Travis Hamonic’s return highlights season improvements since 9-1 loss

On Oct. 25, the Flames had, undoubtedly, their worst moment of the season: they lost 9-1 to the Penguins and, in typical blowout fashion, looked pathetic while doing so. Compounding matters it was their 10th game of the year, and they’d only looked like a middling team up to that point – and, indeed, being a 5-5 team at that stage didn’t do a lot to inspire confidence.

Though they lost their next game, the Flames went on to turn their season around soon after, a four-game winning streak and habit of scoring several goals in single games suggesting there was a much better team underneath the surface. Now, nearly at the season’s halfway mark, it looks like the team started to turn things around – especially in one area in particular.

Via Natural Stat Trick, we can take a glance at the Flames’ underlying numbers at 5v5 through the season so far, split into two categories: before (and including) the Penguins game (10 games), and after the blowout (27 games). A lot of the numbers will look pretty similar, but for one key difference:

The Flames’ regular corsi for is near identical, but their ability to control the bulk of the game’s high danger attempts – both for and against – rose by a fair bit: from one of the worst in the NHL to the top half. Their goals percentage rose alongside that, as well.

But it wasn’t necessarily on the offensive end that got the Flames going: it was preventing so many high danger chances going against them.

While the Flames’ high danger corsi events for have fallen by two per game, they’ve reduced the ones going against them by nearly six per game: and that means quite the reduction in potential scoring chances against.

Their underlying offensive rates have actually fallen since their first 10 games, even though they’ve still been capable of scoring plenty of goals in the meantime. Their shooting percentage is less lethal and their PDO has dropped some, as well. But their save percentage has gone up, and their starting goalies’ balance of games might have something to do with that.

In the first 10 games of the season, Mike Smith started seven (three wins, two quality games, pulled twice), while David Rittich got just three (two wins, three quality games). In the ensuing 27, Smith started 13 games (eight wins, six or seven quality games, pulled once), while Rittich got 14 (nine wins, nine quality games, pulled once). Giving Rittich a bigger workload helped elevate the quality of the Flames’ goaltending. It didn’t guarantee a win, but Rittich gave the Flames a better chance to win more often than not.

Combine that with the Flames’ ability to reduce high danger chances going against them, and you had a much more structurally sound team – one that wouldn’t necessarily have to rely on a high shooting percentage to take other teams to task, but could instead get by on its other merits.

Where did such a defensive turnaround come from, though? Recall that Travis Hamonic was injured in the first game of the season, and missed the next eight games with a facial fracture. He returned just in time for the game against the Penguins, and has been playing relatively high minutes ever since: typically about 18-22 minutes a game, with a couple of 25-minute outings in there. (His average ice time for the season is 20:37 – fourth among Flames defencemen, but not far behind Noah Hanifin’s 20:55.)

Hamonic missing the bulk of those first 10 games allowed him to either escape the ravages of so many high danger corsi events going against his team. That or, well, he’s been a key part in bringing that number down.

Hamonic’s 5v5 HDCF over the 29 games he’s played so far this season is 54.82% – the most out of all Flames defencemen, including ahead of runner-up Mark Giordano (51.30%). His HDCA/60, at 10.92, is third among Flames defencemen, behind Oliver Kylington and Rasmus Andersson, who have far smaller roles than Hamonic does. (For reference, Giordano’s HDCA/60 is 11.23.) Furthermore, Hamonic leads all regular Flames defencemen with an HDCF/60 of 13.25; Giordano’s sits at 11.83.

In short, Hamonic has been a stabilizing force on the Flames’ backend, and losing him to start the season may have hindered the Flames’ ability to get off to a proper start. Though the loss to the Penguins makes for a convenient cutoff narrative point, that Hamonic returned to the team was likely a far bigger factor than losing 9-1 that one time.

It’s also worth noting that the Flames’ special teams have improved astronomically since the loss to the Penguins 10 games into the season – and, seeing as how Hamonic doesn’t play on the powerplay and the goalies are largely irrelevant on the man advantage, the Flames’ success can’t be solely attributed to them.

The Flames had an absolutely abysmal powerplay in 2017-18; perhaps they needed time to get all of that out of their systems, and to adapt to having a right shot as offensively talented as Elias Lindholm that they could actually rely on.

As for the improvement on the penalty kill, well, that’s where Hamonic (third in shorthanded ice time) and the goalie splits likely do come in: Hamonic’s been the top Flames defenceman at reducing high-danger corsi events on the penalty kill, while Rittich’s numbers are better than Smith’s when it comes to a high-danger save percentage down a man.