The Stat Line Of The Night – 3/27/09 – Joey MacDonald
Projecting The NHL Playoffs
Total Pro Sports – They say that to win a championship in a team sport it takes a championship effort from the whole team. That being said I am going to take a look at how each team ranks in five team stats, give them points opposite of their ranking (so if a team is first in a category they get 3o points. 3o points because their are 3o teams in the NHL) and then divide that total by five to give them an average score for their team stats based on how they are doing in relation to the rest of the league.
The five team stats that I plan on using are: Points, goals for per game, goals against per game, power play, and penalty kill.
| Ranking | Points | G/G | GA/G | PP% | PK% | Overall |
| 1 | SJS | DET | BOS | DET | NYR | SJS- 27.6 |
| 2 | DET | BOS | MIN | WSH | MIN | BOS- 26.6 |
| 3 | BOS | CHI | SJS | SJS | NSH | PHI- 24 |
| 4 | NJD | CGY | NJD | PHI | SJS | CHI- 22.4 |
| 5 | WSH | PHI | NYR | BOS | CGY | DET- 21 |
| 6 | CGY | SJS | CHI | ANA | PHI | NJD- 21 |
| 7 | PHI | WSH | VAN | BUF | LAK | WSH-20.2 |
| 8 | CHI | PIT | NSH | CHI | BUF | CGY-19.8 |
| 9 | CAR | NJD | CBJ | STL | ST | MIN-19.4 |
| 10 | PIT | VAN | CAR | ATL | BOS | VAN-18.4 |
| 11 | VAN | ATL | FLA | MIN | FLA | BUF-18.4 |
| 12 | NYR | TOR | PHI | NJD | MTL | NYR-17 |
| 13 | CBJ | NTL | OTT | TOR | BYI | ANA-16.4 |
| 14 | MTL | BUF | BUF | LAK | PIT | PIT-16.2 |
| 15 | FLA | CAR | STL | VAN | CBJ | STL-16 |
| 16 | ANA | A A | ANA | OTT | OTT | CAR-15.6 |
| 17 | EDM | EDM | LAK | CGY | CHI | MTL-15 |
| 18 | MIN | DAL | WSH | TBL | ANA | FLA-14.4 |
| 19 | NSH | FLA | PIT | MTL | VAN | NSH-14.2 |
| 20 | BUF | CBJ | DET | CAR | NJD | LAK-13.6 |
| 21 | STL | STL | MTL | NYI | WSH | CBJ-13.4 |
| 22 | TOR | OTT | EDM | PIT | CAR | OTT-13 |
| 23 | OYY | TBL | CGY | EDM | TBL | TOR-10 |
| 24 | DAL | LAK | PHX | COL | COL | EDM-9.8 |
| 25 | LAK | MIN | DAL | DAL | DAL | ATL-9.4 |
| 26 | PHX | NYI | TBL | FLA | DET | DAL-7.6 |
| 27 | ATL | NSH | COL | NSH | EDM | TBL-7.4 |
| 28 | TBL | COL | NYI | PHX | PHM | NYI-7.4 |
| 29 | COL | PHX | TOR | NYR | TOR | COL-4.6 |
| 30 | NYI | NYR | ATL | CBJ | ATL | PHX-4 |
Again, this chart is not to rank who the best teams are, as you can tell that the overall rankings are a bit off from the points ranking (and in any sport the only stat that really matters is Wins). It ranks which teams are playing a better team game which should give us a clue as to who is going to play well in the playoffs going off of the old adage that it takes at team playing as a team to win.
