hockey
will lockwood
johnny beecher
even strength shooting
cam york
pairwise
[JD Scott]

Hockey? Hockey: Let's Talk Some Hockey Comment Count

Brian January 21st, 2020 at 5:33 PM

It's time to check in with hockey after a 3-0-1 road start to the back half of the season. Michigan swept Notre Dame 3-0 and 3-1 two weeks ago and then got an old-fashioned three point weekend from Penn State, blitzing them 6-0 on Friday and coming a minute away from the sweep in what was eventually a 4-4 tie.

One point to the Daily's Bailey Johnson for getting the headline right after the Saturday Penn State game:

Michigan ties No. 6 Penn State, 4-4, gets extra point in double overtime

College hockey's increasing byzantine overtime system is confusing. For Pairwise purposes—the only ones that matter—anything that happens after 5v5 is over is between you and your conference. Even so, Michigan's weekend in Hockey Valley was productive.

[After THE JUMP: snakebit]

Now to summon Bolded Alter-Ego:

So what's the deal with them being bad? Fire Mel?

They're not bad, they're just not good. They're 10-11-3 now with the #10 schedule strength, per KRACH, and they've been without York for a quarter of their games.

That's a fine hair to split.

This team is not like other recent pretty pretty bad Michigan teams that were massively disorganized and gave up buckets of goals while getting outshot badly. Red's last team was close to dead last in shot ratio (aka Corsi). Michigan's fairly good in that department against a tough schedule.

The elongated end of the Red era caused a lot of uncertainty in recruiting and this is impacting most this year, when Quinn Hughes and Josh Norris are gone and none of the fliers Michigan took in the 2018 and 2019 classes look like hits. So they can't score. Even after the last two weekends they're tied with MSU for 38th (out of 60) in scoring offense. They're 33rd on the power play, which is about right.

The problem in one stat, even strength shooting percentage:

Year ES SH%
2020 5.9
2019 7.9
2018 9.6
2017 7.4
2016 10.8
2015 10.0

The 2019 and 2017 teams were both significantly below .500. The 2017 team had Lockwood, Slaker, and Adam Winborg as three of the top four skaters in points. All three are still on the team. Winborg can barely get a game. And Michigan is scoring 20% fewer goals per shot than they did that year. It's pretty obvious why Michigan isn't scoring as much as they did when they had Compher/Motte/Connor or Dylan Larkin. To not even be in the same area code as 2017 is mindblowing. That's 10 missing even strength goals over the course of the season, enough to move Michigan from 38th to 23rd in scoring.

And that almost has to be nothing but bad luck, right? Unfortunately CHN does not have a page that lists ES SH% nationwide, but if you look back at some of the more infamously impotent MSU teams of the last few years they had ES SH% of 7.8 and 7.9. 5.9 is downright unreasonable.

The good news is that Michigan's kept its head above water thanks to Strauss Mann rebounding to his USHL save percentages—he's currently in Shawn Hunwick territory at .937—and the defense improving in general. Hughes is a tremendous talent but he was outright reckless at Michigan, and while Cam York isn't everywhere all the time he's also not everywhere all the time.

No, do not fire Mel. This is an anomaly. And as I keep talking about in UV, the cavalry is coming.

So what happened after the break?

The Notre Dame games were pretty much like every other game Michigan's played this season with better fortune. Notre Dame is a fairly close analogue to Michigan this year, a low-talent team trying to scrape through with discipline and goaltending. (In ND's case the discipline is off the charts: they have fewer penalty minutes than anyone in the nation) Michigan stuck to narrow leads for much of both games, scored exactly two goals and then got empty-netters to finish.

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[James Coller]

One thing that might be a development is Will Lockwood playing more like the Lockwood we were hoping for preseason. Lockwood has had stretches in his career where he looked like he could drive play on a first line, usually just before he got injured. His play in the first half was pretty muted, but over the past two weekends he's been a lot closer to his career peaks. I wish this replay of the GWG from Saturday's ND game started sooner, because it misses about five seconds of Lockwood wheeling around the zone and drawing everyone's attention. Still, this is a bonafide Fun Goal that's about more than throwing a puck at the net and hoping something happens:

Over the last four games Michigan has been much better at generating real chances. I don't want to overstate things: the ND series was very tight both ways, and Penn State is the hockey equivalent of Iowa basketball.

It does seem like there's a little something there, especially since Lockwood is now playing with Johnny Beecher. Nick Granowicz's first career goal was about 98% Beecher pulling off a move similar to Lockwood's:

That first shot is from a dangerous place and Beecher threw it back once it rebounded to him, hoping to hit the goalie and instead getting Granowicz. The go-ahead goal on Saturday against Penn State was less clean but again you can see how Beecher's size and speed is unbalancing the opposition defense when he starts moving around the zone. He's got the puck at the beginning of this clip; PSU has to start shifting around so when the puck gets to York and Lockwood both the defenders have momentum away from their goal:

A lot of top-end freshmen go through an indifferent first half of the season and ignite in the second half. Beecher looks like he's doing that.

A little better shooting luck and something resembling a real top line featuring Lockwood and Beecher and you could be okay.

Can they get there?

It's going to be a tough road. Michigan dug itself a big hole in the first half of the season and as you approach the top of the rankings it gets harder to take big leaps. They were able to go from 32nd to 24th last weekend; it's unlikely they'll be able to bite off nearly as many spots going forward.

Jim Dahl runs College Hockey Ranked, which runs simulations of the season and forecasts based on that. The number of wins that will land Michigan at the 14 spot that is relatively safe for a bid is between 9 and 11. Michigan has—uh—10 regular season games left and will have at least two in the Big Ten tournament.

The path that lands Michigan an at-large bid is something like 1) go 7-3 down the stretch, 2) win your first round playoff series, and 3) either win the semi or get lucky. It's asking too much for this team to suddenly flip the juggernaut switch.

Do you have a powerful jealousy of Notre Dame hockey?

I do. One: their arena has an organ, which is a million times better than Yost piping in music that you can barely make out because of the weird acoustics in the arena. Two: the quality of their streaming broadcasts is vastly better than BTN's:

The Penn State student broadcast also spent most of a period with one of the announcers muted. ND has crystal-clear streaming with a professional crew. Would be nice if Michigan could do the same.

Anything else? #13 for Penn State is Dennis Smirnov.

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[JD Scott]

Whiteboard guys stay undefeated.

Comments

JonnyHintz

January 21st, 2020 at 5:48 PM ^

It’s hard explaining to people who don’t understand the nuances of college hockey recruiting that what we’re witnessing isn’t on Mel. And that he shouldn’t be fired.

 Michigan’s upcoming classes have a lot of talent. We’re still dealing with the final recruiting of Red on the team now. What we’re seeing was going to happen no matter who the coach was. College hockey isn’t a “give the coach three years,” kind of environment, as YOUR recruits are typically. 2-3 years out.

Joined: 01/11/2015

MGoPoints: 48409

Honker Burger

January 21st, 2020 at 9:11 PM ^

https://www.uscho.com/2020/01/16/after-sweeping-notre-dame-michigans-schedule-doesnt-get-easier-with-penn-state-on-tap-this-weekend/

Pretty good article touching on how difficult recruiting is now compared to the past. In Red's prime years, players RARELY left early. Now it's incredibly common for multiple players each off-season to leave after 1 or 2 seasons. The teams that have benefited from this most are smaller programs, who typically have players starting their freshman year as 20 or 21 year olds and have a lot of players sticking around for 4 years, given limited NHL potential. 4 year, 24-25 year old players have a big advantage, against younger, potential-laden teams.

From 1992-2012 (21 seasons), 2 schools (Maine, Minnesota-Duluth) won their 1st championship and 3 schools (Notre Dame, Miami(OH), Ferris St) played in their 1st championship game.

From 2013-2019 (7 seasons), 3 schools (Yale, Union, Providence) won their 1st championship and 2 schools (Quinnipiac, UMass) played in their 1st championship game.

Bad for Michigan (and other blue blood programs) dominating year in and year out, but ultimately I think parity is good for college hockey. Matching Michigan's streak of 23 straight NCAA tournaments is just completely unrealistic with the way the recruiting landscape is today.

Joined: 04/15/2018

MGoPoints: 5686

JonnyHintz

January 22nd, 2020 at 5:40 PM ^

There’s really three tiers of players when it comes to college hockey. 
 

You have your one-and-done types. Guys you get for one year, two if you’re lucky. Recent examples: Quinn Hughes, Josh Norris, Kyle Conner, Dylan Larkin. 
 

Then you have your core type players. These are draftable players who you expect to stick around 3-4 years, with most sticking around all four. These are guys you rely on to be the veteran presence in the locker room and be the core of your offensive production as upperclassmen. Recent examples: Zach Hyman, Andrew Copp, JT Compher, Cecconi. 
 

These are the main two that Michigan builds their program around. They’ve been okay at still getting the one and done types. But it’s that second tier of player that really makes the core of your team, and that’s where Michigan has been lacking. This would be guys like Lockwood, Slaker, and the Pasujov brothers. You’d like them to be producing more, and you’d like another 2-3 guys to be able to step up in a producing role. Thats ultimately what is hurting Michigan overall. 
 

the third type of player are the guys who finish out their juniors career and then go to college. They’re 21 as freshmen and get by as upperclassmen by being much older than most players. Michigan doesn’t really go after many of these guys, but a lot of the smaller schools will build their programs around this concept.

Joined: 01/11/2015

MGoPoints: 48409

bronxblue

January 21st, 2020 at 9:17 PM ^

Most of the people I saw complaining about Mel were those who seem to only intermittently remember Michigan has a hockey team.

I don't follow college hockey much but it's always felt a bit like college baseball, where a bunch of random schools you may or may not have heard of are just as competitive as "big name" programs and recruiting and player development takes years to pay off.  And since the truly elite guys can go play in Canadian leagues, overseas, etc., getting a 5* guy who'll turn your program around can be really tough and probably not a recipe for immediate success.

Joined: 11/22/2008

MGoPoints: 171779

lhglrkwg

January 21st, 2020 at 7:06 PM ^

A few random hockey thoughts

  • I hope Mel's seat is cold. Seems like the cavalry is coming in the next 2 years and seems like we might have something going with Mann. This team could get good in a hurry. As Hintz notes above, recruiting is super long leadtime in hockey and starting over again after this year would only put the program back in a 5 year rebuild track again most likely.
  • It's so weird how meh so many of the big schools are lately. Michigan, MSU, Wisconsin, and Minnesota are all bleh and BC and BU seem to have lost a step from their elite levels of years past. There's probably a reason for that but I don't know what it is. Arizona State is a top 15 team. It's weird.
  • Seeing those highlights of the goals made me miss my days in the student section and when I actually had time to watch the hockey team on tv a ton. I barely get to see them anymore. Life gets busy when you're older and married and your Fridays and Saturdays aren't as free. But I still catch glimpses of how much fun I had watching the team back in 2008-2012 whenever they get a big win. I hope we're not far from being back to those days again. I miss it

Joined: 07/03/2008

MGoPoints: 87934

I Bleed Maize N Blue

January 22nd, 2020 at 12:31 AM ^

BTN+ is a subscription stream rather than a 2nd TV channel like FSD+. Also BT hasn't been good for U-M hockey on TV, because we're not playing the other Michigan schools as much as we used to in the CCHA, of which FSD aired some games - are Bowling Green & Miami in their viewing area, too? Comcast would even have a few games, though on SD and much more local.  Plus with the Red WIngs and Pistons sharing Pizza Pizza Arena, only the GLI final gets aired nowadays.

Joined: 09/27/2008

MGoPoints: 58709