Mar 14, 2012; Montreal, QC, CAN; Montreal Canadiens defenseman Frederic St-Denis (62) skates with the puck against Ottawa Senators during the first period at the Bell Center. Mandatory Credit: Jean-Yves Ahern-US PRESSWIRE
We’re ten games into the AHL season and the Bulldogs have shown a lot of promise but haven’t exactly set the world on fire out of the gate. This was to be expected given their relative youth and inexperience in a lockout strengthened AHL.
Ten games is also a good time to start looking at some individual numbers for the season, even if its a ludicrously small sample size to make real conclusions from. Today we’ll look at the team’s defensive corps.
Plus Minus:
I find traditional plus minus to be hopelessly biased so I have refined it here to present a breakdown of goals scored for and against by game state. I also exclude any empty net goals as they are a special situation that has little to do with the game as it is played most of the time.
| Player | Games |
ESGF
ESGA
PPGF
PPGA
PKGF
PKGA
St. Denis
10
13
9
1
1
0
0
Beaulieu
10
7
8
4
1
0
0
Tinordi
10
4
11
0
0
0
5
Pateryn
7
4
7
0
0
0
5
Ellis
7
1
6
0
0
0
0
Nash
8
4
1
2
0
0
0
Corbin
8
2
7
0
0
0
0
(ES: Even Strength, PP: Power Play, PK: Penalty Kill, GF: Goals for, GA: Goals against)
Across the board, the Bulldog’s defense is allowing about a goal per game on even strength. Beaulieu was an exception until game 10, were 4 ES goals against were scored with him on the ice. Beaulieu’s goals against have a particular odd distribution, none in 7 out of 10 games, but two 2 GA and one 4 GA games bringing his results down. His GF is distributed fairly normally though. Before that ugly -4, Beaulieu resembled a lower event (likely due to lower ice time), St. Denis.
Corbin in particular looks bad under that, given that he’s likely got the least ES playing time per game on the third pairing and a lesser matchup and usage role as well. Brendan Nash has played a similarly sheltered role and has a lot better results to show for it.
St. Denis has had by far the most goals per game scored with him on the ice this year, followed by Beaulieu. Behind them, Pateryn and Nash are about equal, followed by Tinordi with Ellis and Corbin far behind. Nash is probably doing better on a per minute basis as he’s been on the 3rd pairing all year so far.
Positive results seem to follow St. Denis this season, with the top pair of Beaulieu-St.Denis being the biggest part of the team’s even strength offense from the blueline. Tinordi and Pateryn have something of an excuse for playing defensively focused minutes while the third pair seems only to be effective thus far with Nash.
Tinordi-Pateryn also clearly were taking the bulk of the penalty killing minutes. It can be noted though that in Pateryn’s absence for the past 3 games due to injury the opposition has failed to score.
Uniquely amoung Bulldog’s, Beaulieu has been on ice for all of the team’s powerplay goals for (and against) this year. This does go to show that he is getting the biggest PP minutes, whether that his a good thing given the team’s dismal man-advantage may be a good question. Nash and St. Denis are the only others getting significant use with the man advantage so far, with the 4th point man generally in a state of flux.
In general the Bulldogs are a significant negative on even strength this year, which is not an encouraging trend if you want to see them win games. Five of the seven are negative and three are -5 or worse in 10 total games played.
Scoring
| Name | GP |
G
A
PTS
SOG
TGF
SOG/G
Pt/G
Brendon Nash8
0
4
4
6
6
0.8
0.50
Frederic St-Denis10
1
2
3
12
14
1.2
0.30
Jarred Tinordi10
0
2
2
9
4
0.9
0.20
Greg Pateryn7
0
1
1
10
4
1.4
0.14
Nathan Beaulieu10
0
1
1
20
12
2.0
0.10
Morgan Ellis7
0
0
0
5
2
0.7
0.00
Antoine Corbin8
0
0
0
13
2
1.6
0.00
(TGF: Team on ice goals for)
The Bulldogs’ defense is a low scoring group, which is to be expected on a team with a weak powerplay, but they’ve had no problems producing shots. There is an interesting dynamic between the amount of goals the team has scored with them on the ice and their point totals with very little correlation. Poor Beaulieu has had 12 goals scored with him on the ice while only recording a single assist. On the flip side, Nash and Tinordi seem to have gotten points on a large portion of the goals they have been on ice for. Combining 2 shots on net per game with no goals with one assist on 12 goals, Beaulieu looks like he’s been part of plenty of offense, just no points. On the other hand, I’d bet that Nash does not keep up his scoring pace.