It is out of the frying pan and into the fire for the Allen Americans who open a three game series in Idaho tonight after being swept at home by Kansas City over the weekend. Seven straight games against two of the best teams in the ECHL. Idaho has proven to be a difficult opponent for the Americans. Allen has lost to the Steelheads in 13 of the last 15 times the teams have played. The two wins however, both came in Idaho. One was in the playoffs last season and the other on opening night this season.
- As you would anticipate when a team with a record of 8-2 plays a team with a record of 3-7 the stats heavily favor Idaho. The Steelheads have scored 20 more goals than the Americans (50 vs 30) and allowed 12 fewer goals than Allen (35 vs 47). Here are a few other comparisons:
- Idaho takes more shots per game than Allen (38.40 vs 26.90) and allows fewer shots per game (29.70 vs 44.40)
- Idaho scores more goals per game than Allen (5.00 vs 3.00) and allows fewer (3.50 vs 4.70)
- Idaho has the better power play (24.4% vs 22.2%) and penalty kill (81.3% vs 76.9%).
- Idaho's team plus/minus is +66, Allen's is -74.
- Idaho's 3rd period scoring differential is +4 with 15 goals scored and 11 allowed.
- Allen's third period scoring differential is -11 with nine goals scored and 20 allowed.
- If you are looking for bright spots there are a few:
- Allen's three wins this season have come on the road. The road record is 3-2.
- Allen's team save percentage is better than Idaho's (.894 vs .882).
- Allen is ranked #3 in the ECHL with three shorthanded goals, all came against Idaho.
- Allen's road power play percentage (23.5%) is better than Idaho's home percentage (16.0%).
- Allen got some good news on Monday when the Chicago Wolves (AHL) assigned Hank Crone to Allen. The reigning ECHL MVP and also the reigning 3ICE MVP arrived in Allen in time to fly with the team to Idaho. Adding a player as dynamic as Crone who had 49 goals and 105 points for the Americans last season will be a big help. There is little doubt in my mind you will see Crone reunited with Colton Hargrove on the top line tonight. They have great chemistry together and combined for 88 goals last season.
- Also arriving in Allen in time to accompany the team to Idaho is forward Solag Bakich. The Dallas native was acquired from Reading in a trade. Bakich played high school hockey for Highland Park, spent four seasons in the USHL and played his collegiate hockey at the University of Notre Dame. Last season after finishing his collegiate career, Bakich signed with Reading and played in 12 games and had 10 points (3G, 7A). Here is a link to a video interview where Backich shares his growing up in Dallas, his junior career and his desire to play hockey at Notre Dame. https://www.facebook.com/bismarckbobcats/videos/466143661499188/
- The injury bug continues to bite the Americans. The latest addition to the list is recently acquired defenseman Justin Allen. In the three game series against Kansas City, Justin had a goal, six shots and was a +1. He did not make the trip to Idaho.
- Here is the group that made the trip to Idaho:
GOALIES
- #31 Mark Sinclair
- #35 Chase Perry
DEFENSEMEN
- #4 Kris Myllari
- #5 Stanislav Demin
- #16 Brayden Crowder
- #20 Eric Williams
- #22 Matthew Sredl
- #52 Dalton Gally
FORWARDS
- #7 Colton Hargrove
- #9 Chad Butcher
- #11 Brandon Yeamans
- #14 Jordan Ty-Fournier
- #18 Easton Brodzinski
- #19 Brandon Puricelli
- #21 Matt Marcinew
- #23 Solag Backich
- #26 Spencer Asuchak
- #29 Colby McAuley
- #67 Hank Crone
- Allen split the two games it played in Idaho to start the season. Allen won the first game 5-2 despite being outshot 45-19. Leevi Merilainen led the Americans to victory with 43 saves in the best goalie performance of the season. Idaho won game two 8-5 despite giving up a power play goal and two shorthanded goals to the Americans. A key to this series as always is special teams play. If Allen can play special teams like it did earlier in the season against Idaho they will earn some points. The totals for the two games to open the season was Allen 2-9 (21.0%) on the power play with three shorthanded goals. Idaho was 1-12 (8.3%) on the power play and surrendered three shorthanded goals.
- Allen is one of four ECHL teams with a losing record when scoring first. The Americans record when scoring first is 2-3 compared to Idaho's 5-1 record when scoring first. As usual, Allen doesn't want to play from behind against the Steelheads.
- Here is the game preview issued by the Allen Americans: https://allenamericans.com/news/2023/11/game-day-preview-americans-open-series-in-boise-tonight
- If you are a stats geek and can't get enough of opponents stats, check out this Idaho Weekly which has all the detail you need to to get prepared for the series with the Steelheads: https://idahosteelheads.com/news/2023/11/idaho-steelheads-weekly-week-4-111423
OTHER COMMENTS
- Atlanta lost to Greenville 2-1 yesterday after an 8-0 start to the season. Five ECHL teams have points percentages of .800 or higher. Another reminder of just how difficult Allen's schedule is to start the season. 11 of the Americans first 13 games of the season are against teams on this list. Six of Allen's seven losses this season have come against these teams.
- .900 - Trois Riviéres
- .889 - Atlanta
- .833 - Kansas City
- .800 - Idaho
- .800 - Greenville
- The NHL general managers have discussed changing the 3-on-3 overtime rules. Since the ECHL usually adopts the rule changes made in the NHL/AHL this is something to keep an eye on. The interest is to limit teams from continually looping back and regrouping. Potential solutions include once you cross the red or blue line you can't go back out again or implementing a shot clock. Discussions are ongoing and will be taken up again in March.
- There are five games on the ECHL schedule today, two of them are morning games. Here is the ECHL Today with the previews: https://echl.com/news/2023/11/echl-today-nov-15
Kris Myllari leads (tied) all ECHL defensemen in power play points (7) and power play assists (6). Myllari leads the Americans in assists (8) and is third in points (9).
DID YOU KNOW: The ECHL Stats post today is about wins to start the season. FYI, the Allen franchise record for wins to start a season is seven, set back in 2010-11. The most wins to start the season since joining the ECHL is three in 2017-18.
Idaho 6-2 SOG Idaho 46 - Allen 22 - Hank= wishing he was a healthy scratch with the Wolves....
ReplyDeletecostello - 12 more games...
DeleteI’ve said before I’m giving Costello 5 more games to string together back to back wins, or sign the Hanson brothers, or I’ll have to chill out on my consumption of Allen hockey. Those 5 games were supposed to include the 0-3 weekend they just had, but since Idaho is the league Juggernaut and Crone is back in, I’ll start the 5 games now… might also want to call and beg Jack Combs to come back as well cause they need all the offense they can get to makeup for awful defensive play.
ReplyDeleteDude, you have no clue what you’re talking about. You could bring in any NHL D-Man and it wouldn’t make a difference. Anyone who has ever played hockey can clearly tell that our forwards need to learn how to play in the d-zone. We need to breakout as a 5 man unit and attack as a 5 man unit, like the good teams (FL,ID, ATL) not just throw it up to players who refuse to backcheck. Jumbo won’t fix the problem. Time to get younger not older, time for the coaches to start coaching systems and not play favorites.
ReplyDeletedUdE, I did play hockey through high school. I bet you took the Hanson brothers comment to heart too, huh?
DeletePosted that comment too soon, my b…. My point was, if the team is unable to play defense, then they would need to be able to out score their opponents in high scoring games. Mentioning Jack Combs was a reference to his point production which in theory would aid the teams point production in lieu of all around bad defense. This all bring tongue in cheek… but I don’t expect you to understand sarcasm.
Delete