Why aren’t the Ottawa Senators more consistent?
That is the buzzing question surrounding a team that has dropped three straight games and enters play tonight against the Vegas Golden Knights with an 8-9-1 record.
The Senators boast some of the more impressive underlying metrics in the league, but their record is not indicative of that.
Evolving-Hockey‘s data reveals that the Senators’ expected goals percentage of 54.50 is the fourth-best in the NHL. They trail only the Carolina Hurricanes, Los Angeles Kings and Washington Capitals. The Senators’ expected goals allowed per 60 (xGA/60) rate is the third-lowest in the league.
After years of watching high-event hockey and complaining about how this organization and its players needed to learn how to play the right way, the Senators’ five-on-five defensive metrics are some of their best in the modern analytics era. Unfortunately, their play at even strength has been submarined by poor goaltending and a poor on-ice shooting percentage.
Evolving-Hockey‘s data shows the Senators rank 28th in five-on-five save percentage (89.26) and 27th in on-ice shooting percentage (7.19). During his media availability yesterday, Steve Staios expressed confidence in Linus Ullmark’s ability to turn his game around and understandably so.
Throughout Ullmark’s career, even dating back to his Buffalo days when he did not play for a strong team, he has never experienced having a season with a sub .900 save percentage.
Through 11 appearances this season, it currently sits at .884.
Across parts of 10 NHL seasons, Ullmark has a career .917 save percentage. It is reasonable to assume there is a very good chance that Ullmark’s performance will normalize and regress toward his career average.
Luck is often recognized as a prevailing factor regarding shooting percentages. After this morning’s off-ice work for the Senators, I asked head coach Travis Green about shooting percentage and how his staff can try to help improve that metric.
“I think a little bit of it is luck when you talk about (shooting percentage),” Green explained. “But, can we get our shots in better spots? Can we have traffic?
“Our offensive game has some room to improve, and it’s an area that we’ve, I don’t want to say we’ve under-coached, but we’ve really emphasized our defensive game from the start.”
The emphasis on the defensive side of the puck certainly makes sense, considering how important it was for the group to transition from Jacques Martin, who returned to his senior…