NHL 16/17 Season

[Jimmy Higgins]

I wouldn't call 4 penalties in a game a lot.

 

[ronburgundy]

I wouldn't call 4 penalties in a game a lot.

In relative hockey terms, 4 penalties a lot more than zero and zero is suspiciously little for the 7th most penalized team, especially for a team that is behind in a game that they as as desperate as the Preds were to win last night.7th

Pitt was ranked 7th this season in terms of penalties against them, while Nashville was ranked 7th in terms of committing the most penalties per game. Prior to last night, the Preds had the 3rd most penalty minutes per game among all playoff teams (at 13 minutes) with no other game with 0 penalties, and averaged 5.2 penalties per game in the Finals with at least 3 per game. Zero penalties is extremely rare, even during the regular season where there are generally fewer called. In the 103 other post and regular season games the Preds played, they had zero penalties in only 1 of them back in Feb, when their opponent also only had 2 penalties and they only hit their opponent 8 times all game in contrast to 23 hits last night.

Bottom line is that given their history, their number of hits in that game, the fact that 4 penalties were called on Pitt, and the desperation context of a Cup elimination game, zero is a very unlikely low number of penalties to be called against the Preds, unless the refs made and effort to make up for their own prior error in blowing the whistle too early.

 

[rousseau]

Four powerplays should definitely be enough to score a goal with. Bounces go both ways, but if you're not converting with 8 minutes of odd man situations, you likely didn't deserve the win. Give the Pens 8 minutes of powerplay time and they'll almost definitely score.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Every hockey fan wishes the goal had counted, that the ref had seen it get past Murray. I live 20 miles from the Paint Can and I wished it had counted.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I wouldn't call 4 penalties in a game a lot.

In relative hockey terms, 4 penalties a lot more than zero and zero is suspiciously little for the 7th most penalized team, especially for a team that is behind in a game that they as as desperate as the Preds were to win last night.7th

Pitt was ranked 7th this season in terms of penalties against them, while Nashville was ranked 7th in terms of committing the most penalties per game. Prior to last night, the Preds had the 3rd most penalty minutes per game among all playoff teams (at 13 minutes) with no other game with 0 penalties, and averaged 5.2 penalties per game in the Finals with at least 3 per game. Zero penalties is extremely rare, even during the regular season where there are generally fewer called. In the 103 other post and regular season games the Preds played, they had zero penalties in only 1 of them back in Feb, when their opponent also only had 2 penalties and they only hit their opponent 8 times all game in contrast to 23 hits last night.

Bottom line is that given their history, their number of hits in that game, the fact that 4 penalties were called on Pitt, and the desperation context of a Cup elimination game, zero is a very unlikely low number of penalties to be called against the Preds, unless the refs made and effort to make up for their own prior error in blowing the whistle too early.

I didn't watch the game, so I can't speak to the specific calls or non-calls. In the playoffs, especially the finals, you need to really mess up to get called for a penalty. And 4 penalties in a game still isn't too much. Little more than one per period.

 

[ronburgundy]

In relative hockey terms, 4 penalties a lot more than zero and zero is suspiciously little for the 7th most penalized team, especially for a team that is behind in a game that they as as desperate as the Preds were to win last night.7th

Pitt was ranked 7th this season in terms of penalties against them, while Nashville was ranked 7th in terms of committing the most penalties per game. Prior to last night, the Preds had the 3rd most penalty minutes per game among all playoff teams (at 13 minutes) with no other game with 0 penalties, and averaged 5.2 penalties per game in the Finals with at least 3 per game. Zero penalties is extremely rare, even during the regular season where there are generally fewer called. In the 103 other post and regular season games the Preds played, they had zero penalties in only 1 of them back in Feb, when their opponent also only had 2 penalties and they only hit their opponent 8 times all game in contrast to 23 hits last night.

Bottom line is that given their history, their number of hits in that game, the fact that 4 penalties were called on Pitt, and the desperation context of a Cup elimination game, zero is a very unlikely low number of penalties to be called against the Preds, unless the refs made and effort to make up for their own prior error in blowing the whistle too early.

I didn't watch the game, so I can't speak to the specific calls or non-calls. In the playoffs, especially the finals, you need to really mess up to get called for a penalty.

Just the opposite. More penalties per game were called on every playoff team than on those same teams during the regular season. Among the 4 teams that made it to the Conference Finals, they averaged 11.5 minutes worth of penalties per game which is equal to almost 6 minor penalties per game, compared to 10 or fewer minutes for 3 of those teams during the regular season (except Anaheim who had 11.3 minutes in the regular season). The league median in the regular season is 9.2 minutes per game.

And the per game penalties increased among the teams that went deeper into the playoffs. The only playoff teams with less than 4 penalties per game were the 3 teams that got killed in the first round.

And 4 penalties in a game still isn't too much. Little more than one per period.

You keep focusing on the absolute number of penalties against Pitt. What matters is the zero penalties against Preds relative to not only the 4 against Pitt but relative to the avg 5.5 against Preds in the prior games and the rarity of 0-4 penalty differential in any game by any teams.

Right, 4 isn't "too much", it is close to typical but zero is too little and is uncommon either in the regular or post-season, especially for a team that averaged 5.5 penalties against Pitt in the prior 5 games. The reason it is so rare is that things that technically count as penalties are committed about 20 times every game by all teams, and likely never once have occurred zero times. But the refs are trained not to bog down the flow of the game by calling everything. I didn't look at every game by every team, but I have yet to find a single game this season where one team had zero penalties and the other had 4 or more. If you look at the few games when a team gets zero penalties, it virtually always is a game where the other team got 2 or fewer penalties and neither team had many "hits". Both teams had above their average number of hits in this game, showing that it was a physical game of the sort that typically leads to above average penalties, and amost never to zero penalties versus 4 or more.

 

[ronburgundy]

Every hockey fan wishes the goal had counted, that the ref had seen it get past Murray. I live 20 miles from the Paint Can and I wished it had counted.

Agreed. I wish it had counted too, so people wouldn't be reaching the invalid conclusion that it determined the game. Preds played poorly and Pitt played very well to stop an 8 minute differential in power plays. The game could have easily wound up 3-1 Pitt if that goal had counted and the refs not spent the rest of the game giving them a pass on penalties.