The Coyotes finished the 2013-14 season 37-30-15 and missed the playoffs by three points, finishing with 89 points and coming in 9th in the Western Conference. They finished a distant 11 points back of the LA Kings for third in the Pacific Division.
The Coyotes may have missed the playoffs, but it wasn't an unsuccessful season. They are a young team and were never expected to contend this year. Yes, the playoffs would have been nice, but the important thing to take away from this season is that it was a year of development for the team's younger players, and a year to see what the organization has in everyone else.
Obviously it's hard to tell fans to be patient when the team has never won anything, ownership is in constant flux and even the location of the franchise has been in doubt. Now, you can't do anything about the past, but at least the other two problems seem to be fixed. Still, team released press reports and talking points suggest the team is on the verge of competing and emphasize the importance of the present tense.
Sophisticated fans of the team should realize the Coyotes, while not close yet to contending, are not far off and because of this, they shouldn't be too upset about missing the playoffs this year.
Besides the fact that the Coyotes are not necessarily ready to compete, it was actually only a matter of bad luck that they finished ninth and failed to qualify for the playoffs.
Many people will blame the lack of scoring, the tendency to blow games late or maybe even the coaching when they are looking for reasons for the late season collapse that saw a promising post-Olympic surge go for naught when the team lost seven of its final eight games.
The fact is, luck is not a factor that is discussed enough in either life or sports. It's obvious why: people want to take credit for their success and if others are not doing as well, it's a natural tendency to feel it's because they don't work as hard/aren't as skilled as you etc.
However, any quick research into the topic shows that luck is an overwhelming force in our lives and that this easily extends to hockey. Many people often offer the caveat "well luck balances out over time; everyone experiences the same luck." This is well meaning and intelligent advice, but it fails to consider sample size. Sure, luck comes to everyone, but even 82 games is not a large enough sample size to overcome bad luck and capitalize on good luck.
Now, I don't mean to make it seem like luck is the determining factor in the outcome of hockey games ever single time, but rather I just wish to point out that it is a far, far, larger factor than its discussion in the wider range of hockey commentary suggest. Not ever acknowledging luck would be like if we never discussed skating when we scouted and rated players. I think its that big of a factor.
So, how does this relate to the Coyotes? Simple. They got massively unlucky during the final month of the season. This manifestation of terrible luck can best be personified in Mike Smith, but even just losing seven in a row is bad luck. During that streak, the Coyotes went to overtime three times, and could have easily won any of those games since NHL OT is basically a coin-flip at the best of times. Not to mention that it would be hard to lose seven games in a row on purpose, sometimes things just don't roll your way.
Back to Smith though. Prior to getting injured in a March 24th game against the Rangers, Smith was playing some of the best hockey of his career.
Though he didn't play in the Olympics, and was just there as the Canadian third string goalie, Smith came back to the NHL on fire, posting stats bested by only Jonathan Quick between the time the Olympics ended and he got injured.
It was this injury that directly caused the Coyotes to miss the playoffs.
When Smith was injured, the Coyotes were leading the Rangers by a goal with 7 minutes to go in the third period. Thomas Greiss came in and subsequently the Rangers won in overtime. Greiss did an admirable job in stead of Smith, considering that he (Greiss) was the league's least used back up goalie at that point, but he is no Mike Smith and it's not even close.
Now, I realize fully that the Coyotes had problems scoring (and we will talk about that in pt. 2) but to say that Mike Smith could not have secured 3 points over the final 11 games of the season is ridiculous. (Especially since one of those points was lost in the very game he was injured.)
If, as many have said, you can't blame the collapse on Smith's injury, then I ask, what is the point of having one of the best goalies in the league? Doesn't that mean you are saying that any goalie is interchangeable? Doesn't that mean that taking a goalie who is arguably the hottest in the league at that time and replacing him with a guy who literally never plays makes zero difference?
If this was court and I was a lawyer, I would just ask those two questions rhetorically and rest my case.
Mike Smith, due to the bad luck of his being injured, is the only reason the Coyotes are not playing right now, in what was an otherwise successful season of player development and franchise building.
Back with part 2 tomorrow.
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