Welcome, welcome, welcome back to the second edition of your favorite weekly column - 31 thoughts that I condense into five!
Alright, enough of the appetizer, let's get to the meat and potatoes of this thing, shall we?
1. Through the early part of the season it's been one of those things where it seems the teams are really struggling with respect to the penalty kill. It seems there are a lot of teams that are really below where one would think is an acceptable level; well perhaps that level is 90% if you are an old school guy like I am.
However, when you actually look, CCHL teams were averaging 81.7% as a whole killing penalties this week which is actually just under two percent better than what the NHL was in 19-20 at 79.9.
The best of our PK teams is five percent over the average and the worst is three percent under. It's always frustrating to lose a game because your penalty killers couldn't get the job done, but from a recreation standpoint, they are doing quite well compared to that other league, the NHL.
2. A few surprises in the top ten scoring with Jake Guentzel, Brock Nelson, and Bryan Rust all seeing their name appear in the top ten at this point. Guentzel is obviously talented but is playing a ton of minutes which is something Tampere should be concerned about given his questionable durability rating.
GM Gayle Zuk should be pleased with Nelson's production as it's finally meeting the expectations that the Express has had on him since the day his gigantic body was drafted. Nelson's former teammate Rust is also flourishing in Sudbury but with 88-90% of the season still to play, a lot can change.
3. Through eight games this season, the Niagara Falls Thunder have only scored a paltry 15 goals. It's almost impossible to believe that a team with Stamkos, Couture, Doughty, Reinhart, and Marchand would be having trouble scoring goals. Aside from Stamkos, the other three forwards mentioned only have three points in eight contests which is massively underachieving for a group that talented. Something tells me that the group is due to explode soon or their GM might be forced to look at a hard trade in order to give the group a much-needed spark. They are a playoff team so it's only a matter of time until they show that in the standings.
4. The CCHL is on the way to a record pace in terms of waivers this year. Seven players have found the waiver wire in the last week with only Carter Hutton being claimed by a team. It's interesting to see the team's so willing to pay to get rid of players compared to past years.
5. The CCHL is also on the way to setting a record for most profiles received in a season. I am not sure if it's the result of just having to hit yes to upload and making it easier or something else. It's definitely nice to see though and I appreciate everyone keeping up with their rosters to ensure they do not have illegal lineups. So far we have only had 4-5 illegal lineups so it's good to see that at the current pace, everyone should get something in terms of bonus cash for keeping their rosters updated!
That's all for this week's thoughts. Until next week, for the CCHL Commissioner, I'm the CCHL Commissioner. Bye!
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