(Image permission: IceHockeyMedia)
BILLINGHAM, UK – Telford Tigers and Whitley Warriors made great strides this weekend from a statistical standpoint meaning this blog will focus very much on them.
Tigers had a two-game weekend in the league, scoring 20 goals in the process against Solihull Barons and Sutton Sting which had an adverse impact on those teams respectively.
Whitley on the other hand made full use of a game against Nottingham to boost their numbers by out-shooting the Lions 73 to 12.
Special Teams
With five games played there were 15 powerplay markers and two shorties scored this weekend. Full disclaimer here, Fixtures Live has an error recorded by Solway (naughty Sharks) for their game against Billingham and lists their fifth as a short-handed goal.
This was not the case as Billingham’s Matty Campbell was sitting a major penalty for fighting at the time and should have been a Solway PPG. As such, for the purposes of this blog and the stats within it has been counted as a PPG.
Telford jumped a mammoth five places on the powerplay and accounted for seven of the weekend’s PPG’s. To make the feat more impressive this came on seven attempts for a 100% record on the weekend. Doug Clarkson scored four of those.
On the PK the biggest numbers come in the opposite direction, with Sutton dropping 5.47% after conceding three goals on six kills between Sheffield Steeldogs and the Tigers. Solihull (-6.94%) fell even further after conceding on four of four on Saturday against the Tigers.
On overall special team efficiency, between both PP and PK, Telford gained 19.32% to move to second. Whitley gained two places with a positive swing of 7.28% whilst going the other way were Sutton (-7.41), Solihull (-6.27) and Billingham (-4.62).
| Powerplay % | Penalty Kill % | Special Teams | |||||
| Telford | 41.38% | Hull | 96.15% | Hull | 136.62 | ||
| Hull | 40.47% | Telford | 85.29% | Telford | 126.67 | ||
| Sheffield | 33.33% | Sheffield | 82.76% | Sheffield | 116.09 | ||
| Solway | 33.33% | Blackburn | 81.08% | Solway | 111.11 | ||
| Solihull | 23.40% | Whitley | 80.00% | Whitley | 101.57 | ||
| Sutton | 21.74% | Solway | 77.78% | Blackburn | 101.08 | ||
| Whitley | 21.57% | Sutton | 75.61% | Sutton | 97.35 | ||
| Blackburn | 20.00% | Billingham | 70.73% | Billingham | 89.65 | ||
| Billingham | 18.92% | Solihull | 62.50% | Solihull | 85.90 | ||
| Nottingham | 6.82% | Nottingham | 60.34% | Nottingham | 67.16 |
Shot Statistics
Nottingham had a meagre 12 shots on the Warriors’ net on Sunday night at home to reduce their shots for even further this week.
Unfortunately for them that isn’t even a season low after only having eight shots on goal in their second game of the season against Sheffield. Whitley’s 73 shot performance against the Lions saw them gain 3.75 shots per game from last week.
At almost the same going the other way is Sutton who took 23 and 22 shots over their two games respectively to drop by 3.25 shots for per game. Once again Telford and Whitley improved the most allowing 2.89 and 2.92 less shots per game respectively.
Solihull dropped two places and allowed an extra 1.19 shots per game moving them into ninth, propped up only by Nottingham. Shooting percentages did not change much for any team with no one going up or down by over 1%. The only change in this department is Whitley and Blackburn Hawks swapping positions.
| Shots For Per Game | Shots Against Per Game | Shooting % | |||||
| Hull | 60.83 | Sheffield | 24.33 | Telford | 19.33% | ||
| Solway | 51.50 | Hull | 26.50 | Hull | 15.89% | ||
| Telford | 46.57 | Solway | 28.50 | Solihull | 14.39% | ||
| Sheffield | 44.33 | Telford | 32.71 | Sheffield | 13.53% | ||
| Solihull | 41.00 | Blackburn | 37.33 | Solway | 12.14% | ||
| Billingham | 37.14 | Billingham | 39.57 | Billingham | 11.15% | ||
| Blackburn | 36.00 | Whitley | 41.18 | Whitley | 9.74% | ||
| Whitley | 35.45 | Sutton | 42.11 | Blackburn | 9.26% | ||
| Sutton | 33.89 | Solihull | 42.30 | Nottingham | 8.96% | ||
| Nottingham | 21.20 | Nottingham | 65.40 | Sutton | 8.20% |
Even Strength
At even strength teams stayed very much as was. No-one moved up or down by more than one goal per game per category, although Sutton gave it a good go for even strength differential dropping by 0.99 goals per game and into ninth position and swapping with Whitley. The Warriors again traded places with a team, this time Blackburn, in even strength for.
As for even strength goals against Solihull (7th) and Solway (4th) swapped places with Sutton (8th) and Billingham (5th) respectively.
| Even Strength For | Even Strength Against | Even Strength Diff | |||||
| Hull | 7.33 | Hull | 1.00 | Hull | 6.33 | ||
| Telford | 6.71 | Sheffield | 1.00 | Telford | 4.71 | ||
| Solihull | 4.40 | Telford | 2.00 | Sheffield | 3.00 | ||
| Solway | 4.13 | Solway | 2.13 | Solway | 2.00 | ||
| Sheffield | 4.00 | Billingham | 2.14 | Billingham | 0.71 | ||
| Billingham | 2.86 | Blackburn | 3.17 | Solihull | 0.40 | ||
| Whitley | 2.36 | Solihull | 4.00 | Blackburn | -1.00 | ||
| Blackburn | 2.17 | Sutton | 4.11 | Whitley | -2.27 | ||
| Sutton | 1.56 | Whitley | 4.64 | Sutton | -2.56 | ||
| Nottingham | 1.40 | Nottingham | 7.50 | Nottingham | -6.10 |
What does it mean for this weekend?
With no close games last weekend, the closest being a four-goal win for Solway, it would be nice to see some more competitive scorelines over the coming four games.
This almost certainly won’t be the case in the weekend-ending Steeldogs v Lions game that will surely see the bottom side dominated once again.
After only managing 12 shots against one of the league’s more porous teams statistically to date in Whitley, the Lions face a trip to iceSheffield to face the stingiest team in D1. The Dogs also just so happen to be the side that restricted Nottingham to just eight shots in their last encounter.
A resurgent Whitley face high-flying, statistical darlings Solway on Saturday, before a fifth versus sixth battle at home against the Barons.
The weekend’s other league fixture sees Billingham out for revenge against Sutton who stunned the Stars with a 3-6 away win in September in a rink that hasn’t been known to be kind to the Teessiders.
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