The VHLs Most Polarizing Season: S20 | Records Shattered

[Matt_O 897]

Part 1 of a 3 part series

 

Part 2

Part 3 coming Thursday, April 16th

 

While I am sure people that have been around for most of VHL history will disagree with me on this, they would at least agree that the 20th season in our leagues history was one of the wildest. The incredible talent gap between the leagues worst and the leagues best was on full display this year. The sudden increase in scoring. The beginning of the Shaw vs Kanou rivalry that remains as one of the VHLs best player rivalries to date. Today, we will be looking into this season as deep as someone who wasn't around to witness it can.

 

First,  lets make this clear. This season shattered the record book in ways no other season has. S62 can give it a fight, but S20 wreaked havoc on the record books and many of the records held by teams from S20 still stand, 50 seasons in the future. This is because the good teams in the league were elite, while the bad teams were terrible. This allowed for the good teams to beat up on the bad teams and score tons and tons of goals, which led to inflated scoring. There also could have been a change in the version used in STHS, but I am not sure if that's true. The Riga Reign perhaps put the biggest dent in the record books. They had Tarik Saeijs and Max Kroenenburg that year, who both scored 157 points. Keep in mind, when we show stats, anything prior to season 20 may not be counted because of the fact that their are no indexes for them, so we can't get a fully accurate number. We are simply using the VHL Hall of Fame's record books, and any archives I can use.

 

For some reason, Saeijs and Kroenenburg don't appear in the VHL's record book. Why? Perhaps the VHL is trying to hide this season away, ashamed of the chaos that was created. Anyhow, both Saeijs and Kroenenburg had 157 points that year. That would place them tied for third all time in the record books. If we included the early VHL, with Campbell and Slobodzian, they likely would barely crack the top 10. But it's incredible that two teammates would both be that high up. They would also be in fourth and fifth place for goals, as Saeijs had 71 goals and Kroenenburg had 70. But it's not only those two that put up points that year. In S20, the sixth placed scorer was Markus Strauss, with 139 points. That total would be enough to be the leagues leading scorer in 50 of leagues 70 seasons, (two of them would have been ties). That's either as good or better than 71% of the leagues top scorers in history, yet he finished sixth that year. But that's not it. Judging solely by the VHLs record book from the Hall of Fame, Strauss's 139 points that year would put him tied for tenth all time. The fact that SIX players in S20 had seasons that were good enough to be in the top 10 most points in a single season shows just how crazy this year was. But it's not over yet. Not even close.

 

Remember Saeijs and Kroenenburg? Well, they helped engineer an offense that was the best in the league that season. They scored 371 goals that season. Where does that rank all time? Oh it's first place. Well, who could be in second, probably another elite offensive team. It happens to be the HC Davos Dynamo. What season? S20, of course. The two greatest offenses in the history of the league, and both of them played in the same season. But that Riga team, the greatest offense of all time? They scored 47 more goals than the Dynamo. The Reign not only had the greatest offense of all time that year, it wasn't even remotely close. Now, what does the rest of the top 10 look like? Probably a good combination of other seasons and teams, right? Well, if you said that, you would be half right. Actually, less than half right, because SIX teams from S20 are on the top 10 list for most goals scored in a single season in VHL history. That is absurd! That should not be possible, yet it happened. But even then, we still have just scraped the surface.

 

We looked at most goals in one season, what about most goals in one game? Believe it or not, an S20 team isn't at the top. Or second, third, or even fourth. Four teams in history have scored 12 goals in one game, and none of them did it in S20. What a breath of fresh air. We can breathe easy,  S20 finally isn't dominating a top 10 list for offense. Actually, I may have spoke too soon. The next six of the top 10 all scored 11 goals in one game. All of them happened in S20. The offensive surge in S20 is off the charts. But there's more, don't worry.

 

Has anyone ever heard of the stat game points? I didn't until I searched through the archive, and I've come to the conclusion that it's the total of all your players point totals. I'm sure you can see where this is going. The Riga Reign are the only team to ever reach 1000. The Dynamo from S20 and the Reign are the only teams to ever reach 900. Six of the top ten teams for total game points in a season belong to S20. 

 

Remember the Reign? Lets talk about them again. Saeijs and Kroenenburg scored six goals in one game on separate occasions. Six goals from one player has happened eight times in VHL history. These two both did it in the same season. This Riga team was simply unreal.

 

Now, my final point. S20 rewrote the record book like no other season, but it's possible this is the most remarkable achievement from that year. Plus minus is a controversial stat, some say it's poorly represents players. That may be true, but take a look at this. The top 10 list for best plus minus by a player in VHL history is the most jaw dropping stat of this season. Take a guess how many S20 players are on the top 10. Three? A little too low, bump it up. Five? Seven? Eight? You would be wrong with all of those. On the top 10 list for best plus minus in a season, nine spots are from players in S20. Five players finished with a plus minus above 100, all of which played on the Reign. No one has ever had a plus minus of over 100, before or after this season. In fact, the Reign have seven spots on this list. The only player not from S20 to make this list is Matt Thompson from S68, with a plus minus of +52. Naturally he ruins our perfect list of all S20s, but lets think about this. That was in S68. Before S68, I have a very strong feeling that Patrick Bergqvist's +46 that season would have finished 10th all time. S20 completely rewrote the top 10 list for best plus minus, and it stayed like that for nearly 50 seasons.

 

S20 is the most incredible season in VHL history. Today we only looked at the way it shaped the record books. Next week, we will look into other stuff. What is that other stuff? I truly have no idea. But I will find stuff for y'all. And until next time, I hope you enjoyed.

 

Also, I'm well aware that S1 Calgary Wranglers are the best team ever and better than the Reign. But they weren't in the HOF record books or the index, so they didn't count for this. I also am aware that I switched between the HOF record book and index record book, but I'm not gonna go back and fix it now.

 

1,300ish words

Edited April 13, 2020 by Matt_O

[Doomsday 4,126]

This was an awesome read, can't wait for the next segment!

[Matt_O 897]

Just now, Doomsday said:

This was an awesome read, can't wait for the next segment!

Thanks a lot!

[Victor 10,911]

Unreal season tbh. A couple teams goalies were a special level of bad (before the 200 TPE CPUs were introduced).

[Matt_O 897]

Week 2 claim

[diamond_ace 3,110]

20 hours ago, Victor said:

Unreal season tbh. A couple teams goalies were a special level of bad (before the 200 TPE CPUs were introduced).

*cough Alejandro Messi cough*

[Advantage 2,891]

On 4/6/2020 at 3:29 AM, Victor said:

Unreal season tbh. A couple teams goalies were a special level of bad (before the 200 TPE CPUs were introduced).

Indeed.  Angelo still with one of the least likely records to break coming from that season.  Was a wild one.

[frescoelmo 1,275]

On 4/5/2020 at 9:08 PM, Matt_O said:

Remember Saeijs and Kroenenburg?

 

I DO

 

Edited April 13, 2020 by frescoelmo