Red Wing's Goals Part 2

                Last post I focused on when the Red Wing's scored and the answer supported results found elsewhere that teams score during transitional play. This time I broke down how the Red Wings scored, similar to the tracking done by Chris Boyle for the Shot Quality Project.
               The goals were separated into 7 categories. Clean goals are any goal when the goaltender was not screened and able to set his feet prior to the shot. Any goal where the goaltender was unable to set his feet prior to the shot due to either a pass or skater movement was deemed a transition goal. I also coded goals coming from rebound, deflections, dekes, screened shots and wraparounds.

              Overwhelmingly the Red Wings scored a majority of their goals off transitional play and rebounds. Chris Boyle found that goaltenders managed only a .693 SV% against transitional shots and .760% against rebounds which fits with our results. Only 20% (31 goals) came off a clean shot where the goalie was not screened and able to set his feet. Again despite the fact that most shots would be classified as clean shots, goaltenders have a SV% of .951 against these types of shots.

            On he power play things things turn out very similarly as most goals still come off transitional play or rebounds. The one big difference is the increase in deflected and screened shots resulting in goals and a big decrease in clean shots ending in the back of the net. This would seem to fit well with our eye-test as most teams enlist a Tomas Holmstrom type to set up in front of the net, leading to more deflections or screened shots and less clean looks.
           As evidenced by the past results, clean goals are incredibly rare due to the size and positioning of NHL goaltenders. While most shots would be classified as clean, goaltenders average a .951 SV% on such shots according to Chris Boyle. Since it is such a difficult task, I wanted to see who on the Red Wings excelled in this task.

             The numbers are not particularly surprising as the best snipers on the team, Nyquist, Tatar and Franzen, lead the pack. The two potential surprises are Sheahan, who did demonstrate an incredibly hard and accurate shot at times throughout the year and Darren Helm who found all of these goals through breakaways. An interesting observation is the absence of Pavel Datsyuk from this list, as he managed 0 goals off a clean shot. Hopefully future research can answer if this is the result of his injury decreasing the sample size, or his ability to move laterally forcing the goaltenders into transition. To partially answer this question I wanted to see how different player's goal totals broke down by category. Since the Red Wings had only 8 players break 10 goals this season, I analyzed  each of those player's goals.

            My immediate observation was that with the exception of Riley Sheahan, who plotted 9 on only 59 shots, every player who recorded multiple goals off clean shots was able to break 10 goals on the season. Again, due to the difficulty, it would make sense that only the best goal scorers are able to beat a goaltender clean so this seems to fit with intuition.

For all the talk of Nyquist's scoring spree last year, Tomas Tatar may have been overlooked. Tatar stays right with Gus in nearly every category except deflections, which I would hypothesizes has a rather large luck component with regards to these two more peripheral players. An encouraging sight was to find Helm and Abdelkader on this list. Helm's goal totals come mostly as a result of his breakaway speed, while Abdelkader did the dirty work going to the net from rebounds, deflections and backdoor goals in transition. If those two can continue to provide this kind of scoring from the third line the Wings will be in great shape next season.

The one big thing that stuck out for me was the Mule, Johan Franzen. Most Wings fans will agree he is one of the most frustrating players due to his reluctance to play like a typical power forward. While he is blessed with a great shot, see his 13 goals off direct shots, he managed 0 rebound goals and only 2 deflections. As he ages and his speed begins to deteriorate, he may be able to prolong his time as a scorer if he heads to the front of the net. With his combination of size and soft hands, he could easily be a more skilled version of Tomas Holmstrom.