Practice Update, Roster Update, Individual and Team Stats Leaders and Why All the Injuries

When I arrived at the Allen Americans practice session yesterday my first thought was it was an optional practice day because there were so few players on the ice. However, there are no optional practice days when you have lost a franchise record seven straight games. A boatload of injuries and a couple of excused absences made for a practice with one goalie, eight defensemen and just seven forwards.

Goalie Jeremy Brodeur was in Toronto to attend his father's Hall of Fame induction ceremony Monday night. He caught a plane back to Allen very early Tuesday morning and would have made practice if there wasn't a 45 minute delay sitting on the tarmac because of the weather. A sleep deprived Brodeur arrived at the rink just as practice was ending. If you haven't seen Martin Brodeur's emotional induction speech here it is:

- Allen now has seven forwards out of the lineup due to injury if you count Josh Thrower who coach Martinson intended to play up front this season. Here is the list with games missed thus far.

12 games - Kevin Sundher
11 games - Chad Butcher
10 games - Josh Thrower
7 games - Casey Pierro-Zabotel
2 games - Johnny McInnis
2 games - Zach Pochiro
0 games - Dante Salituro

44 games - Total games missed by the seven forwards currently injured and this number will go much higher.

22 games - Total games missed due to injury by players back in the line up.

66 games - Grand total of games missed due to injury after just 14 games. That is an average of 4.7 players out of the lineup for every game. At the current pace Allen would miss 339 player games over the course of a full season.


- Allen has had numerous upper body injuries this season as the result of flagrant penalties. It makes you wonder if there is any connection between all of the injuries and Allen's lack of physical play. It seems like in past seasons if a player was the recipient of a cheap shot there was hell to pay with everyone willing to drop the gloves to stand up for a teammate. This season not so much. Other than the home opener against Wichita where there were four players (Josh Thrower, Dalton Thrower, Zach Pochiro, Josh Atkinson) with fighting majors the Americans have not been willing to drop the gloves. If you eliminate the home opener game, Allen has had a total of one fighting major in 13 games, the fewest in the league. This is a far cry from a typical Steve Martinson team.


- Coach Martinson said after the last home game if the third line isn't scoring it makes more sense to put together a third line that is tough to play against. I think that is what he is in the process of doing.  



INDIVIDUAL STAT LEADERS AND TEAM STATS


- I thought it might be instructive to take a look at Allen's stats leaders after 14 games. Below are the team leaders in various statistical categories with the league rank in parentheses:

Points:
14 - Braylon Shmyr (14th)
13 - Spencer Asuchak (18th)
12 - Alex Breton (26th)


Goals:
7 - Braylon Shmyr (8th)
7 - Zach Pochiro (8th)
6 - Spencer Asuchak (21st) 


Assists:
10 - Alex Breton (12th)
7 - Spencer Asuchak (41st)
7 - Braylon Shmyr (41st)
7 - Josh Atkinson (41st)


Plus/Minus: (Only one player is plus)
+1 - Adam Miller (185th)


Penalty Minutes:
62 - David Makowski (3rd)
41 - Dalton Thrower (7th)
38 - Zach Pochiro (13th)
 

Shots On Goal:
60 - Dante Salituro (2nd)
37 - David Makowski (38th) 
33 - Braylon Shmyr (67th)


Points by Defensemen
12 - Alex Breton (1st)
7 - Josh Atkinson (58th)
5 - David Makowski (30th)
5 - Joel Chouinard (30th)


Goals by Defensemen
2 - Alex Breton (16th)
2 - David Makowski (16th)
1- Joel Chouinard (44th)
1 - Eric Roy (44th)


Assists by Defensemen
10 - Alex Breton (3rd)
7 - Josh Atkinson (9th)
4 - Joel Chouinard (34th)


Save Percentage
.910 - Jeremy Brodeur (20th)
.901 - C.J. Motte (28th)



- If you can draw any conclusion from the individual stats it would be the impact offensively of three rookies and a second year player. Atkinson, Breton, Shmyr and Salituro have contributed 44 points in the first 14 games. The rest of the roster combined has 67 points. The four young players (including two defensemen) have accounted for 40% of the offense.


- Another stat from above worthy of note is goals by defensemen. So far as a group they have just six goals in 14 games. At that pace the defensemen would end the season with 30 goals. That compares to the defensemen contributing 46 goals last season and 52 goals two seasons ago.



-  Here is how the Americans rank in the ECHL in some critical statistical categories:

Goal differential - 26th (-18)
Shot differential - 25th (-95)
Average PIMS per game - 4th (20.14)
Power play - 18th (14.9%)
Penalty kill - 11th (84.3%)
Ave. goals scored - 19th (2.86)
Ave. goals against - 27th (4.14)
Ave. shots for per game - 6th (32.93)
Ave. shots against per game - 27th (39.71)
Shooting percentage - 18th (8.5%)
Team save percentage - 17th (.899)


There is not much to like in the stats above which help explain the 3-9-0-2 start by the Americans. With goals allowed the worst in the league (4.14) and goals scored ranked #19 (2.86) it is easy to see the reason for the poor results. 


- Over the first five home games the Allen Americans attendance has averaged 4110 per game. That ranks Allen #15 in average attendance. Ranked #1 is Fort Wayne averaging 8488 per game and ranked #27 is Manchester averaging 2073 per game. The leaguewide average attendance is 4284.


- Allen is 11 points behind Kansas City who is in first place in the Mountain Division with 19 points. The Mavericks have played three fewer games than the Americans.


- Four ECHL teams are tied for the fewest regulation losses (1) and three of them reside in the Mountain Division; Kansas City, Utah and Tulsa. The fourth team is Toledo.



DID YOU KNOW: The Mountain Division has three of the top five teams in the ECHL as measured by winning percentage. Here are the five ECHL teams with winning percentages above .700.

.875 - Toledo Walleye
.864 - Kansas City Mavericks
.773 - Utah Grizzlies
.769 - Adirondack Thunder
.727 - Tulsa Oilers