Allen is going to have its hands full tonight taking on the Kansas City Mavericks in the first of a three game series. Kansas City is the best team in the Mountain Division, the hottest team in the ECHL (9-1-1-0) and owns a record of 6-1-0-0 against Allen this season.
The stats don't lie and they tell a pretty bleak story and it started from the beginning of the season and it has never stopped:
- In Allen's home opening weekend Kansas City shutout the Americans 4-0 and 9-0.
- Allen scores one goal per game less than KC (2.5 vs 3.5).
- Allen allows 1.7 goals more per game than KC (4.2 vs 2.5).
- Allen takes 5.1 fewer shots per game than KC (28.8 vs 33.9).
- Allen allows 12.4 more shots per game than KC (38.5 vs 26.1).
- Allen's road record is 7-12-3-1 (.391).
- KC's home record is 12-5-2-1 (.675).
- Allen has lost seven straight games while being outscored 39-14.
- KC is 9-1-1-0 in its last 11 games, allowing and average of 1.55 goals per game.
- Allen's road PP% is 19.7%. KC's home PP% is 25.4%.
- Allen's road PK% is 78.2%. KC's road PK% is 79.7%
- Allen's record when scoring 1st is 7-9-4-2 (.455), KC's is 23-3-1-1 (.857)
- It is hard to look at the stats above and see how Allen can get a victory tonight. However, anything can happen on a given night in the ECHL. After all, Allen's lone win against the Mavericks this season came on the road on January 4. It was a strange game as the American won 5-2 and scored their five goals on just 18 shots. Brayden Watts had a pure hat trick scoring the first three goals of the game. It took a Herculean effort by goalie Luke Richardson who face 48 shots and had a .952 save percentage. He will need another Herculean effort tonight for the Americans to win.
- I swapped messages with coach Ferguson yesterday as the team was about to arrive in Kansas City in snow and cold. FYI,. the high today will be 9 and the low tonight -10 and that isn't wind chill. You can expect several line changes and position changes when the lineup comes out later today.
- The typical keys to the game apply to this series. Get a good start, don't play from behind, avoid neutral zone turnovers, keep the front of the net clear, keep the shots close, get good goaltending and win the special teams battle. Penalty kill will be particularly important. In the last four times Allen played Kansas City the Mavericks were 8-17 (47%) on the power play. Can't let Kansas City score two or three power play goals and expect to win.
- Luke Richardson will be in goal tonight and will likely play all three games against the Mavericks. Dylan Wells was recalled by Tucson yesterday, so Allen will use an EBUG tonight. Not sure what the goalie situation will be for Friday and Saturday. Anson Thornton is on 3-day injured reserve and could be cleared, coach Ferguson could find a free agent goalie, a SPHL goalie or he could go with an EBUG.
- Here are Allen's top scorers in their last 10 games played:
9 points, (6G, 3A), Asuchak
8 points (2G, 6A), Crnkovic
6 points (2G, 4A), Gorman
6 points (2G, 4A), Watts
5 points (1G, 4A), Kulakov
5 points (3G, 2A), Blaisdell
5 points (2G, 3A), Duarte
5 points (0G, 5A), Brassard
- Allen will likely see plenty of Kansas City goalie Jack LaFontaine in this series. He was just named the ECHL Goalie of the Week for last week. He was 3-0 with a GAA of 0.96 and a .962 save percentage. He saved 76 of the 79 shots he faced.
- There will be one referee working the game tonight, #33 Chazz Knoche. When you consider in the last three head to head games Allen and Kansas City combined penalties assessed were 19, 13 and 9, you can expect double digit penalties tonight.
OTHER COMMENTS
- If you look at leaguewide overtime stats some teams are involved in a lot. Orlando leads the league with 20 of 54 games (37%) going to overtime. Idaho is second with 16 of 49 games (33%) going to overtime. The best overtime team is Fort Wayne. The Komets have been involved in only eight overtimes with two going to a shootout. Fort Wayne is 4-2 in overtimes and 2-0 in shootouts for a league best .750 point percentage. The worst overtime team is Cincinnati who is 1-7 (.125) in overtimes. Here are the stats for Allen and Kansas City.
- Allen - 12 of 49 games (24%) have gone to overtime. Allen's record is 3-7 in overtime and 0-2 in shootouts for a points percentage of .250.
- Kansas City - 10 of 48 games (21%) have gone to overtime. Its record is 3-4 in overtimes and 2-1 in shootouts for a points percentage of .500.
- Remaining home games and road games vary quite a bit in the Mountain Division. With three teams (Tahoe, Wichita, Tulsa) currently tied for second place with identical 62 points and .620 point percentage home vs road games could be a big factor. Here are the home and road games remaining.
Home Games Remaining
- 16 - Kansas City
- 13 - Tahoe
- 12 - Rapid City
- 10 - Utah
- 10 - Allen
- 9 - Tulsa
- 6 - Wichita
Road Games Remaining
- 16 - Wichita
- 13 - Allen
- 13 - Idaho
- 13 - Tulsa
- 13 - Utah
- 12 - Rapid City
- 9 - Tahoe
- 8 - Kansas City
- "Best of the Rest"
- .458 - Rapid City (44 points)
- .418 - Utah (41 points)
- .357 - Allen (35 points)
- It is a light Wednesday night in the ECHL tonight with eight games on the schedule. Other than Allen at Kansas City the only Mountain Division team in action is Tahoe at Florida. Here is the ECHL Today with all of the previews: https://echl.com/news/2025/02/echl-today-feb-19
EBUG. Sure could’ve used Costantini, I guess. 🤔
ReplyDeleteNot sure how Thornton is still on the roster. Despite being an affiliate, it’s hard to believe that we play him. Utah must want to make it more difficult for us to win. Not sure Richardson is the cure to our goalie ills but he’s mostly better than Thornton.
Maybe Voodoo will be our key. Hey, go Red and get a win so we can start a streak. Don’t let these KC clowns get you down. GO RED! (Voodoo doll in hand…)
He’s on IR
DeleteUnderstood. So does that make him
DeleteBetter because he’s not playing? 🤔. Not that Richardson is playing great…
Daniel Amesbury = modern day Alex Penner - a criminal, not a hockey player - hope he get's his old worthless ass hurt soon.
ReplyDeleteAre the Thrower brothers really still playing? Wow - amazing someone still pays them
Amesbury = borderline SPHL player. Thug. Someone needs to hammer him hard. He has lots of enemies. The ECHL should ban the prick.
DeleteDaniel Amesbury, how does he find time in his arson and rioting career to "play" hockey?
ReplyDeleteMax Andreev isn't even playing - LOL!!!
ReplyDeleteAndreev's last 3 games have been dismal. He might have well been suspended for those games. Unless he has found form, he's not a factor based on his last 3 games.
DeleteLet's define all the Americans players by their last three games - or their season...Same dismal results
DeleteThey just plain SUCK - no talent - no skill - Spencer just showed he is just running on frustration - not much else. Sad state these owners have you in...
I think the person meant he probably wouldn't be a factor tonight based on his last 3 games, The decisiveness on here is getting out of control. We are all frustrated with the season, let's not turn on each other.
DeleteNOTE TO ALLEN MERCHANDISE FOLKS:
ReplyDeletehttps://store.kcmavericks.com
They have legit kids jerseys! No way. #TargetMarket
Pay attention here. Lots to learn. #FIXTHEMERCHMESS
The lack of proper kids jerseys is simply icing on the cake for this season and the craziness since Costello was fired.
DeleteThat being said, most other teams have a downloadable pdf schedule ... Allen can't even figure that out.
Hoping for kids jerseys or a decent range of kids t-shirts or the like is a pipe dream at this stage.
Look at most other successful ECHL team sites and you'll see they have their marketing and merchandising in order.
Heads should roll based on this season and the outcomes delivered, especially merchandising.
Zawyer ran all of the merchandise purchases for this season and put all of the orders in at the start of the season. They chose to do little to no youth stuff.
DeleteSurafel, Maddy, and Jonny are already working with Athletic Knit to beef up the youth jersey selection for next season.
You do know the Zawyer excuse can only last so long and it sure is funny Jonny got paid all that time for doing NOTHING!
DeleteZawyer is not an excuse it’s a fact. They demolished this season from the top to the bottom, so until next season don’t expect huge changes because at this point it’s a trickle down effect.
DeleteThanks for the info. Zawyer royally screwed us based I. The fact all their other teams have plentiful youth/kids merch. Crazy how they ruined us. Retaliation for governors not allowing them full control?
DeleteZawyer blew the entire budget on a new women's collection that nobody is buying and is taking up all the space. The merchandise is purchased 6 months in advance from these manufactures. It's going to take time to get youth stuff back but I've spoken to the people in the store and leadership and it will be better next year. Quit your complaining about the merchandise, move on.
Delete"ALLEN MERCHANDISE FOLKS" ?????
ReplyDeleteThere is a person responsible for this - call them out -Johny Loser!
Allen was intentionally and willfully destroyed. The man responsible was hired by the owners then promptly left when his intended job was done.
ReplyDeleteInvestment owners were ignorant to Earnst wet dream come true and handed it to him on silver platter by dumb money. Was nothing more than a personal vendetta of one man angry about the legacy of another man and neither are currently associated with Allen but both left a legacy and the fans have paid the price.
This was a time delayed pissing match.
RIP Allen Hockey, there's just not enough hockey smarts or momey left in right places to save this. And that was the plan of one vengeful man from the start. The fact the ECHL, owners and zawyer have remained silent on this whole debacle tells you all you need to know about the future for Allen.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uhBHL3v4d3I
Agreed. The ECHL sure has been quiet, but that is because they are so deep in bed with Zawyer. I still think a lawsuit from ownership would be interesting when all of these people have to testify under oath about their part in it, along with emails revealed. At least it would show they give a damn
Deletetick tock, tick tock ......
Deletedid someone say "lawsuit" ??
Deletetick tock, tick tock .....
ReplyDelete