If you were witness to the Capitals game last night against the Flyers you saw a tale of two games. The Capitals came out focused, with a sense of urgency to win and complete a tough five game road trip with 2 more points. They controlled the play for 15 minutes, scoring during the 1st minute, but eventually the Flyers hit their stride and leveled the game at 1 in the 2nd period.
It was a taut, well fought game for 40 minutes, but then devolved into a backyard scrimmage for the final 20 minutes of regulation and overtime. The Capitals were in most need of points, but the Flyers still have faint visions of top spot in the Eastern Conference and it appeared to me that both teams signed a treaty to not try too hard after the 2nd intermission. Neither team wanted to walk out of the arena pointless and the product on the ice showed.
The last 10 games of the season are supposed to be a precursor to the playoffs with each teams scratching and crawling for every point in desperate and dramatic fashion. What fans were witness to was a crawling pace and a entertainment level that left them scratching at their eyes. By the time the overtime started is was almost a given that a shootout was inevitable. There were only two shots on goal attempted during the five minute, 4 on 4 overtime. With all the open ice available and skilled players like Alex Ovechkin and Claude Giroux you would figure that more than two shots would occur. Sadly, no, each team had relegated themselves to an exhibition of one on one skill sets to decide the final available point in the standings.
The shootout has nothing to do with team hockey. It was implemented for the casual fan who didn't want to shell out $300 or more for a family of four to go to the good old hockey game and leave with the unsatisfied taste of a draw. We want a winner and a loser dammit! I assume the same people who bemoan cliffhangers during sweeps week on television or open ended conclusions in movies are the ones who demanded all fans go home happy or sad.
I remember the days of ties after five minutes of five on five hockey and the level of play during the majority of those overtimes were barely worth watching. Of course the overall product of the NHL leading to the lockout was ugly as well. Opening the ice in overtime was meant to make that five minute period more exciting and lead to more conclusions, but the fact is teams are more interested in points than pleasing their fans at the games. The only good thing to ever come out of the shootout is getting witness a coming out party of the sick, unbelievable moves that gritty forward Matt Hendricks uses. His stop and go, double fake out that left both Evgeni Nabokov and Ilya Bryzgalov flopping like it was their first time on skates is the only argument for keeping the shootout.
If it must stay I propose a new scoring system that will further make winning while playing team hockey an incentive. For those new to the NHL, the points are accrued in this fashion:
Regulation win 2 points, Regulation loss 0 points
Overtime win 2 points, Overtime loss 1 point
Shootout win 2 points, Shootout loss 1 point
By this scoring system overtimes and shootouts are weighed exactly the same (save for the tiebreakers for seeding at the end of the season where regulation/overtime wins are ranked 1st while shootout wins are excluded). Some teams don't have the speed or skill to compete with the extra open ice, but they do have one or two Matt Hendicks' on their team to score in a breakaway contest. This would force those teams to pack it in during the overtime and hope that the shootout is the key to that valuable extra point. My proposed plan would to make that decision a riskier proposition, one that would affect the standings points and that might just get the attention of the league.
I would like to see 'hockey' wins weighted more:
Regulation win 3 points, Regulation loss 0 points
Overtime win 3 points, Overtime loss 1 point
Shootout win 2 points, Shootout loss 1 point
Now there is a true competitive reason for teams to push for a win during the 65 minutes possible during team hockey. This is what fans really want to see. That proverbial '4 point game' has now turned into a '6 point game.' Imagine the swings in the standings and the strategy a team would employ with 3 full points at stake. Last night the Capitals would have surely pushed for another goal late in the game to get 3 points in the standings rather than risking only gaining a point in either overtime or in the dreaded shootout where their maximum potential would have been only 2 points.
For a visual of how the Eastern Conference standings would look though games played on 3/22/12 under my scoring system:
1) NY Rangers* 140 points
2) Boston* 120 points
3) Washington* 113 points
4) Pittsburgh 132 points
5)Philadelphia 131 points
6) New Jersey 118 points
7) Florida 111 points
8) Ottawa 110 points
---------
9) Buffalo 104 points
10) Winnipeg 102 points
11) Tampa Bay 99 points
12) Toronto 97 points
13) Carolina 96 points
14) NY Islanders 88 points
15) Montreal 88 points
Obviously Capitals fans are much happier with these standings as it shows that outside of the shootout, they are barely a better team than the Panthers, standings-wise. For the Flyers fans, knowing that they left a point on the table last night that would have pulled them into a tie for home ice advantage against the hated Penguins is all the impetus that they should need to yearn for a new scoring system. I want to see games decided by the teams, not by individuals no matter how fun it is to see Matt Hendricks make a goalie look silly.
