Four wins in a row. Eight wins in their last ten games. The Dallas Stars are playing some of the best hockey we have seen from this team all year, and look more like what most envisioned the team to be with all the moves made last offseason.
They extended their streak with a win over the Calgary Flames, who they are in desperate need of beating if they want to take the spark of hope and fan into a flame (pun totally intended). Here’s a look at the numbers in that win.
Dallas pretty much dominated the first period shot attempts, but started the second slow, which is strange because that’s generally the Stars’ best period. Calgary was the aggressor in the middle frame and ended the period ahead in shot attempts. The third period was pretty evenly matched for it’s entirety, but ended with the Flames having a slight advantage.
In these posts, I will also be including a chart that shows scoring chances. Scoring chances are loosely defined as shots generated from inside the black outlined area below.
Scoring chances paint a somewhat different picture. The Stars only managed three scoring chances in the first out of roughly 15 shots. You can also tell how flat the Stars played in the second, again only getting three scoring chances. Surprisingly, Dallas was the better team in the third, generating five chances and limiting the Flames to only two.
Leaders for the Stars in individual scoring chances were Patrik Nemeth (3), Cody Eakin (2), and Jamie Benn (2).
In these posts, you will also see a few abbreviations and terms used.
CF, CA, C+/- and CF% are Corsi For, Corsi Against, and Corsi For Percentage. They are defined as follows,
Corsi For: The number of on-ice shot attempts (on goal, missed, or blocked) taken by the player’s team.
Corsi Against: The number of on-ice shot attempts (on goal, missed, or blocked) taken by the opposing team.
Corsi%: The percentage of on-ice shot attempts (on goal, missed, or blocked) taken by the player’s team; also known as CF%.
Patrik Nemeth and John Klingberg continue to be a solid pair defensively and at tilting the ice towards the opponents net. The dynamic duo of Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin also had solid nights pushing play in the right direction.
Because I’m an old man I had to record this game and watch it at 4:30 this morning. Perhaps I was still asleep while watching, but I do not remember the Jason Demers-Jordie Benn and Alex Goligoski–Jyrki Jokipakka pairings being that bad. Jordie with a 28 percent CF and Alex Goligoski with 21 Corsi against. Yikes!
Graphs and numbers taken from War-on-Ice and hockeystats.ca