Yzerman and Cooper creating the “Lightning way” in Tampa Bay

Quietly head coach Jon Cooper has turned the Tampa Bay Lightning into one of the best defensive teams in the National Hockey League. Remember the old saying the best offense is a good defense, well not in Tampa Bay. For the Lightning the best defense is a good offense and they have been excelling at this style of play through the first 20 games of the NHL season.

There has been a great deal of analysis as to the analytic flaws inherent with teams like the Colorado Avalanche, Toronto Maple Leafs and Calgary Flames. Instead of using hockey analytics to tear down teams let’s take a look at the positive side and what the Tampa Bay Lightning, under Jon Cooper’s and Steve Yzerman’s leadership are doing right. The key areas contributing to the Lightning’s success are fewer defensive zone starts, limiting the quality of shots and utilizing their defenders in the correct roles.

Defensive Zone Starts

Logically the best way to stop the opposition from scoring is to not allow them into your defensive zone. Currently the Tampa Bay Lightning are leading the NHL with only 26.6 percent of their face offs occurring in their defensive zone. How has Jon Cooper managed to have his team keep the puck out of their zone so well?

The key has been how they have built their defense core. Instead of relying on your traditional big bruising defensive defenders they have built off puck moving players. So Steve Yzerman did his job and as you can see from the below chart Jon Cooper has been effectively utilizing his defenders. His more mobile defenders in Carle, Stralman, Garrison and Sustr have all received the most minutes. As well the most mobile of the bunch (Carle, Stralman and Garrison) have the most defensive zone starts. With starting his better puck movers more often in the defensive zone they are able to exit the zone with possession and control the play through the neutral zone.

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Another key area is the ability to suppress the total number of shots as well as shot quality. Thus far the Lightning have allow approximately nine scoring chances per game at even strength. One way to determine which players are the best in terms of suppressing shot quality we can use their relative on ice save percentage. This measures the difference in save percentage when they are on the ice as compared to the team overall. The theory being lower quality shots generate a higher save percentage for goaltenders.

Their top four defenders in Carle, Stralman, Garrison and Sustr are all positives in this area. All three of Brewer, Gudas and Barberio are negatives by the statistics, hence why Jon Cooper tends not to start them in the defensive zone. By optimizing the use of his defenders Cooper is driving the success of his team.

This has led to Tampa Bay allowing the fourth least shot attempts against per 60 minutes of play behind only the Minnesota Wild, Detroit Red Wings and New Jersey Devils.

Final Thoughts

Currently the Lightning are tied for third in the league with 30 points while they trail the Montreal Canadiens for the Atlantic division lead by only three points. Based on Montreal’s high degree of puck luck expect Tampa Bay to take over the division lead at some point this season. Most pundits are choosing the Pittsburgh Penguins to represent the Eastern conference in the Stanley Cup finals this season. However it appears that their biggest challenge will be the Lightning. General Manager Steve Yzerman has brought the “Detroit way” to the sunshine state and head coach Jon Cooper have effectively utilized the talents at his disposal. This is a well run franchise that should be a top tier Eastern conference franchise for some time to come.

 

About Mike Burse

Mike will make the numbers make sense in the NHL for Puck Drunk Love.

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