The Leafs’ Statistical Progression In November, As A Team

Photo Credit: Dan Hamilton/USA TODAY SPORTS

November is officially behind the Toronto Maple Leafs. Over the course of those 30 days, the team went 8-5-1 and gave everybody a heck of a lot to be excited about, even if that 7-0 loss to the Kings made life feel temporarily pointless. With December’s games soon to be underway and the Leafs sitting a point out of a Wildcard spot, I figured it would be interesting to compare where the Leafs stand now to where they did before. We’ll be breaking this up into two posts, with this one covering just the team’s statistics. Let’s dive in!

Here are Toronto’s shot and goal-based numbers (with score adjustment) from October:

Conversely, here are November’s:

If your eyes immediately head to attempts (Corsi), it looks a little scary. Toronto, clearly, has lost its’s offensive ways and with the defence still being bad (read: even worse) at giving up opportunities, the team is clearly boned, right?

Well, not exactly. As you can see, they’re still near the top of unblocked shot attempt generation and actual shots, and they stepped up even further in generating scoring chances (close range shots, rush shots, rebounded shots), which effectively evened out the goals. I’m not a huge fan of shot quality debates, mostly because the bulk of them boil down to “my eyes see what your data can’t”, but there might be something to the idea that the Leafs moved in an already tight game a bit closer.

Out of curiosity, I decided to break down what types of shots the team was taking and facing in that stretch. So let’s break them the attempts into shots that hit the net, are blocked and miss the net. We’ll also look at how many attempts become scoring chances, and become Expected Goals (again looking to our boy Manny).

Here’s October:

Here’s November:

That’s where you see it. More of Toronto’s attempts are ending up on goal, mostly because they’re making it through traffic and allowing them to build up opportunities in close, where players like Auston Matthews, James van Riemsdyk, and even slightly less skilled forwards like Tyler Bozak, Leo Komarov, and Zach Hyman make their livings.

Unfortunately, Toronto is also giving up slightly higher quality shots compared to last month, but the offensive difference is bigger and net positives are most important.

For those who don’t buy into the whole “shots are a proxy for possession” stuff… well, you won’t buy much into zone starts and finishes either, but we may as well compare the two months anyway.

The percentages didn’t particularly work to their favour this month. They started and finished less frequently in the offensive zone, and started/finished more frequently in the defensive zone as well. However, most of the offensive drop went into Neutral Zone time, and while they were starting from worse spots, there wasn’t as negative of a gap between where they started and where they finished.

For all the talk of improving special teams this month, there isn’t really a lot to brag about. They’re taking more shots when on the powerplay, but they’re coming from out wide and not as many are heading to the net. That might also explain the drop in percentages, given that they’re allowing more shots. If the numbers lineup with the eye-test observation of the team giving up the puck at the line more often this month, that implies that the point has been more involved.

On the penalty kill, I’m not sure how much the Hunlak and Smiths how is doing. Teams are getting in closer and taking more shots.

I won’t pepper you with every table I possibly can, but there are other things that can be quickly touched on. Toronto’s giveaway to takeaway ratio remains at about even throughout the season, as does the frequency for shots for/against to come off the rush. They gave up more rebounds, which I presume is a combination of Andersen bouncing more shots away and the stay at home defencemen getting distracted with battles in front of the net, which we saw on more than a few occasions. Toronto’s shooting percentage at even strength shot up from 8% to 10.3%; combine that with a spike from 0.889 out of their goaltenders to 0.920 and you’ve got a PDO pendulum swing for the ages; from 969 to 1023.

The Leafs still have a lot of growing to do. They’re a young team with a lot of new pieces, and they’re definitely still getting a feel for each other. The net difference between this month and last month seems to be help from Frederik Andersen, though the fact that shots are starting to come from in closer is definitely worth keeping in mind in regards to their offensive generation. Shot suppression and special teams are the things worth focusing on month heading towards the new year.