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This is old news at this point, but here's a quick recap of how the Wild's puck possession game has progressed this season:
- Early Season: Elite puck possession+No Shooting Luck=Decent results in the standings.
- December: Bad puck possession+No puck luck=Terrible results.
- January-February: Bad puck possession+Great goaltending=Good Results
- Post-Trade Deadline: Great puck possession+Very little puck luck=Average results.
The Wild Out-Possess The Opposition...
|
W |
L |
SO |
W% |
≥50% |
15 |
10 |
8 |
45.4% |
50%-54.99% |
4 |
1 |
4 |
44.4% |
55%-59.99% |
2 |
6 |
2 |
20.0% |
≥60% |
9 |
3 |
2 |
64.2% |
- The Wild are winning less than half of their games when they have at least 50% puck possession. A lot of games are going to the shoot-out.
- Their winning percentage is much more convincing when they have over 60% possession.
- Weirdly, when they have over 55% and less than 60% they really struggle to win. This is probably just randomness, but it's strange all the same.
The Opposition Out-Possess The Wild...
|
W |
L |
SO |
W% |
<50% |
13 |
17 |
6 |
36.1% |
45%-49.9% |
7 |
4 |
3 |
50% |
30%-44.9% |
3 |
11 |
2 |
18.75% |
≤30% |
3 |
2 |
1 |
50% |
- As you can see, the winning percentage is 9.3% lower when they are being out-possessed.
- Strangely. when they have been dramatically out-possessed (FF% of below 45%) they've had excellent success.
PDO Effects
|
Sh% |
Sv% |
PDO |
≥50% |
6% |
93.25% |
99.25% |
<50% |
9.83% |
93.56% |
103.39% |
- You can see the major reason they're winning more than they should while being out-possessed and losing more than they should while winning the possession battle is because of PDO or, more specifically, shooting percentage.
- The Wild have had consistently great goaltending this year, but their shooting percentage has been all over the place and, to their misfortune, it has deserted them when they have played their most dominant hockey.
- Puck possession numbers (FF% when the score is close) aren't going to tell you 100% which team will win a game but over time, dominating shot attempts correlates with time spent in the offensive zone which correlates with generating scoring chances which correlates with winning and making the playoffs and playing for the Cup.
- Teams can defy their poor puck possession numbers by riding unsustainable shooting or goaltending (PDO) to success, but it is not a good model to go by. These things are mostly controlled by randomness and can't be planned for. Dominating puck possession can be through recruiting the right personnel and employing tactics that encourage not surrendering the puck.
- You can argue that teams can defy the importance of puck possession by taking higher quality shots, but these "shot quality" arguments have been dismissed over and over again.
- The other factor that comes into winning a game, outside of puck possession, shooting and goaltending, is special teams.Great special teams can carry an average team very far, but they are still nowhere near as important as strong 5v5 play.
[P.s. Major props to SomeKindOfNinja, the site I used for all the shot location data and some of the player usage charts. Also, thanks to Stats.HockeyAnalysis, BehindTheNet, ExtraSkater and Hockey Abstract for various other numbers.]