Blackhawks head west looking for consistency

[BobbyJet]

The six-game road trip will span 12 days, all against Western Conference rivals. It will be a tough grind...... more below.

http://alongtheboards.com/2015/01/blackhawks-head-west-looking-consistency/

Personally, if offered anything more than seven points, I'd take it right now.

Click to read more...

 

[scarchelli]

I agree. 2 points tonight, none friday, 2 saturday, 2 tuesday, none next friday, then hopefully 2 in st louis February 8th.

We need to beat the jets and/or blues in regulation, that's of utter importance.

 

[CallMeShaft]

I will never agree to anything less than 2 points per night!

 

[Nothingman*]

I expect 3 points per night.

 

[CallMeShaft]

I expect 3 points per night.

3 for us, right?

 

[No Fun Shogun]

The first game after a break tends to be rough for us.... but then again long road trips tend to usually go well for us.

Battle of storylines....

 

[Hawkaholic]

Pacific division games have been a breeze for the Hawks in the past, hope that continues. Would be nice to see 2 wins against the Central teams too.

 

[BobbyJet]

A solid 60 minute game by the Blackhawk team last night. I'm sure that is exactly what Q wants to see. Now they need another game like that tonight.

 

[Xinji]

We should have 4 points already, but I'm satisfied with 2. Hopefully they can keep it rolling.

 

[zac]

A solid 60 minute game by the Blackhawk team last night. I'm sure that is exactly what Q wants to see. Now they need another game like that tonight.

It was one of the better efforts of the season. We had a few lulls, like Toews being a little lackadaisical on the lone Duck goal, but other than that we played great. The first period was one of the most entertaining of the year.

That's how we need to play night in, and night out. Save for the PP which was horrendous yet again.

 

[CourtneyDagger50]

Well, they are consistently frustrating.
Theres that.

 

[JaegerDice]

If the Hawks play the way they did tonight against San Jose every game the rest of the season, they will win far more games than they lose. Soft goal and a hot opposing goalie were the difference. They dominated in possession, shot diff and were ahead on scoring chances too.

Two great efforts back-to-back. Hoping for another on Tuesday

 

[BobbyJet]

If the Hawks play the way they did tonight against San Jose every game the rest of the season, they will win far more games than they lose. Soft goal and a hot opposing goalie were the difference. They dominated in possession, shot diff and were ahead on scoring chances too.

Two great efforts back-to-back. Hoping for another on Tuesday

Yeah, which happens when you're chasing the game. Flawed stats.

 

[hockeydoug]

Well, they are consistently frustrating.
Theres that.

I was going to post something along these lines.

 

[JaegerDice]

Yeah, which happens when you're chasing the game. Flawed stats.

I don't think so.

From an eye-test perspective, Sharks didn't change their playstyle until the 3rd period, where they basically just focused on defense and forced the Hawks to play dump and chase. In the 2nd period the Sharks were still pressing for offense, and the Hawks were simply outplaying them, as they did for the majority of the 1st period.

What did you see with your eye-test?

As far as flawed stats, the consistent, recurring trend in the data is that score effects don't take hold when the score is close (tied or within one goal), and when they do it's usually in the 3rd period. That's what happened in this game to my eye, as the Sharks backed off and let the Hawks have the puck for most of the 3rd period, they barely attempted to cross the Hawks blue-line, but the Hawks just couldn't generate anything when they were forced to dump and chase.

Whether that's because they were tired from the back-to-back, or because of roster management issues (the 3rd and 4th got little ice time, Roszival continued to play big minutes despite handicapping his team with terrible, botched zone exits, the 2nd line as currently constructed is REALLY limited if they can't carry the puck in, etc) could be an interesting discussion.

 

[BobbyJet]

I don't think so.

From an eye-test perspective, Sharks didn't change their playstyle until the 3rd period, where they basically just focused on defense and forced the Hawks to play dump and chase. In the 2nd period the Sharks were still pressing for offense, and the Hawks were simply outplaying them, as they did for the majority of the 1st period.

What did you see with your eye-test?

As far as flawed stats, the consistent, recurring trend in the data is that score effects don't take hold when the score is close (tied or within one goal), and when they do it's usually in the 3rd period. That's what happened in this game to my eye, as the Sharks backed off and let the Hawks have the puck for most of the 3rd period, they barely attempted to cross the Hawks blue-line, but the Hawks just couldn't generate anything when they were forced to dump and chase.

Whether that's because they were tired from the back-to-back, or because of roster management issues (the 3rd and 4th got little ice time, Roszival continued to play big minutes despite handicapping his team with terrible, botched zone exits, the 2nd line as currently constructed is REALLY limited if they can't carry the puck in, etc) could be an interesting discussion.

I saw a Hawk team that when falling behind in a game have trouble finishing. A recurring theme against good teams who after taking the lead, tighten up. Sharks played them tight and gave them very little room or time to execute, and were physical. As time went by at 1 - 0, Hawks became increasingly frustrated. Niemi made some nice saves but he was anything but under attack. When Hawks did get a PP, they failed miserably. After 40 minutes, they were done.
The miss by Toews on the breakaway and the subsequent unwarranted whistle to stop the play, was the turning point in the game. I don't need stats to tell me anything other than that.
The one stat I did find interesting, rather perplexing in fact, was the unbalanced ice times which was a factor I'm sure in the team running out of gas well before the game was over.

 

[JaegerDice]

I saw a Hawk team that when falling behind in a game have trouble finishing. A recurring theme against good teams who after taking the lead, tighten up. Sharks played them tight and gave them very little room or time to execute, and were physical. As time went by at 1 - 0, Hawks became increasingly frustrated. Niemi made some nice saves but he was anything but under attack. When Hawks did get a PP, they failed miserably. After 40 minutes, they were done.
The miss by Toews on the breakaway and the subsequent unwarranted whistle to stop the play, was the turning point in the game. I don't need stats to tell me anything other than that.

Ah, so you're a narrative kind of guy.

Fair enough.

We disagree. I don't need stats to tell me what happened in a game, but I do find them useful for fact-checking my eye-test. Confirmation bias afflicts us all.

In this case, I found the stats aligned pretty well with what I saw, a Hawks team that dominated throughout the first two periods, and then struggled to create chances when they were forced to dump and chase.

If they play as well as they did tonight on most nights, they won't be going into the third period without the lead (let alone a goal) very often.

 

[BobbyJet]

Ah, so you're a narrative kind of guy.

Fair enough.

We disagree. I don't need stats to tell me what happened in a game, but I do find them useful for fact-checking my eye-test. Confirmation bias afflicts us all.

In this case, I found the stats aligned pretty well with what I saw, a Hawks team that dominated throughout the first two periods, and then struggled to create chances when they were forced to dump and chase.

If they play as well as they did tonight on most nights, they won't be going into the third period without the lead (let alone a goal) very often.

Dominated, my ass.

 

[CourtneyDagger50]

If they play like they did last night every night,
i would probably have more fun watching Toronto

 

[zac]

Dominated, my ass.

They dominated possession, and on the overall we had strong fight and effort. Offensively our passing was horrid and we passed up some great shooting opportunities yet again. The bad passing led to about half of SJ's rushes. As far as elite scoring opportunities go, it was pretty even as SJ had far too many chances considering the number of shots and the amount of possession they had.

The soft goal cost us the game, but the offense was fairly nonexistent. We also saw another game exemplifying the futility that is Andrew Shaw. It's bad enough to suck, but even worse when you take bad penalties (repeatedly) for your team. He did have the one nice move though, which I guess is better than most of his games.

 

[BobbyJet]

They dominated possession, and on the overall we had strong fight and effort. Offensively our passing was horrid and we passed up some great shooting opportunities yet again. The bad passing led to about half of SJ's rushes. As far as elite scoring opportunities go, it was pretty even as SJ had far too many chances considering the number of shots and the amount of possession they had.

The soft goal cost us the game, but the offense was fairly nonexistent. We also saw another game exemplifying the futility that is Andrew Shaw. It's bad enough to suck, but even worse when you take bad penalties (repeatedly) for your team. He did have the one nice move though, which I guess is better than most of his games.

Yes we dominated possession for the first 40 minutes, just not the game. The players need to go to the dirty areas when ops go into defensive, tight checking mode like that. And not in spurts here and there ( a la, the one nice rush by Shaw).... do it all night until we bulge the twine. I hate watching a game like that knowing we aren't likely to score a single goal.