Roster/Rumors/Speculation/Trade Talk - 2024-25: Re-Tool, Re-Group, Re-Mix, Re-Build

[BrockLobster]

Lou eats pizza with a knife and fork.

Confession: me too.

 

[MarsTBOW]

Lou eats pizza with a knife and fork.

Only Sicilian Pie

 

[13th Floor]

Trying to put my thoughts about the possession numbers so far into the crudest full season implication terms. I'm no statistician and there's obvious more factors here, but:

- League shooting percentage has been around 10% for the past 5 years or so. That means league save % should be right around 90% or .900.

- The Islanders are averaging 33 shots a game, third in the league. If average shooting % is a sticky stat, they should expect to land right around 3.3 goals per game if they kept that up for the rest of the season.

- The Islanders are allowing 25.3 shots per game - however, teams that face the Islanders to not face a league average of goaltending over time.
They're going to face Sorokin and Varlamov who have posted a 91.3% save percentage in their 4 years as a tandem, meaning that teams have had an 8.7% shooting percentage against the Isles over that time, agnostic of coach or system.

- 25.3 shots at a 8.7% clip is 2.2 goals a game. So with the possession numbers they've posted, it should lead to them expecting about 3.3 goals a game and giving up about 2.2 goals a game over a full season, which is exactly a 2:1 ratio (didn't expect it to work out that cleanly!)

- If you're expecting to win games at a 2:1 ratio over a full season where there are 164 points available, that would put you on track for 108 points, which would have been good for 5th in the conference and 8th in the league last season.

Again, super crude numbers here, and not accounting for X factors... but I think we are seeing what Roy's plan is. Combine dominant possession numbers with above average (and potentially elite) goaltending. It makes a lot of sense when you consider the strengths of our best players, and our lack of a game breaking scorer. Barzal usually in the top 3 in possession metrics and Sorokin usually in the top three in Save %. Puck bounces a different way a couple of times and I think we're all a bit more optimistic.

I feel like you kind of made your point and refuted your point, heh. If we regress to the mean, then goals will start going in, but we know those X factors are real and this group is in the bottom quartile of finishing, and so this is what we get. I agree that some puck luck our way, especially in two separate 1-0 losses, and things look better in the standings, but the underlying vibe is same old same old, and I think we all know what we got here, especially since we lost the only new addition to the roster for the rest of the calendar year. Nobody on this team is cracking the PPG threshold. I'd put coin on that.

This season comes down to Sorokin standing on his head (and, relatedly, not being dead last in PK), which is at best good enough to get a WC and maybe win a round. I can get excited enough to root for that, but I'm not fooling my self into expecting more.

I'm also very curious to play a game in our division. I think that will be telling.

 

[warrior60]

This is a surprising reaction; I've seen nothing from Horvat or Nelson that warrants them getting more ice time than Barzal. I get the frustration with Barzal, but am perplexed that Horvat and Nelson aren't getting the same heat. They've been terrible; at least Barzal actually gains the zone and sets up his teammates for scoring chances, almost all of which they (meaning Horvat) have missed

Isn’t Barzal the face of this franchise that is playing with the only other superstar on this team that is signed for eight more years at nine million per year, Nelson is making three million a year less that could be gone anytime.

 

[LeapOnOver]

I suggested they should put Lee back on the top line with Duclair out and some people didn’t like it, but he’s looked noticeably quicker to me. Maybe that’s a result of playing less minutes, but he looks way better than Tsyplakov for sure

I don't know, I see a slowing, weaker Lee. He loses the puck way more on the boards than he used to and can't get away with cheating angles anymore as he's slowed. Lee is still a 3rd liner imo.

I feel like you kind of made your point and refuted your point, heh. If we regress to the mean, then goals will start going in, but we know those X factors are real and this group is in the bottom quartile of finishing, and so this is what we get. I agree that some puck luck our way, especially in two separate 1-0 losses, and things look better in the standings, but the underlying vibe is same old same old, and I think we all know what we got here, especially since we lost the only new addition to the roster for the rest of the calendar year. Nobody on this team is cracking the PPG threshold. I'd put coin on that.

This season comes down to Sorokin standing on his head (and, relatedly, not being dead last in PK), which is at best good enough to get a WC and maybe win a round. I can get excited enough to root for that, but I'm not fooling my self into expecting more.

I'm also very curious to play a game in our division. I think that will be telling.

No idea why you think that with the way the team has been pretty rock steady in defending so far.

 

[impaaaaaact]

at least its only 4-6 weeks...

They’re not putting him on LTIR, and I have a guess as to why. I’m no cap expert, but at the beginning of the season we were only a couple hundred k from being able to keep Engvall and Wahlstrom. Does anyone know when we will have accrued enough cap space to have them both on the roster?

 

[LeapOnOver]

I mean actually I think the forward depth is pretty good… they have Fasching, Karlstrom and some guy named Engvall still in Bridgeport who have all played a fair amount of NHL games, plus Martin whenever they want him. Left side D behind Cholowski there’s Bolduc as #8. RHD is maybe thin with only Hutton there, but we did get Bortuzzo for a 7th last year so seems like something that can be easily rectified.

TBH I think Reilly has been pretty flat so far. I wouldn’t mind seeing Cholo for a game and seeing if it sparks anything, esp on the pp2

When I said thin, I look at it as do we have good fourth liners that can fill in at higher spots while being replaced with solid bodies? The former no, the latter yes. If anybody in the top six go down, we've got hardly anybody that can really handle top 6 minutes with any ability. I know the same can be said for many teams, but our 4th line guys are not 3rd line/4th line tweeners....they are all AHL/4th line tweeners.

 

[Throttle]

You think putting Wahlstrom and Cizikas with Barzal will help the lack of scoring? Barzal hasn’t been great by any stretch of the imagination, but he is still the best forward on the team. Strapping him with 2 plugs is not going to help. If anything shuffle the lines around. Maybe even put him back to center.

The problem is Lou has never found adequate talent on the top lines. Ideally Barzal is your 2-3 best forward. Here he doesn’t have anyone remotely close to as talented to play with.

And we are back at this argument again…