Wait Til You've Tried Crow And Other Thursday Notes

I had a bit of a discussion on this on Twitter on Monday, as I was watching yet more slobbering over Jonathan Quick and I was drinking. My best Twitter debates tend to come when I’m at the bar and I have time to kill. I’m sure I’m not alone in that.

Anyway, the narrative once again is that Jonathan Quick is dragging the Kings kicking and screaming through the playoffs. And I suppose that blue line beneath Drew Doughty does need some bailing out from time to time. But it got me to thinking:

59 games – 35-24, 8 shutouts, .928 SV%, 2.12 GAA

46 games – 27-18 3 shutouts, .925 SV%, 2.03 GAA

The top is Quick’s career playoff numbers. The bottom is Crawford’s. As you can see, other than the shutouts they’re almost identical. Ah, but I’m sure people will point to the Conn Smythe that Quick got and Crow doesn’t have. Ok then.

Quick’s 2012 run – 16-4 .946 SV%, 1.41 GAA

Crawford’s 2013 run – 16-7 .932 SV%, 1.84 GAA

Obviously, Quick’s run to the Cup was a little better, but not by all that much. And in 2012, Quick’s last three opponents didn’t finish in the top half in the league in scoring (and Vancouver was without Daniel Sedin courtesy Duncan Keith and Ryan Kesler was being held together by duct tape and hope), whereas last year’s Kings and Bruins both finished in the top half in scoring. We could easily make the argument that Crow had a tougher path to the Cup than Quick did.

Oh right, but Crawford had a tough regular season which cost him a spot on the Canadian Olympic team, and Quick was the main starter for Team USA so he must be better.

.915 2.07

.917 2.26 

The bottom is Crow, the top is Quick. By any measure, he’s been just as good. In fact, over their whole careers…

Quick: 335 games, .915 SV%, 2.28 GAA

Crawford: 211 games, .914 SV%, 2.36 GAA

I just think it’s kind of funny that the narrative about them is so different–Quick is the Great Wall to be overcome whereas Crow is always the surprise–when essentially they’ve basically had almost the same career. And Quick is all of one year younger, so it’s not like he’ll get too many more years to warp these numbers.

The amount of work they have to do doesn’t vary much either, and in fact Crow has had more of it. In his regular season career, Crow has seen 27.5 shots-against per game. Quick 26.7. That does change in the playoffs, where Crow has seen on average 27.2 shots per game and Quick’s leaps up to 29.5.

Maybe it’s an American thing, or that Crow is buried beneath a lot more marquee players here in Chicago so the natural conclusion is that he’s a weak link. Maybe it’s because he wasn’t around for the first Cup. I don’t know. But it’s just weird.

And now I’ve set Crow up for a huge crash soon.

-It’s funny, the Hawks sit 6-3 but have been outshot in most of their games so far this spring. So basically, they’re the Avalanche, right? They actually only outshot the Blues twice in that series, but it’s a little more cloudy than that. In Game 1 the Hawks tried to sit on a lead for the entire 3rd period. inviting pressure. Game 2 saw them spend the last half of the 3rd period short-handed. They were genuinely outplayed in Game 3, so that’s valid. They spent the entire 2nd period of Game 6 shorthanded.

But more worryingly, the Hawks have gotten housed in Fenwick and Corsi for a majority of these playoffs. They’ve only come out ahead in the Corsi battle twice in these playoffs, Game 4’s win against St. Louis and last out in Game 3 against Minnesota. Again, some of these are skewed by trying to sit on leads against St. Louis or Minnesota, but this much? It’s something to keep an eye on. Here are the specific numbers for you to see: The first set is the Corsi the second the Fenwick (Corsi minus blocked shots).