Top Shelf: Trotz’s Caps a work in progress

Philadelphia, PA (SportsNetwork.com) – If advanced statistics directly translated to points in the standings, the Washington Capitals would be one of the NHL’s top teams in 2014-15.

Since that isn’t the case, the Capitals instead find themselves near the bottom of the Metropolitan Division standings and currently mired in a five- game losing streak.

The disparity between Washington’s puck possession numbers and its 4-5-3 record is frustrating for head coach Barry Trotz, who is trying to get the Caps to turn the corner in his first year with the organization.

The longtime Nashville Predators bench boss is one of the few NHL coaches who has vocally thrown his support behind advanced statistics. So, to see his team struggle while dominating possession in the early going is causing Trotz to scratch his head.

“The only thing that really matters in the game, in pro hockey, are the numbers on the scoreboard, and we’re not winning those,” Trotz told the Washington Post.

“But the numbers tell you that if you have the puck more … It’s not rocket science. But it is mathematical odds. And if you go by the mathematical odds, if we’re doing all those things better, then we should have better results.”

Trotz is known for his lengthy tenure in Nashville, where he helped build the franchise from the ground up and eventually led the Predators to seven playoff appearances over an eight-season stretch from 2003-04 to 2011-12. That he was able to do that on a shoestring budget has given Trotz the reputation as a coach who can get the absolute most out of his roster.

Paying attention to what the possession stats tell him about his team is one reason Trotz has been so successful at his job, but he’s having a difficult time making heads or tails of the numbers in D.C.

Washington currently ranks fourth in the NHL in Fenwick For Percentage (54.61) and fifth in Corsi For Percentage (53.68). Both are stats which measure possession based on shot attempts taken versus shot attempts allowed and the only difference between the two is Fenwick takes blocked shots out of the equation while Corsi counts them.

The four teams ahead of the Caps in the Corsi department are Boston, Chicago, Minnesota and St. Louis — all teams that are over the .500 mark and who cumulatively own a 30-18-2 record this season.

When a team does well in Corsi and Fenwick, but it doesn’t translate to success in terms of wins that’s when we turn to PDO, which attempts to turn the concept of “puck luck” into a statistical number by adding even-strength save percentage to shooting percentage. Over a longer sample size, PDO is supposed to regress to the mean, so that clubs with higher PDO numbers are likely headed for a fall, while clubs with low numbers are theoretically due for a run of good luck.

Washington is currently 25th in the league with a 97.8 PDO score, meaning things could get better for the Caps if they continue to play the way they have so far.

“I don’t know if there’s a disconnect at all,” Trotz told the Post. “There’s times where the math doesn’t add up, and this is one of those stretches where the math is not adding up. It could be an individual play, it could be a lucky bounce. We had a lucky bounce, they had a lucky bounce. We tried to shoot the puck in the corner, it went in our net. Went off our guy.”

“The disconnect, some of it is random, and that’s where it?s a little bit random right now.”

Considering Washington has much deeper pockets than the Predators organization, over the long run it’s reasonable to assume Trotz eventually could get even more mileage from his roster in D.C. than he did in Nashville.

As far as the biggest concern regarding Trotz’s move to the Caps, whether or not the new coach would mesh with Washington superstar Alex Ovechkin, that doesn’t seem to be a problem at the moment.

Ovechkin is known for filling up the stat sheet at a prolific pace while struggling on the defensive side. But so far, Trotz and his focus on team defense hasn’t stifled Ovechkin, who has six goals and seven assists in 12 games. The coach also has seemed pleased with his captain’s effort at both ends of the ice.

At the moment, Trotz is trying to do his best to lead the Caps through a tough start while continuing to preach his plan for success. If his team can stay dedicated to the strategy when it doesn’t produce results then Trotz believes it’ll pay off big time when (or if) luck starts to break Washington’s way.

“We’re in a process of building a team and we’re going to go through some rough patches, and how we react through those rough patches will say a lot about us. We go through a rough patch, we get stronger and stay with it, and on the other hand we’ll be a lot better. I think that’s how you deal with adversity.”

Categorized in: NHL