How Predictable Was Davos v. Riga?

[Renomitsu 934]

How Predictable Were the EU VHL Quarter Finals?

 

Over the last several days, we’ve seen a number of figures thrown out: Davos holds a 12-3 franchise record against Riga; Davos was 1-5-2 against Riga this season, with an overall -7 differential; Riga’s rookie class looked great this season. At the start of the season, Davos looked poised to compete for a title: a young roster composed of star-quality S63-65 players, plus a couple of highly-rated draft picks. Riga’s roster, on the other hand, felt a bit more polarizing: just two S64-65 players in centers Anthony Matthews and Gucci Garrop, a very large rookie class (including 6 immediate call-ups), and several S61 and S63 players.

 

We’ve got a handful of storylines, but the regular season significantly favored Riga.

 

Why did we get a heavy-handed 4-0 sweep in the other direction? Let’s investigate here.

 

Our TL;DR:

1) Riga’s several forward rookies had ice time, but no favorable matchup

2) When together against Davos’s second/third lines, Riga could go roughly even unless all rookies were on at the same time

3) Davos’s superior veteran depth and limited rookie ice time gave them a significant on-ice TPE advantage

4) Davos gave more ice time to veterans Crimson and Peace for the playoffs.

 

The Back Half of the Season: Davos’s 0-3-1 Record vs. Riga

 

In spite of how lopsided the playoff series was, Davos did not win a single game against Riga in the second half of the season. Around the midpoint, they suffered 0-2 and 2-3 losses against the Reign – respectable games in their own right. The first of these two meetings ended with nearly identical shot totals (30 for Davos, 29 for Riga) where the difference was a simple disparity in goalie play – a perfect record for Kriketers (30/30) and an excellent-but-not-perfect outing from Davison (27/29, .931% saves).

 

Riga was riddled with penalties in this first outing (17 PIMs), especially when compared to Davos (9) including a fight where Dynamo star Ryuu Crimson beat up rookie Hunter Hearst Helmsley. Rookie defensemen Nielsen and Hackett received plenty of ice time (26-28 minutes each), while forward minutes were more heavily skewed in favor of veterans.

 

It’s worth noting in both of these matchups (and the next) that Davos’s lineups were identical – shown below with CURRENT TPE totals and percentage of ice time (tactically) at the end:

 

F1 – Ryuu Crimson (878) – Rylan Peace (779) – Veran Dragomir (880) || 40%

F2 – Elias Dahlberg (757) – John Madden (670) – Pat Svoboda (752) || 30%

F3 – Veran Dragomir (880) – John Madden (670)– Katie Warren (470) || 20%

F4 – As F1 || 10%

 

D1 – Shawn Glade (traded) – Smitty Werbenjagermanjensen (624) || 40%

D2 - Alvaro Jokinen (499) – Charlie Paddywagon (383) || 30%

D3 – Shawn Glade (traded) – Codrick Past (339) || 20%

D4 – Smitty Werbenjagermanjensen (624) – Alvaro Jokinen (499) || 10%

 

Frankly, there isn’t much to say about these lineups – they make plenty of logical sense. Davos’s first forward line is incredibly imposing and can compete with virtually every other lineup in the game today. The second would still be competitive with most other teams’ top lines, and the only time a rookie or sophomore can plays at the forward position for Davos is S65’s Katie Warren, who gets 20% of total ice time and doesn’t appear on any powerplay line. Note that Shawn Glade was traded, among other things, for 651 TPE offensive defenseman Marvin Harding towards the end of the season, but their spots in the lineup throughout the year were identical.

 

Defensively, Davos is predictably more diverse: with only two defenders over 500 TPE, they’re really about a line and a half deep, and their only two rookies appear separately on D2 and D3. Past receives no PP or PK time, while Paddywagon receives some second-line PP/PK time.

 

Let’s now take a look at Riga’s lines for each of these victories:

 

F1 – Gucci Garrop (420) – Podrick Cast (934)– Randoms (768)

F2 – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – HHH (574) – Chico Smeb (340)

F3 –Mikko Aaltonen (410) – Anthony Matthews (390)– Arnor Sigurdsson (374)

F4 – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Podrick Cast (934) – Mikko Aaltonen (410)

 

D1 – Ryan Kastelic (980) – Apollo Hackett (366)

D2 – Cayden Saint (518) – Aron Nielsen (331)

D3 – As D1

D4 – As D2

 

In the first game, Riga went with a pretty mixed lineup, with their late-career veterans only appearing on forward line 4 and powerplays/penalty kills together. But arguably more importantly, check their depth – while Riga is regarded as an excellent team (and the regular-season record shows it), their defensive pairs each include a rookie, and all of their forward lines have at least one player under 500 TPE – including a S65-66 line of Matthews, Aaltonen, and Sigurdsson. This line played under 15 minutes in the game and didn’t have a great chance to post high numbers – but more importantly, they didn’t lose any of the lead Riga built in the first period. Provided what we’ve seen from both teams, this is well within the realm of possibility.

 

Let’s skip forward a couple of games in this regular season series to the 5-4 Riga shootout victory over Davos. The Dynamo’s lineup was identical to the previous two games’, but Riga’s changed yet again:

F1 – Gucci Garrop (420) – HHH (574) – Randoms (768)

F2 – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Podrick Cast (934) – Chico Smeb (340)

F3 – Mikko Aaltonen (410) – Anthony Matthews (390) – Arnor Sigurdsson (374)

F4 – Podrick Cast (934) – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Mikko Aaltonen (410)

 

D1 – Ryan Kastelic (980) – Cayden Saint (518)

D2 – Apollo Hackett (366) – Aron Nielsen (331)

 

There are a couple of changes here – namely HHH for Podrick Cast swapped between F1 and F2, and making a veteran line and rookie line on defense. The plus-minuses are a bit more telling this time around – notably, Hackett and Nielsen are at -1 and +0 respectively; on the other hand, Saint and Kastelic were both at a +1 for the game. It’s not terribly difficult to interpret – having two rookie defensemen on a single line may just not do as well as splitting your veterans. When we also consider that Hackett and Sigurdsson are the weaker passers of the four, it may just not be as easy to move the puck out of the defensive zone with them both on the floor at the same time. Certainly, they’re both competent passers (70 and 75, respectively), but Kastelic (99) and Saint (87) give something of a safety cushion to avoid having the puck stay in the home side of the ice so long.

 

What Changed in the Playoffs?

No matter what, a factor in any given playoff series is luck – so let’s get that out of the way first. Could it have gone 4-0 for Riga? Sure, but we consider that to be of an exceedingly slim probability – same with a 4-1 or 4-2 in favor of Riga, provided how the series ended.

 

Games 1 & 2 – 3-1, 4-1 Davos

Strangely enough, Davos's manager @ShawnGlade kept lineups similar to their regular season tour. Notably, he swapped Dragomir for Svoboda at RW and tacked on more ice time for Peace & Crimson by adding them to the third line with Katie Warren, moves made very late in the regular season. Davos also made a slight adjustment to their ice time (40-40-20-0). The swap makes the first line a little bit more physical (75 checking vs. 60) in exchange for a few points of strength (75 vs. 80) and skating (90 vs. 99), but overall isn’t a terribly significant difference. This doesn’t change the overall playtime of S65 draftee Katie Warren – but it does give a little more time to 757 TPE Elias Dahlberg, 878 TPE Ryuu Crimson, and 779 TPE Rylan Peace.

 

On the other hand, Riga made some significant changes that should be made clear below:

 

F1 – Gucci Garrop (420) – HHH (574) – Randoms (768)

F2 – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Podrick Cast (934) – Chico Smeb (340)

F3 – Mikko Aaltonen (410) – Anthony Matthews (390) – Arnor Sigurdsson (374)

F4 – Podrick Cast (934) – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Mikko Aaltonen (410)

 

D1 – Aron Nielsen (331) – Apollo Hackett (366)

D2 – Ryan Kastelic (980) – Cayden Saint (518)

D3 – as D1

D4 – as D2

 

First, we can appreciate that Riga went with a forward lineup identical to their worst back-half performance against Davos (the 5-4 OT/SO win) – a splitting of their veterans to an extent, but with Preencarnacion and Cast on their second line.

 

We can try to interpret this forward lineup in two ways – hoping for Preencarnacion and Cast to abuse a weaker second defensive line with rookie Charlie Paddywagon or perhaps testing the waters to see how HHH and Garrop fare against the cream of the VHL crop. Regardless, we can also point out that the first forward line doesn’t have great passers (80, 60, 85 for Garrop, HHH, and Randoms, respectively). Bringing up what I had mentioned previously about Nielsen and Hackett’s middling passing (again, 75 and 70 respectively), we have a problem. As a result, Nielsen’s, Random’s, Garrop’s, and HHH’s -1 plus-minus are all probably something we could come to expect.

 

Now, don’t get me wrong – this isn’t intended to be a roast of Riga’s players or management. Nielsen and Hackett played reasonably well against one of the VHL’s best first lines, but the result was probably something we could expect, and Riga’s power duo of Preencarnacion and Past didn’t get the edge the coach wanted. Part of that is, frankly, luck – Cast had 4 PIMs and only got one shot off for the game, and Preencarnacion got a few shots off but just didn’t happen to score in our first game. Kriketers even played slightly above his average (29/31, .935 SV%); Davos happened to score on an empty net late in the game, making the first game look a little worse than it actually was. Overall, however, a limited Riga offense in the first game and exploitation of Riga’s many rookies handed them their first loss. A similar skater performance plus an off game from Kriketers gave them their second, even worse 4-1 loss.

 

Game 3 – 3-2 Davos OTW

The closest game of the series was game 3, where Riga kept shot-for-shot pace with Davos until overtime, when they were blown out of the water (3 shots vs. 13).

 

F1 – Gucci Garrop (420) – HHH (574) – Randoms (768)

F2 – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Podrick Cast (934) – Chico Smeb (340)

F3 – Mikko Aaltonen (410) – Anthony Matthews (390) – Arnor Sigurdsson (374)

F4 – Podrick Cast (934) – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Mikko Aaltonen (410)

 

D1 – Ryan Kastelic (980) – Cayden Saint (518)

D2 – Aron Nielsen (331) – Apollo Hackett (366)

D3 – as D1

D4 – as D2

 

@hedgehog337 made a choice to keep his veteran defenders together as he did in games 1 and 2, but gave more even-strength ice time to them in an attempt to keep the rookies on the ice with lower-TPE forwards – and this strategy seemed to work well. Even against Davos’s top line, Preencarnacion and Cast managed 17 total shots together and had 2 goals and 2 assists between them – making them two of just four players (in addition to Hackett and Nielsen) with positive plus-minuses. Overall, it seems to have been a move in the right direction, but Riga still didn't have any wins.

 

The more troublesome part comes when examining the team’s first and third lines – as Garrop, HHH, Randoms, and our rookie forward line all had -1 plus-minus values. Notably, Riga’s first forward line continued to struggle in generating shots, with #1 pick Hunter Hearst Helmsley managing just 5 across the first three games. His impact was limited when playing against a line with multiple 750+ TPE players on it, but that shouldn’t really be a surprise.

 

Game 4 – 2-0 Davos, Series Clincher

The last game of this series looked close, but the shot differential tells a much different story. Davos managed a whopping 45 shots in game 4, while Riga put up just 14 – a sign of a possible larger problem.

 

Davos chose to keep their lines exactly the same as they were, but Riga tried something a little different:

 

F1 – Randoms (768) – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Podrick Cast (934)

F2 – Chico Smeb (340) – HHH (574) – Mikko Aaltonen (410)

F3  – Anthony Matthews (390) – HHH (574) – Arnor Sigurdsson (374)

F4 – Podrick Cast (934) – Edwin Preencarnacion (901) – Gucci Garrop (420)

 

D1 – Ryan Kastelic (980) – Cayden Saint (518)

D2 – Aron Nielsen (331) – Apollo Hackett (366)

D3 – as D1

D4 – as D2

 

No defensive changes to this point – and provided their last game’s result, perhaps that was for the better. However, Riga chose to stick their best line out first, while their second and third lines were composed primarily of rookies. This presents a similar set of challenges to what we saw in Game 1, where Nielsen and Hackett were exposed with Garrop/HHH/Randoms against high-TPE players. Ultimately, this is a poor overlap in passing that resulted in zero shots for HHH and Smeb, and just 1 for Sigurdsson and Aaltonen, respectively.

 

Crimson, Svoboda, and Madden ran amok on the mostly-rookie second lines, with 10, 7, and 6 shots, respectively – and while it came out to be a pretty close game goal-wise, Riga’s rookies never stood a chance. In spite of Kriketers’s best efforts in this game (43/45, 0.956 SV%), it’s nigh impossible to overcome a 31 shot deficit.

 

Ultimately, it's not clear if GM Benjamin Zeptenbergs is to blame for the loss. Shawn Glade found a combination that worked his high-TPE veterans harder than in the regular season, and Riga couldn't beat it with their rookies. Regardless, the Reign have an excellent future ahead of them, and a pretty solid second-place finish in the regular season speaks to that. A championship run simply wasn't in the cards for them, but the sheer number of time-worthy rookies they have on their roster spells trouble for the league in the future.

Edited June 23, 2019 by Renomitsu

[ShawnGlade 1,010]

4 hours ago, Renomitsu said:

Ultimately, it's not clear if GM Benjamin Zeptenbergs is to blame for the loss. Shawn Glade found a combination that worked his high-TPE veterans harder than in the regular season, and Riga couldn't beat it with their rookies

I don't think it's fair to blame hedge for Riga's loss. Like the second sentence said, I think I just found a line combo that worked well. We shut down Riga's 2nd and 3rd lines hard and just overwhelemed them on offense. Riga has a young team, and it was just on full display this series. Unfortunate that it ended in a sweep, but sometimes thats just how it goes

[Renomitsu 934]

1 hour ago, ShawnGlade said:

I don't think it's fair to blame hedge for Riga's loss. Like the second sentence said, I think I just found a line combo that worked well. We shut down Riga's 2nd and 3rd lines hard and just overwhelemed them on offense. Riga has a young team, and it was just on full display this series. Unfortunate that it ended in a sweep, but sometimes thats just how it goes

I'm inclined to agree. Our best players went roughly even with Davos's first/second forward lines, but after that HHH is our best player against lines with Dragomir/John Madden.

 

The losses still sting though, that's for sure!

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