2013 Fall Season Stats: Goals and Shots by Period

by Owen E. and John "Statman" R.

The DCHL's crack scorekeepers and stats team are recording some great information in their weekly spreadsheets.  Now that the regular season has concluded we thought it'd be fun to do a few visualizations on the "by-period" numbers John has been working on this season.  The charts below reflect the final numbers for the 2013 Fall regular season (7 weeks), and the teams are, from left to right, in order of the final regular-season standings.  All observations are based on aggregate numbers for the season.

Let's get right to it!

Goals by Period

The two stacked bar graphs below show Goals For and Goals Against by period for the PRO and REC divisions.  The bars at the right of each graph show the average for the division.

Goals For and Against by Period (PRO)

Goals For and Against by Period (REC)

Observations:

• For both REC and PRO, the average Goals For were exactly equal to the average Goals Against for all three periods (just making sure you are paying attention).
• Not unexpectedly, the top five teams in each division scored more goals than they allowed.
• The bottom two PRO teams scored fewer goals in the entire game than they allowed in the 1st period alone. They fell behind early and just never recovered.
• The bottom two REC teams scored fewer goals in the entire game than they allowed in the first two periods.
• The bottom three REC teams may have kept pace with their opponents through the 1st period, but fell behind by the end of the 2nd period.  L2T's offense fought back in the 2nd and 3rd to make things close but tended to relax on defense in the 3rd period, which hurt the come-back attempt.
• 2 Jacks No Coke had a comfortable lead by the end of the 2nd period and didn't tire out. They kept the goals coming and extended their lead in the 3rd despite being slightly less effective on defense as the game progressed.
• The Warriors finished the season a strong second in REC scoring (behind 2 Jacks).  They also tended to finish games strongly with the most 3rd period goals of any DCHL team (15), which helped win their close games.
• The graphs also show how teams tend to:
• Jump out to early leads that they maintain (Puck Buddies, Funkmaster, 2 Jacks No Coke)
• Grab a lead, give ground, and then surge ahead (Moosassins)
• Explode quickly, but then appear to wear down over the final two periods (Blood Red)
• Start slow, then methodically fight back to finish their opponent (Scabs)

Here is another view of the by-period numbers for goals.  Each box is filled from the left according to the proportion of goals in that period compared to the entire game.

Observations:

• The Untouchables scored 60% of their goals in the 3rd period.  Next best 3rd-period-scoring PRO team was Blood Red at 42%.
• In PRO, only The Untouchables scored more than 50% of their goals in the 3rd period while three REC teams did (Warriors, Moosassins, Scorpions).
• In PRO, only Funkmaster scored at least 50% of their goals in the 2nd period while three REC teams did (SCABS, L2T, Greenbacks).
• Puck Buddies may have given up early goals, but they clamped down quickly. They allowed 80% of their goals in the 1st period but did not allow a single goal in the 2nd period.
• Scorpions started strong on defense but the wheels came off after the 1st intermission; they allowed only 5% of their goals in the 1st period, but almost 70% in the 2nd. To compensate, they scored over 50% of their goals in the 3rd.
• The All Blacks were the most consistent in terms of scoring evenly splitting their goals among all three periods.   They tended to play tougher defense as the game progressed with over 40% of their goals against in the 1st period, 33% in the 2nd, and 25% in the 3rd.
• L2T and Funkmaster tended to let their guard down in the 3rd; each surrendered about 60% of their goals in the final stanza. 

Shots by Period

The next two stacked bar graphs below show Shots For and Shots Against by period for the PRO and REC divisions.  Again, the bars at the right of each graph show the average for the division.

Shots For and Against by Period (PRO)

Shots For and Against by Period (REC)

Observations:

• Puck Buddies on average took about 1.8x as many shots as the average REC team and 1.5x as many as the average PRO team.
• Moosassins and Blood Red took about as many shots as they faced.
• One team in the top half of each division faced significantly more shots than they took (Snake Eyes and Scabs).  This is a departure from the goals for/against stats shown above where the top five teams all had a favorable ratio.  (Would be interesting to compare shooting/save percentages here.)
• Overall, the average shots for/against were much more even than average goals for/against.  The outliers were:
• Puck Buddies - took almost double the number of shots that they faced.
• The Untouchables - faced more shots in the 1st period than they took in an entire game.
• Babylon Warriors - took more shots in the first two periods than they allowed in an entire game.

Here is the alternate view of the by-period numbers for shots.  Each box is filled from the left according to the proportion of shots taken in the entire game.

Observations:

• Much less variability here; most numbers are between 30-40%.

The fine print: Of course, all the usual caveats apply to the observations in this post: this is a small sample size, we are commenting on trends we see in aggregate numbers, these trends may or may not be observable in any actual previous or future game, etc.