Of course, the season doesn’t end on Tuesday, because it’s early December and 28 games isn’t enough to determine the best teams in the NHL.
But more than a quarter of the way through the season, the Jets are hanging around with 33 points, the same number as the defending champion Kings, and more than the Sharks; Wild; everyone’s favorite sleeper, the Stars; and last year’s surprise team, the Avalanche.
The Jets still have a long way to go to make the dance this spring. However, it’s still worth looking whether this nice start is backed up by the numbers or whether it could be demolished by regression at some point coughCalgarycough.
The Jets have a Fenwick For percentage of 51.1 (14th in the league) at 5v5 according to Stats.HockeyAnalysis.com. That’s better than the Ducks, Stars, Kings, Sharks and far ahead of the Flames, who are all the way down at 46.0 (27th in the league). So the Jets aren’t a terrible possession team — that’s a good start.
Of course, FF% isn’t the be-all-end-all. Last season the Jets were also 14th in FF%, albeit with a lower number of 50.5. That’s also not terrible. They missed the playoffs by seven points, anyway.
But FF% only gives a partial picture. Losing teams may have better possession numbers than their true talent level, because of score effects – leading teams will cede possession to be a little sturdier in their defensive end — and the Jets spent a whole lot of time behind in 2013-14,
Last year, the Jets had a FF% in close situations of 49.7 — that was 18th in the league. Down by one goal, they had a FF of 52.6, which was 20th in the league, and trailed by a goal for the fourth-most amount of time.
Down by two or more? Winnipeg had the second best mark in the league at 60.0, though at least they were 21st in minutes spent trailing by that amount. Still, that inflated their FF number a bit.
This year, Winnipeg’s FF close is 52.8, which is eighth best in the NHL. The Jets have spent the second fewest minutes in the league trailing by a goal and 13th-most down by two goals. In other words, they’re better when the game is within reach.
The game is in reach more frequently too. Winnipeg has played the 14th most minutes in close situations. It has also spent the third-most time leading, though its FF% checks in at 45.8, 17th in the league. The Jets have led by one goal for more minutes than any other team in the league this year, and have a FF% of 47.8 — that’s 13th in the league.
Getting better goaltending also helps. Last year, Ondrej Pavelec had a .908 even-strength save percentage in 57 games. Given all that playing time, Pavelec was arguably the least valuable goalie in the league last year.
This season, he’s got a .923 mark in 22 games. That’s going from one of the league’s worst goalies to slightly above average — a huge difference for any team. Whether Pavelec can keep it up is another story, of course — outside of 2010-11 with Atlanta, he’s never been very good.
The Jets other goalie, Michael Hutchinson, has a .953 even-strength save percentage in nine games this season, but has played in just 12 games total in his NHL career. The Jets might be wise to look into a low-cost backup who could step in if Pavelec’s bubble bursts and/or Hutchinson struggles with more playing time.
And Winnipeg is still a team with flaws. The power play is lousy, just as it was last year, with a scoring rate of 13 percent (27th in the league). It has a good penalty kill, 84.1 percent (No. 8) but has had to use it more than anyone else.
But there’s reason to be optimistic here. If the Jets can keep these numbers up, we may be saying “Winnipeg is in the playoffs” on the day the season actually ends.
