The NHL is cyclical, much like the teams that are within it.
Every up comes with a down in due time, and sustaining competitiveness is quite the arduous task.
The Western Conference has been on top of the league for several years. Stylistically it has been a game much more about size and strength versus pace (Although Chicago has been one of the pacier teams out there in the past several years). That paradigm is shifting it seems. With speed becoming a more dominating factor in the league, on top some of the Western Conference teams perhaps peaking, it looks like the West, and the Pacific division specifically, is on the downturn.
The Pacific division has been an absolute destructive force for several years. Back in 2014 I wrote a piece analyzing the California road trip, and how teams had had little success on it. It was mainly due to the quality of the teams overall and the sheer volume of games in a short time span. San Jose, Anaheim, and Los Angeles have been amongst the top of the NHL for some time, and good teams have fallen into mini slumps coming out west. This year, despite promising finishes by San Jose and Anaheim, the division was on the weaker side for about half of the season. With the teams perhaps wavering a touch in terms of quality, and the division overall being presumably weaker, let's revisit the numbers and see if anything has changed over the past few years on the "California Gauntlet" so to speak.
First, let's talk about the past. You should definitely check out the piece from 2014 to get a better sense of how teams did on the trip then. To put it bluntly, it was not good. Teams generally won just about one out of those three games. You were lucky if you got away with two wins. You were also dead in the water if you had to play in back to backs on the trip, which teams went 2-9-1 on the second night of.
In that article are cool things like game scores, when teams scored the most in the three game set, and other factors.
We will go over the same on this one.
A few things have changed in the scheduling, mainly that every team now has to come out and visit once a year. Because of that, there are a startling number of back to backs due to Eastern teams trying to cram the games in in one trip. We saw 24 back to back games, instead of the 12 in 2014.
Overall, teams had to make a west coast swing of three games that involved the Sharks, Ducks, and Kings 32 times this past season. Most of these swings were three games in five nights, or three games in six nights on some occasions In some sets we added trips to Colorado, Dallas, and Arizona. Vancouver, for example, did not have to do a San Jose, LA, Anaheim set. They did, however, have to do a Dallas, Anaheim, Los Angeles three games in five nights set. Things like that were taken into consideration.
Overall, there was only one team that did not have to do a gauntlet of sorts through California.
Colorado.
There were four teams who had to do a variation of the trip TWICE! Minnesota, Winnipeg, and Calgary all had to make a tough run twice. Carolina got the short straw having to do a Colorado-Los Angele-San Jose, AND a Dallas-Anaheim-Arizona swing. They actually came out two out of three in the latter trip. Both trips included back to back games.
Colorado played a few back to backs against the California teams, but never had to run a nasty three in five, or three in six against the triplets of terror in California. They should consider themselves fortunate.
In 2014, no team swept the series. However, in 2015-16 we had a winner.
The Winnipeg Jets were able to play Anaheim, San Jose, and Los Angeles on three games in six nights and come away 3-0. Granted, one was a shootout win and one was an overtime win, and they did not have to play a back to back. Be that as it may, the Jets were able to do what no other team did all season. Play all three California teams in a short road trip and win all three.
It was not easy folks, believe it. Including Winnipeg, only nine out of the 30 times in 2015-16 did a team win more than one game on the California swing. Nine. Just like in 2014, you were very very lucky if you got out of the trip with more than one win.
Those teams that did it, for due recognition: Chicago, Winnipeg, Carolina, New York Islanders, Tampa Bay, Columbus, New Jersey, Detroit, and Ottawa.
Game to game the records were again very interesting.
Game 1 of the trip: 16-11-3 Game 2: 12-10-8
And prepare yourselves for this
Game 3: 5-23-2
Holy moses. AND, to cap that number off, only ONE SOLITARY WIN CAME IN REGULATION IN GAME 3. Three were shootout wins, one was an overtime win, and the New York Islanders were the only team to win a game three of the Gauntlet in regulation.
Brutal.
Furthermore, teams got massacred in game 3. It wasn't just a loss, it was generally a drubbing. 15 of those 30 games saw the visiting team allow 4 or more goals.
So if you got a win out of game one and two, just take an early flight home and do not bother with the third. Forfeit and save yourself the trouble.
That's an amazing drop off in game record, and not something we saw in 2014.
What we also didn't see in 2014 was the amazing brutality of back to back results.
Now the back to backs could come in the first two games, or the second two games. Six times teams opened the trip with a back to back. Four of those six back to backs were split, and no team won both.
If the back to back was on the end of the trip, well, 8 of the 18 were split, and the Hurricanes miraculously won both on a back to back (Against Anaheim and Arizona in overtime). They were the ONLY team to do this on the West Coast trip. A back to back night happened on 24 of the 30 trips, and only won team was able to get both wins. No one could do it in regulation.
From an advantage standpoint, the Kings were the benefactor of a back to back 14 times, the Sharks four, and the Ducks five, and Arizona once.
The big advantage though, was having Game 3.
Turn away San Jose and Anaheim fans. The Kings got Game 3 a startling 15 times in the 30 trips and they were perfect in regulation, going 12-0-3.
Anaheim got only six Game 3s, and had the lone regulation loss to the Islanders. Otherwise they too were perfect.
San Jose got seven Game 3 appearances, and were also perfect in regulation.
Logistically, Los Angeles had the most statistically fruitful legs of the trip. With Games 1 and 2 of the series basically being one in the same in terms of win percentage, the Kings dominated the back end leg of the trips. Victories were perhaps low hanging fruit by that point.
Home and away records overall, considering all teams, are not AS important as people make them out to be. Good teams obviously win more at home than bad teams, and vice versa. Overall though it balances is out to just about a 50-50 split. The game is the same at home versus on the road, and the odds of winning are about the same. Good teams normally win, and that has little to do with home ice. In this case however, the schedule can be exceptionally brutal, especially when considering the startling Game 3 numbers. While the better team should win most nights, the Kings, Sharks and Ducks massacred teams coming through California with little regard to their relative place in the standings. Good, bad, or otherwise, teams had extreme difficulty traversing that part of the schedule and coming away with a positive outcome. Fortunately for most, they only had to do it once a year, and three losses on the schedule can be easily made up later.
Overall though, if you were a betting man and liked playing the odds, putting down money on the home team winning in Game 3 of the California Gauntlet next season, that would be a safe play.