy” penalties, than the opposition. That is a very important, and telltale stat that these kids know how to play, and are listening to their coach. Give credit to Ken Gernander, he has these kids playing well, playing as a team, and playing within the Rangers system.

Update:
Ted from the blueshirt bulletin comments section here, had some more interesting stats…

  • Tied w/ Blues for most goals (19)
  • Fewest goals allowed (10) next had 12
  • Largest goal differential (+9) – next largest was St. Louis with +5
  • Scored in every period of play
  • Never lost a period
  • Only outshot in two periods: in 3rd period of Thrashers game (8-6) and 1st period of Tampa game (11-9)
  • Fewest Shots Allowed (77) – Next Fewest was the Blue Jackets with 106!
  • Biggest differential in shots taken to shots given up with +40 – next closest were the Wild with +26
  • Best power play percentage of any team (30.77%) and most power play goals scored (8) – next best power play percentage was 17.86% (Thrashers & Blues) and next most goals scored was 5 (Thrashers, Blues & Wild)
  • Fewest times short handed (20)
  • Tied w/ Blues, Thrashers, and Red Wings with the fewest short handed goals allowed (3) – in spite of this only had 85% penalty killing percentage, due to giving up so few power plays.
  • Out of 16, our goalies ranked 8th (LaFleur) and 11th (Wiikman) in SV% – 0.892 and 0.850 respectively
  • Ranked 3rd (LaFleur) and 6th (Wiikman) in GAA – 2.0 and 3.0 respectively
  • Pumped up for training camp yet?

    Northeast preview tomorrow.

    -Inferno