THUNDERBIRDS

T-Birds head-to-head vs. Portland: numbers prove they’re more than a “one-line team”

Feb 22, 2017, 2:57 PM | Updated: Feb 23, 2017, 10:43 am

Tyler Adams has scored three goals against Portland this season, fifth most on the team (T-Birds ph...

Tyler Adams has scored three goals against Portland this season, fifth most on the team (T-Birds photo)

(T-Birds photo)

There was quite a bit of chatter on the social web and elsewhere after Seattle’s consecutive victories over the Portland Winterhawks regarding the T-Birds’ supposed complete dependence on their top line. Upon review, my description is not an exaggeration — in many places Seattle was referred to as a “one-line team” by the Portland faithful.

When people call Seattle a one-line team, it’s no question who they’re referring to. The T-Birds’ top line of Mathew Barzal, Ryan Gropp and Keegan Kolesar is one of the best in junior hockey. I don’t have the opportunity to watch the Ontario Hockey League or Quebec Major Junior Hockey League much, so I can’t confidently say they’re the best across the board, but scouting reports would seem to indicate that they certainly belong in that conversation.

First and foremost, it’s an odd assertion to make at this particular point when you consider the situation that the Thunderbirds find themselves in. Three of Seattle’s top nine forwards are out with injury, two of those that you could probably describe as “long-term,” and we’re still unclear on the third. Scott Eansor is Seattle’s best defensive forward and was averaging nearly a point per game before he went down with injury in mid-January. Matthew Wedman is a prospect likely to be taken in this year’s NHL Draft and went down a day after Eansor. Nolan Volcan is another two-way player who has been out for a couple of weeks.

Add Wyatt Bear to the mix of injured Thunderbirds forwards, and you have Seattle missing 33 percent of their usual forward depth and 33 percent of their usual top nine forwards. This doesn’t include Layne Bensmiller, who Seattle expected to fill a top-nine role when the season began, only to lose him for the season after just seven games.

All of this to say that, because of how hampered they’ve been by injury, it wouldn’t be much of a surprise for Seattle to become overly dependent on their top line.

Even with that excuse available in their back pocket, they haven’t.

Calling Seattle a “one-line team” is unfair to the other seven or eight forwards Seattle has been dressing on a nightly basis. Of course Seattle counts on their top line for production, just as every team in the league does. And, with all of the injuries, they are forced to rely on their top line more than they’d prefer. But that doesn’t mean that those other seven or eight aren’t contributing.

Seattle and Portland have faced each other ten times this season, with the T-Birds having a 5-3-1-1 record. In those ten games, Seattle has scored 35 regulation or overtime goals. Barzal, Gropp and Kolesar have combined for six of those 35 goals, or 17 percent of the T-Birds’ scoring against the Winterhawks. If you add high-scoring defenseman Ethan Bear to the mix as a top-line player, the four have combined for 10 goals, or 28.5 percent of Seattle’s scores.

So, one-fourth of Seattle’s forwards have accounted for less than one-fourth of their goals scored. Or, if you include Bear, four players out of the 18 in the lineup — 22 percent — have accounted for 28.5 percent of their goal-scoring. Granted, Barzal, Kolesar and Gropp have not played in all ten of those games, but even in the last four head-to-head matchups — all of which came since the beginning of 2017 — Seattle has totaled 20 regulation and overtime goals, and all six of the top line forwards’ goals have come in those four contests. Those six scores amount to 30 percent of Seattle’s goal-scoring, by no means an extraordinary amount for a top line to score.

By comparison, here is the breakdown of Seattle’s notable individual scoring numbers versus Portland this season:

Barzal. 5 games played, 11 points (1 goal, 10 assists)

Kolesar. 6 games played, 5 points (1 goal, 4 assists)

Gropp. 7 games played, 7 points (4 goals, 3 assists)

E. Bear. 9 games played, 10 points (4 goals, 6 assists)

Eansor. 6 games played, 5 points (2 goals, 3 assists)

Volcan. 7 games played, 7 points (2 goals, 5 assists)

Donovan Neuls. 10 games played, 9 points (4 goals, 5 assists)

Tyler Adams. 6 games played, 3 points (3 goals, 0 assists)

Sami Moilanen. 10 games played, 6 points (2 goals, 4 assists)

Alexander True. 8 games played, 5 points (4 goals, 1 assist)

Jarret Tyszka. 9 games played, 6 points (0 goals, 6 assists)

With the injuries to Eansor and Volcan, who started the season as Seattle’s second line with Moilanen, various players have been asked to step into a second-line role of some sort, including True, Neuls, and Adams, who was acquired to bring size and grit to the fourth line.

Seattle’s “next six up,” if you will, after the top three — Eansor, Volcan, Neuls, Adams, Moilanen, and True — would normally make up their second and third lines (you might switch Adams out with Wedman) and have accounted for 17 of their 35 goals versus Portland — 48.5 percent. Seattle’s fourth through ninth forwards, half of your total depth chart and not including the famed top line, have accounted for approximately half of your goals. That’s about the definition of “balance.”

Does Seattle’s top line play a lot of minutes? Absolutely. Would the T-Birds be in trouble if that top line wasn’t playing? You bet. Does their presence open things up for others? Without a doubt. But how many teams at any level don’t depend on their top line?

Let’s take a look at Portland.

The Winterhawks have scored 38 goals against Seattle this year in regulation or overtime. Portland’s top scoring line consists of Cody Glass at center with Skyler McKenzie and Evan Weinger on his wings.

Glass. 10 games played, 12 points (3 goals, 9 assists)

McKenzie. 10 games played, 7 points (6 goals, 1 assist)

Weinger. 10 games played, 5 points (1 goal, 4 assists)

Ten of Portland’s 38 goals against Seattle have come from their top scoring line — 26 percent. Just over one-fourth of your goals scored have come from one-fourth of your forwards — nothing surprising, and not a significant difference than the contributions Seattle has received from its top forward line, goal-scoring wise.

To their credit, the Winterhawks do have other scoring weapons:

Ryan Hughes. 10 games played, 12 points (5 goals, 7 assists)

Keegan Iverson. 7 games played, 10 points (5 goals, 5 assists)

Joachim Blichfeld. 8 games played, 7 points (4 goals, 3 assists)

Caleb Jones. 9 games played, 4 points (2 goals, 2 assists)

Henri Jokiharju. 10 games played, 5 points (1 goal, 4 assists)

Portland’s set of “1B” forwards, if you will, have accounted for 14 of their 38 goals — 37 percent. Include Jones and Jokiharju and those five players have accounted for nearly 45 percent of their goals scored against Seattle.

Portland’s top six forwards have scored 63 percent of the Winterhawks’ goals versus Seattle.

If you take Seattle’s top line plus their next three best goal-scoring forwards (since they haven’t really had a consistent second line) — Barzal, Gropp, Kolesar, Neuls, Adams and True — they make up a total of 17 of the T-Birds’ 35 goals versus Portland, which amounts to, again, 48.5 percent. Considering Neuls is normally on the third line when Seattle is healthy and Adams is on the fourth, Seattle’s done a pretty good job spreading out their scoring and have been less reliant from a goal-scoring perspective on a small contingent of players than Portland has.

Overall, Seattle has scored 205 goals this season. The top line has accounted for 52 of those goals, just a hair over 25 percent. They’ve missed a fair amount of time between them, but it’s in no way unreasonable to expect your top scoring line to account for far more than just a quarter of your offensive production. The idea that Seattle is a “one-line team,” as so many have suggested, is untrue, but also unfair to a group that has been victimized more than most by injuries and seen huge contributions from those players they’ve depended on to step up.

Yes, Seattle does have an excellent top line. Most teams would count on them for the majority of their scoring and it is important to Seattle that they play well. But to say that the rest of the lineup is some sort of placeholder on the ice while those top three take their brief rests doesn’t give credit to the depth of a Seattle team that is one point away from tying for first place in the Western Conference.

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T-Birds head-to-head vs. Portland: numbers prove they’re more than a “one-line team”