Rangers underlying numbers paint clouded picture about 1st quarter of season
The New York Rangers have been on a roller coaster ride in the first quarter of this season. Their record and position in the standings tell a much different story than the underlying numbers and the general sentiment around the team.
After losing their fourth straight game on Wednesday, 4-3 to the Carolina Hurricanes, the Rangers fell to 12-8-1. This puts them in the first wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference. Given that they won the Presidents’ Trophy last season, this isn’t exactly where they’d like to be. However, if the season ended today, they’d be in the Stanley Cup Playoffs despite all of their issues the past month or so.
The big concerns for the outlook of the team come into consideration when you look at the five-on-five numbers. This has been an issue for years with the Rangers, and they’ve managed to overcome it well enough to easily make the playoffs and reach the Eastern Conference Final in two of the past three seasons.
This season, the Rangers are controlling 51.37% of the expected goals (xG) at five-on-five, according to Natural Stat Trick, when adjusting for score effects and venue. That’s probably a bit better than most fans would expect based on the negativity around the team of late. It ranks ahead of two current division leaders, the Vegas Golden Knights and Winnipeg Jets, who currentlit atop the NHL standings.
It still ranks just 15th in the league — in the top half of the League but not where you would want a true Stanley Cup contender. A bigger concern is the number of xG against per 60 minutes. That currently sits at 2.76, the fifth worst in the NHL. The teams below them are all non-contenders. No team below them has a points percentage above .500.
Related:Â Rangers 1st quarter report cards for all players, the coach and GM
Rangers results have been driven by finishing and goaltending
Having mediocre five-on-five play isn’t the be-all, end-all for a team. The Rangers proved that over the past few seasons. If an NHL team finishes its chances and has sustainable, above-average goaltending, it can easily overcome this.
Hockey actually has a metric to track this: PDO, an abbreviation that doesn’t actually stand for anything. It combines a team’s save percentage and shooting percentage. For the past three seasons, the Blueshirts are sporting a 101.8 PDO, the highest in the League. The theory is that PDO regresses to 100 on most teams. This season, the Rangers are at 102.7, the fourth highest in the NHL. While they’ve proven that they can perhaps be a bit above the 100 mark given their talent, even they might struggle to maintain a 102.5 PDO.
This also explains what’s happened during their recent struggles. The Rangers’ PDO is down to just 96.9. When you combine that with just 38.2 percent of the xG, you have a recipe for disaster. They also have really struggled on the power play of late.
The power play is down to a 20.4 percent success rate, 15th in the NHL, after failing to score on the man advantage in their past seven games. Last season, their power play ran at 26.4 percent. When you are a team that’s close to break even at five-on-five in terms of xG and shot attempts, scoring on the PP is key.
Rangers analytics say they can be nearly as good as last season
In many ways, the Rangers analytical numbers are better than where they finished last season, when they had the best record in the League. Their adjusted xG was only 49.24 at five-on-five, and the team’s PDO was 101.4. Both numbers are better this season, and even if their PDO regresses towards 100 this season, the better xG should eventually help offset that.
The power play is six percentage points worse than last season, but the penalty kill is 2.5 percentage points better. A key injury on the power play to Chris Kreider definitely hurts, since he led the team with 18 PP goals last season. When he returns to the lineup, the hope is that the slump ends.
Another injury that’s really hurting the team is the one to Filip Chytil. His relative xG percentage is 16.54 at five-on-five, by far the best on the team. If the Rangers want to get back to having the better end of the even-strength play, getting him back into the lineup is vital. Chytil has missed seven straight games with an upper-body injury but might return to the lineup soon.
The Verdict
It’s challenging to determine if the Rangers are genuine contenders or merely a bubble team, based on what the numbers say. While there are reasons for optimism that they can replicate last season’s success, there are also valid causes for skepticism.
On to the second quarter of the season. There’s still plenty of hockey to be played.
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