The Devils have started strong with a solid 5-2 record. However, they are not winning the possession battle. It will be interesting to see what changes as we move forward.
Seven games in, and the New Jersey Devils are a crisp and clean 5-2. You can only play the teams on your schedule, and the Devils are beating up against teams that should be worse than them. This is exactly what you’d hope they were doing. How many times in the past has this team played down to its competition and gotten burned for it?
What they have not been doing so well, and this is unexpected, is possessing the puck. Even last season, when the team vastly underperformed versus expectations, they still had a fairly solid 51.91 CF%, good for 7th in the NHL. This season is early, yes, and seven games is not big enough of a sample size to get a strong indicator of a stat like Corsi. To really gauge possession, we need a bigger sample size. Nonetheless, early on, the Devils are not possessing the puck well at all despite winning.
So far, New Jersey ranks 24th in the NHL with a lowly 47.38 CF%. That is abysmally low. It will improve for sure as the season goes on, good teams do not produce possession numbers that low, or I should say they rarely do. The Rangers seem to regularly have great regular seasons with mediocre possession at best, but I digress. The Devils are winning games while not possessing the puck nearly as much as they should. Now, you could potentially chalk this up to game situations. Teams that are ahead tend to play a little more defensively, and so are not possessing the puck as much as staying back and playing more defensively sound hockey. However, that usually does not relate to such low Corsi numbers, and it does not always need to. Tampa Bay has yet to lose a game this season, and they have a Corsi at nearly 52%. Granted, they have played in four fewer games than the Devils, so it is even less of a sample size, but the point still stands. Leading in games does not automatically mean poor possession.
Looking at the specific games in particular, of the team’s five wins so far, in only two of them did they have positive possession at the end of the game at 5 on 5, and really in only one game where they were really ahead with it. Against Utah, the Devils rocked a 53.85 CF% in a dominating win. Interestingly enough, they actually lost the Fenwick battle, which tracks all unblocked shot attempts, but won in the Corsi battle by a fair margin, which also tracks blocked shots. But nonetheless, it was a strong showing in terms of possession. They were also good on Thursday night against Ottawa, with a reasonable 50.48 CF%. Again, they lost the Fenwick battle in that game too, but that is just an interesting note really, nothing to comment on.
Outside of those two games, however, they did not lead in possession in the other 3 wins. They tied with Washington at 50% Corsi in that win, both teams generating 44 shot attempts at 5 on 5. And in the two Buffalo games, they got beat pretty well in possession. In game 1 they only had a 40.40 CF% with 40 attempts for versus 59 attempts against. They were slightly better in game 2 with a 43.88 CF%. They had 43 attempts for versus 55 against. Overall, not great possession numbers. I think the Buffalo games, to some degree, can be chalked up to the game situation, as the Devils held the lead for the majority of those 120 minutes and spent a lot of time just keeping Buffalo from getting high-danger chances. That worked to great effect in the second game where the Devils had a 61.11 HDCF% despite only having that 43.88 CF%. It was less effective in game 1 where they got crushed in high danger as well with a 36.84 HDCF%, but goaltending saved them in that one.
In fact, the Devils have been slightly better when it comes to high-danger Corsi chances than actual Corsi. Of the team’s seven games, in four of them, they had a HDCF% above 58%. That is very good. So while they might be losing the possession battle, they are mostly winning the high-danger battle, which is key. They might be giving up extra shot attempts from the blue line or from the side boards, but where it really counts, in that high-danger area in front of the net, they are playing much better and are winning those battles. That is how you get to 5-2, that’s for sure.
Moving forward, it will be interesting to see how this plays out as we get a larger sample size and things regress more towards what the mean should be. Will the Devils continue to be a sub-50% Corsi team this season? Or is this just an aberration despite the strong start? And if they continue to win the high-danger attempts battle, does it even matter? I look forward to seeing how this plays out in the weeks ahead.