Silver Nuggets: Projecting the Senators' goal totals
The Ottawa Senators have played 30 games and totalled 88 goals (the 91 in the goals for column in the standings include shootouts) or 2.93 a game, which is definitely higher than many would have predicted. Is this sustainable? For the purpose of this analysis, the goal totals for the rest of the season are projected by assuming that the forwards playing tonight will play the remaining 52 games with the exception of Zenon Konopka who is assumed to be replaced by Bobby Butler after tonight. Sergei Gonchar and Filip Kuba will be assumed to miss five more games and then play the rest of the season with Brian Lee and Matt Carkner the healthy scratches for the remainder of the season. Stéphane Da Costa is assumed to never be called up. Each player's goal total will be calculated as follows:
Season Goals = Current goals + (# of games played for rest of season * shots per game this season * career shooting percentage)
Essentially, this will give players credit for a hot (or poor) start, but assumes they will return to their career shooting percentage the rest of the way. The projections end up as follows:
Forwards
Colin Greening (19 goals), Jason Spezza (30 goals), Milan Michalek (37 goals)
Nick Foligno (19 goals), Peter Regin (6 goals), Daniel Alfredsson (24 goals)
Chris Neil (13 goals), Zack Smith (17 goals), Erik Condra (13 goals)
Kaspars Daugavins (10 goals), Jesse Winchester (5 goals), Bobby Butler (9 goals)
Zenon Konopka (2 goals), Stéphane Da Costa (3 goals)
Defence
Filip Kuba (5 goals), Erik Karlsson (10 goals)
Jared Cowen (5 goals), Sergei Gonchar (9 goals)
Chris Phillips (3 goals), David Rundblad (3 goals)
Brian Lee (0 goals), Matt Carkner (0 goals)
This comes out to a total of 242 goals. If you simply did (88/30)*82, the Senators would project to 241 goals. So maybe I could have skipped all that work above.
Tonight's game
- Game preview for tonight. (Ottawa Sun, Senators Extra)
- Everyone predicts a loss tonight except Steve Lloyd. Peter went with 3-1 for the Sabres. (Senators Extra)
- Zenon Konopka will play tonight with Bobby Butler a healthy scratch. (Ian Mendes)
- Bryan Murray doesn't think the gamble on Nikita Filatov is over yet and he hopes Filatov can come back next year. Murray confirmed that he will make a qualifying offer to Filatov in the summer to retain his rights. (Ottawa Sun)
- Graeme Nichols posts a transcript of Bryan Murray talking to the media as well as Nichols' own take on the responses. (The 6th Sens)
- More on the Filatov departure, this time in French. (Le Support Athlétique)
- SenShot asks if Erik Karlsson is being played too much? I don't think so, but even if he is, there's really no one currently healthy that can take his ice time. They also pose the question if Karlsson's success is having the opposition focus on him a bit more. (SenShot)
- Bruce Garrioch thinks Ottawa should try to sign Chris Kelly if he makes it to free agency in the summer. Kelly was a good player for us, but I am not sure where he would fit on an Ottawa roster bursting with bottom six players. Plus, playing on a contending team, Kelly is going to end up with inflated offensive numbers that he will never replicate in Ottawa, but he will still get a raise. (Ottawa Sun)
- Craig Anderson has a new mask design. (Ottawa Senators)
- Anderson will wear the mask tomorrow against Boston. He will only wear it with the heritage jerseys. (Allen Panzeri)
- Patrick Wiercioch has been released from hospital and is heading home. (Binghamton Senators)
- Did Nick Foligno stomp on Alex Burrows? (Yahoo!)
- Why does hockey tolerate fighting but other violent sports such as rugby or American football do not? One possible explanation could lie in the origin of hockey, where English, Scottish, Irish and French players despised each other in the 19th century. Could ethnic rivalries really explain the culture of fighting in hockey that is still seen today? (New York Times)
- It is too bad that Sidney Crosby is out again, but really, the NHL is spiralling into the abyss? (Globe and Mail)
- Pat Hickey, a columnist with the Montreal Gazette, thinks that Theoren Fleury 'enabled' Graham James. (Yahoo!)
- Lastly, a hockey brawl between 9-year old kids in Kazakhstan. (Yahoo!)