Itโs around the midpoint of the MSHL season, Iโm bored, and there arenโt any Hockey Zone matches for the next few days. Letโs stare at spreadsheets and make some weird assumptions about people.
Team Scoring
Given the outbreak of postponements among some teams, it wouldnโt be fair or feasible to compare team stats like goals scored and allowed, and some teams still havenโt played each other yet. That said, hereโs the per-game numbers for everyone:
| Team | Goals Scored | Goals Allowed | GS per Game | GA per Game |
| Juul | 34 | 37 | 5.67 | 6.17 |
| Peckerwoods United | 31 | 49 | 3.88 | 6.13 |
| PieRats | 44 | 15 | 6.26 | 2.14 |
| The Prestige | 14 | 21 | 4.67 | 5.25 |
| Rogue Squadron | 12 | 28 | 2.4 | 5.6 |
| Shrekโs Little Ogres | 11 | 47 | 2.2 | 9.4 |
| Tr1nch p1ssm1n pr1sp1ct1 | 41 | 37 | 5.86 | 5.29 |
| Yard Sale | 46 | 17 | 6.57 | 2.43 |
| Zamboni Zombies | 33 | 15 | 6.6 | 3 |
Of the 266 goals scored so far, 109 were scored by warbirds (41%), with the next closest ship being the terrier (47 goals, 17.7%). Yes, the birds are feasting, to the point they alone have as many goals as PieRats, Peckerwoods United, and Juul combined.
In terms of goals allowed per game, Itโs a three-horse race. Zamboni Zombies are allowing a respectable 3 goals per game with Jack between the pipes, while Yard Sale has allowed 2.43 goals per game with OldShiat playing all but a period and a half in goal. However, PieRats is only allowing 2.14 goals per game, thanks in large part to the efforts of that new* up-and-comer** Linix in net***.
* Linix has more RSHL trophies (21) than PieRats has points in the standings right now (20).
** Linix has more MVP awards (4^) than PieRats has Beer League titles (3).
^ Does not include one Playoff MVP award.ย
*** Linix has as many Best Goalie awards (7) as PieRats has wins (7) and letters in their name (7).
As for goals scored per game? Itโs the same teams in reverse order. Just for the hell of it, letโs introduce another random but related stat to potentially show offensive depth: the number of players on a roster who have scored five or more goals. PieRats (6.26 GS/G) has four such players: Chaotic- (14), Ra (9), Randle (8), and Riverside (6). Meanwhile, Yard Sale (6.57 GS/G) has five players meeting this mark: Antsy-HZ (16, somehow), AFRI (11), Nameless King (7), don barbecue (7), and Gold (5). Zamboni Zombies (6.6 GS/G) leads the charge in scoring overall, though in part because they have only played five games so far, they have only three players above the five-goal mark: the resurgent Scuzzy Sureshot (12), Creature (8), and Pooter89! (8).
Enough of this team stuff I have to manually calculate stats for. Letโs head over to the individual stats where everything is mostly already sorted for me. For all of these, Iโm only including players who have logged at least two games worth of ice time.
Random Ship Usage Note
Iโm writing this in later because after playing with the filters for the stats page, I realized just how few people were playing weasel and leviathan; only eight people have logged ice time in each ship. Even the shark goalie has had more takers. Only four of these people played more than two games worth of leviathan time, and only three people have logged more than two games in a weasel. Still, those four leviathans accounted for over 1,000 checks, and the three weasels have scored a combined 25 goals (AFRI has 11), or the goal totals of The Prestige (14) and Shrekโs Little Ogres (11) combined.
Offensive Stat Breakdown
When I say โoffensive statsโ, I mean goals, assists, and points; weโll get to the other stuff later. In terms of goals scored per game, hereโs the top five.
Antsy-HZ (3.34 (again, how?)) has exceeded all (read: my) expectations, logging three hat tricks and scoring a goal in every game for which he has logged ice time. Ellis D. (3.31) has only scored in two games this season, but when he has, heโs logged a four-goal hatty and a double hat trick. The biggest surprise on the list (to me) is yeH (3.16), who has also recorded a double hat trick this season. Though he primarily appeared in spot duty, ww (2.88) had his goal rate bolstered by a 5-goal game against The Prestige earlier in the season. Meanwhile, Ra (2.79) has logged two hat tricks of his own.
I know I said I didnโt want to manually calculate stats for a bit, but I was curious to see who was scoring most efficiently; in other words, who had the best shooting percentage (goal scored divided by shots) among players with at least seven goals (i.e., the top 16 goal scorers)? The results were not what I expected, as the top five looks like this: Scuzzy Sureshot (35.3%), yeH (35.5%), Antsy-HZ (40% (why?)), Ellis D. (41.7%), and at the top of the pack, itโs Pooter89! (44.4%).
As for the setup men out there, here are the leaders in assists per game. RaCka (3.87) has been using his warbird to set up his teammates for success repeatedly this season, while Nameless King (3.15) has largely used a mix of spider and leviathan, with most assists coming from the latter. For the zombie brigade, aiti (2.8) has taken selflessness to a different level, nearly reaching double-digit assists without scoring a single goal. Cyris (2.69) follows close behind despite limited ice time, and Randle (2.67) is not only consistent but also one assist away from leading the league in total assists.
But who are the best in the MSHL at both? I donโt know, but points are a stat so letโs see who the leaders are in points per game. From first to fifth overall, itโs RaCka (6.45), Antsy-HZ (5.43 (I donโt fucking know anymore)), Scuzzy Sureshot (5.05), Ra (4.65), and Nameless King (4.31).
Perhaps not so coincidentally, the people showing up as leaders in these categories are some of the same people leading the league in plus-minus per minute. Specifically the top five for that are Antsy-HZ (+1.8 (I swear I didnโt know about this before deciding to write this)), Pooter89! (+1.6), Omega Red (+1.55), Ra (+1.46), and that raw talent taking the league by stormโบ, Linix (+1.3).
โบ Linix is and always has been inevitable.
Miscellaneous Stat Breakdown
When I say โmiscellaneous statโ, I mean more nebulous stats which can stem from offense or defense, like steals and turnovers. These can translate to a few things, such asโฆ
- Effective defensive play (high steal and low turnover counts);
- Poor offensive and midfield play (low steal and high turnover counts);
- Trying to ball kill players constantly;
- Absolutely nothing.
Unfortunately there is no steals/turnovers ratio as a stat in the database, and no way in hell am I calculating that myself for everyone with 2+ games to their name. Time to be lazy and look at steals and turnovers per game. For steals per game, the top five looks like this: hulk (33.93), Artos (32.34), RaCka (32.23), big eater (31.42), and wayne arnold (31.41). Itโs no surprise that many of these players favor stronger ships and defensive positions, but then thereโs RaCka, whoโs been playing warbird the entire time.
ย As for turnovers per game? Itโs dai (50.35), RaCka (42.33), Ellis D. (39.03), Chaotic- (38.3), and Zyzz (37.5), who was right at the two-game cut-off. Unsurprisingly, these are primarily warbird pilots, though just playing any ship on offense enough would lead to a lot of turnovers over time.
And now for the fun stat: checking. First of all, letโs congratulate Scratcher for blazing his way to exactly 420 checks at the Easter break. Now then, checks per game. The people laying the lumber most often are Valour Ant (68.3), Scratcher (62.65), Nameless King (43.93), Gold (38.5), and Cyris (31.17), each of which has played defense, flown a blue bullet ship, or both.
Now for the punching bag award, AKA the players who get checked more often than anyone else. The players with the highest checked per minute numbers (i.e., those most responsible for me listing those five names in the last paragraph) are dai (61), Antsy-HZ (46.38 (okay that one actually makes sense)), wayne arnold (46), RaCka (44.48), and Zyzz (44). Friends donโt let friends fly red bullet ships.
Then there are the field generals out there, and by โfield generalsโ I mean โguys who hold the puck for a really long timeโ. For this, Iโm giving the unofficial โIโM OPENโ Award to Chaotic-, who has amassed over 22 minutes of puck time across about 253 minutes of play. Heโs over five minutes clear of the next-highest total and has several minutes more puck time than two non-goalie players with more ice time than him.
Goalie Stat Breakdown
Look, this will probably seem like a one-goalie category. I thought that going into this, which is why I tried looking for stuff other than saves and goals allowed to keep things interesting. As usual, Iโm only counting players with at least two games worth of pipe time.
Anyway, youโll be surprised to hear that that upstart Linixแต has the highest save percentage (89.39), but not far behind him is OldShiat (87.3), followed by censoredbydai (85.33), Randle (84.62), and Bacon (84.11).
แต Linix knows where you live.
The goals allowed average looks similar with Linix (1.5) at the top, but beyond that point we find Randle (1.91), OldShiat (2.44), Jack (3.07), and Bacon (3.96).ย
Hereโs where things get messy. There arenโt really advanced stats for the โGoalie Statsโ page, so when I looked to see which goalie had the most checks per game, I had to look closer at the numbers. Three seconds later, it became obvious that this is a two-horse race; censoredbydai has a little under 13.5 goalie checks per game, but over a larger sample size, 2pacZ is averaging about 13 checks per game.ย
The same applies for assists. A good goalie outlet pass has a decent chance of leading to an assist, and I wanted to find out who did that most often. Again, thereโs no A/36 stat for the goalie section, so I could only verify this (without digging through a huge pile of game reports) among players who spent almost all their time in net.ย The results? The goalie with the most assists per game, according to my crude and admittedly lazy calculations, is Bacon (1.61), followed by OldShiat (0.62), Jack (0.40), and Navee (0.33).ย
Look man, I put enough time into the rest of this write-up that a proper conclusion to all of this is just asking too much.