Hockey
It hasn’t been this crazy in the NHL for 26 years. Ovechkin masterfully seized the moment
Alexander Ovechkin / Photo: © REUTERS / Stephen R. Sylvanie-USA TODAY Sports
The regular season was remembered for its anomalous performance. What are the reasons?
abnormal season
The 2021/22 season will be remembered fondly by the fans and dreaded by the goalkeepers. It’s all to blame for the abnormal scoring activity of the teams this year. Hockey players were so dispersed that by the end of the regular season, the average performance indicator was equal to 6.2 goals per game. There have not been such big numbers since the 1995/96 season. The performance boom also manifested itself in individual matches. Recall at least Toronto, whose hockey players celebrated a victory with a score of 10: 7 over Detroit, or when Florida defeated Tampa – 9: 3.
Hockey pundits cite many reasons for the unexpected scoring explosion. In their opinion, hockey players began to score more after the last two incomplete seasons. Crumpled regular seasons affected the physical form of the athletes, so many clubs sagged at the full distance in 82 matches. Also, due to the expansion of the league, the concentration of star players in the teams has decreased, and the number of average athletes has increased.
And another factor is that there are many goalkeepers in the league, but few good ones. Due to the fact that the main goalkeepers often appeared in the covid protocols, goalkeepers from the AHL occupied places in the “frames”. Often their level of skill left much to be desired.
Russian goalkeepers did not notice anything unusual
The Russian keepers stand apart, having had a strong season under these conditions. Sergei Bobrovsky became the first goaltender in Florida history with 36 wins for the regular season. And Igor Shesterkin, according to the Rangers media service, received the MVP following the results of the regular season. The last Rangers goalkeeper to receive this status was Henrik Lundqvist in the 2017/18 season. In total, in this regular season, Shesterkin took part in 53 meetings, in which he won 36 victories with 93.5% of reflected shots. In general, for a 26-year-old goalkeeper, this year could be special – the Rangers have good chances in the playoffs, and Shesterkin himself is the main contender for the Vezina Trophy.
Andrey Vasilevsky became another Russian goalkeeper for whom the season went well. Vasilevsky and the same Bobrovsky won the most victories in the NHL regular season among goaltenders (39). Keepers from Russia are so good that they could soon take over the entire league. This season, 11 goalkeepers from Russia received playing time, which is a repeat of last year’s record.
And if the Russian goalkeepers had a good season in spite of the anomalous performance, then it only benefited our forwards.
Ovechkin is the headliner of the season
The increase in average performance in the NHL will benefit, first of all, Alexander Ovechkin. Under such conditions, it will be easier to overtake Wayne Gretzky in career goals. Well, if the scoring boom is a one-time action, then Ovechkin took full advantage of the moment.
Ovi started this regular season in seventh place on the list of the best goal scorers in the history of the NHL, and finished in third place. The rapid rise of the captain of “Washington” is easy to explain. Despite the fact that the visiting card of the Russian is an accurate shot from the “office”, he often scores in equal compositions. In a 5-on-5 game this season, he finished 11th in the league.
Ovi breaks records almost every day, but it’s impossible to get used to it. Fans perceive each new achievement of Ovechkin emotionally and then discuss it for a long time. But the third line in the list of snipers in the history of the NHL stands apart. The American sports portal “The Score” even included this event in the top 5 most memorable moments of the season. Ovi became the league’s top European scorer in league history and tied Gretzky and Mike Bossy for 50+ goal seasons (9).
And if Ovechkin’s productive “regular season” benefited in the sniper race, then it helped St. Louis forward Vladimir Tarasenko to revive his career. The Russian abstracted from all the rumors about the exchange and about leaving hockey in order to spend his strongest season in the NHL.
Return to the elite and club records
In this regular season, Tarasenko scored 82 points (34 + 48), updating his personal performance record. But it is also impressive that he scored 29 out of 34 goals when playing in equal compositions. After all sorts of injuries and relapses, Tarasenko’s future in the NHL was in doubt, but he got a second wind – he broke the St. Louis record for points scored in a season and regained his status as one of the league’s most dangerous strikers. And sports journalist Michael Stevens called Tarasenko one of the best players this season among those who managed to regain the status of a star player.
But Kirill Kaprizov does not need to reanimate anything, he is only at the beginning of his overseas career. However, Kaprizov did not sit idle in such a productive season and entered his name in the history of Minnesota. Kirill scored 108 points (47 + 61) and this season became not only the only hockey player from Russia who managed to knock out a “hundred”, but also the first “savage” with a “hundredth” in the history of the club.
In the most anomalous scoring season over the past 26 years, hockey players from Russia felt great – they broke a bunch of records and claim individual awards. The playoffs are ahead and it is unlikely that teams will lose their ability to score, so we should expect new records in the Stanley Cup.
Source: Sportbox
I have been working as a sports journalist for about 6 years now. I currently work as an author at Sportish, which is a sports news website. I mainly cover sports news and I love writing about all aspects of the sport. I also have experience working as a broadcast journalist, so I have some great insights into how sport is reported and presented.