Comparing this year to last: Goaltending

by James Mirtle on Nov 19, 2008 5:32 PM CST in Statistics Comment 3 comments

If I gave you 30 or so guesses as to which team's goaltending has improved the most this season, it'd be pretty interesting to see just how far down the Lightning were on that list.

Mike Smith, and to a lesser extent Olaf Kolzig, have transformed the way Tampa Bay is losing games this season, so much so that the Lightning have the most improved save percentage of any team in the league.

I wonder how many teams in NHL history have had a nearly 4-per-cent swing in a single season?

		2008-09	2007-08
RK	TEAM	SV%	SV%	Change
1	Tampa Bay	0.923	0.885	3.81%
2	Boston	0.935	0.914	2.07%
3	Minnesota	0.935	0.915	1.99%
4	Ottawa	0.916	0.902	1.47%
5	NY Rangers	0.925	0.910	1.46%
6	Chicago	0.914	0.901	1.28%
7	Carolina	0.908	0.896	1.21%
8	Buffalo	0.910	0.900	0.96%
9	Vancouver	0.922	0.913	0.89%
10	Washington	0.908	0.899	0.84%
11	Phoenix	0.918	0.911	0.74%
12	Edmonton	0.909	0.904	0.52%
13	Montreal	0.919	0.917	0.20%
14	NY Islanders	0.905	0.903	0.20%
15	San Jose	0.906	0.906	0.00%
16	Florida	0.920	0.920	-0.06%
17	Pittsburgh	0.914	0.916	-0.18%
18	St. Louis	0.890	0.897	-0.67%
19	Los Angeles	0.893	0.900	-0.72%
20	Colorado	0.893	0.904	-1.10%
21	New Jersey	0.903	0.915	-1.17%
22	Atlanta	0.892	0.904	-1.26%
23	Anaheim	0.907	0.920	-1.26%
24	Calgary	0.890	0.904	-1.41%
25	Detroit	0.891	0.907	-1.65%
26	Nashville	0.889	0.908	-1.98%
27	Toronto	0.873	0.894	-2.02%
28	Philadelphia	0.892	0.913	-2.05%
29	Columbus	0.883	0.907	-2.39%
30	Dallas	0.868	0.905	-3.71%
		0.9050	0.9063

You can really see the difference on teams that switched netminders this season: Tampa Bay has Smith/Kolzig instead of Holmqvist/Denis/Ramo, Ottawa with Auld playing exceptional and no Emery, Chicago with a rejuvanated Khabibulin and Huet as a backup, and Carolina getting some solid play from its backup.

On the low end, Dallas could really use Smith as the backup right now, while Columbus has had a lot of injuries in the crease. Philadelphia, Toronto, Nashville, Detroit, Calgary and Anaheim have simply seen their No. 1 play far worse than last year.

See any surprises in there? Other than the fact Tim Thomas, an all-star last season, is now the best goaltender in the league somehow.

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Suprised to see the Wild improve

To see an improvement for the Wild, Backstrom would need a career year. Hmm, yep, looks that way so far.

by nathaneide on Nov 19, 2008 5:48 PM CST reply actions 0 recs

Even though the Blues didn't make the bottom 10...

I think there is no doubt that goaltending has played a big role in their recent troubles, injuries on the front line notwithstanding…Mason has been a disappointment, but he probably came back too soon…Legace hasn’t matched his brilliance from the past two years…the good news is I think we have a future star in Bishop.

by tbell61 on Nov 20, 2008 8:53 AM CST reply actions 0 recs