The Noon Number: 46.2

by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 13, 2012 12:01 PM EST in Ottawa Senators Noon Number

Even though Craig Anderson leads the league in saves, his team can't regularly beat opponents even when they outshoot them.

46.2 - The Ottawa Senators' winning percentage in games where they outshoot their opponents, tied with the Edmonton Oilers for 21st in the NHL.

The Sens have outshot the opposition in 26 games so far this season, and have a 12-12-2 record in them. It's a sub-50 winning percentage, but exactly 50 per cent in terms of points-earned.

Thankfully for the sake of the Sens, they have a winning percentage of 50 when outshot by opponents: In 32 games where they're outshot, Ottawa's got a very impressive 16-10-6 record. That's a points-earned percentage of over 59. The Senators' winning-percentage-while-outshot is tied (with the Minnesota Wild and Dallas Stars) for 14 in the NHL.

Curiously, the Senators haven't finished a game with an equal number of shots as their opponents.

The obvious take-home from this goes against traditional hockey wisdom: The Senators need to take less shots. That's how statistics work, right?

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Anderson likes to be busy

I think he has only lost 1 career game in which he has faced 40+ shots. The more shots he faces, the less goals he allows, the fewer goals our forwards need to score, the more we win!

Makes so much sense that it doesn’t!

Common sense is the most evenly distributed quality in all the world.
Everyone thinks they have enough.

by havey03 on Feb 13, 2012 12:03 PM EST reply actions

It's called playing to the score

by TheGuineaPig on Feb 13, 2012 1:22 PM EST up reply actions

I think it’s a bi-product of playing from behind. When you’re behind you start playing the shots from anywhere game. You start taking lower percentage shots in hope of getting a bounce or something ugly, which seems to rarely work. It just shows the team needs to work harder at quality instead of quantity when it comes to taking shots.

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by modsuperstar on Feb 13, 2012 12:33 PM EST reply actions