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10 Wild Stats Through the First Two Rounds

The first two rounds of this year's playoffs are over and round 3 has just begun. With this being the midway point of the playoffs, I figured this might be a good time to take a look at some of the stats so far. While I'm sure there there are plenty of other crazy stats, these 10 just happened to jump out at me. Note that I tried to stay away from the really obvious ones (e.g. Marc-Andre Fleury sucks!), although a couple were just too impressive to leave out.

81.7% – Derek Stepan's Sedin-esque offensive zone start percentage through 14 playoff games. A number of players who played in just one or two games have higher zone start ratios than Stepan, and Tomas Holmstrom even has 86.4% (in 5 games), but while doing it in just a few games is one thing, being constantly deployed in the offensive zone that much over a long period of time is pretty incredible.

16.4% – Sean Couturier's offensive zone start percentage through his team's 11 playoff games. Again, a handful of other players have more extreme numbers, including Manny Malhotra's 7% (in 5 games) and Couturier's linemate Max Talbot's 11.7%, but to put up a number like 16.4% offensive zone starts as a rookie in the playoffs is nothing short of spectacular. It shows what an incredible amount of confidence the Flyers' coaching staff has in him too.

22.33 – Marc Staal's 5-on-5 ice time per 60 minutes. This is up from Staal's regular season average of 16.96 minutes/60 at 5-on-5, which was 3rd on the team. Stall played more than 3 minutes/60 fewer than Dan Girardi and Ryan McDonagh during the regular season and was slightly ahead of Michael Del Zotto. In the playoffs though, Staal's 5-on-5 ice time is second among all players remaining in the playoffs (McDonagh is first), more than a minute higher than Dan Girardi's 5-on-5 average, and almost 6 minutes higher than Michael Del Zotto's 5-on-5 TOI/60. When the chips are down, we know who Tortorella trusts. It's McDonagh and Staal. Or, for those more cynical than I, maybe it's just not Michael Del Zotto and Anton Stralman. And definitely not Stu Bickel.

54% – The percentage of 5-on-5 goals against (not including empty net goals) that Chris Kreider has been on the ice for. The Rangers have given up 13 such goals since Kreider joined the lineup and Kreider has been on the ice for 7 of them. And he's managed to do it with a TOI/60 of just 11.41 through 12 games and a 73.8% offensive zone start ratio. Talented kid, but the Kreider hype might have been a bit premature.

4.07 – Dustin Penner's points per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 through the first two rounds of the playoffs, the highest of any player remaining in the playoffs and more than triple his regular season average of 1.25.

10 – The number of points Dustin Penner needs in order to equal his entire regular season production. Not to pick on Penner too much, but if the Kings reach the Stanley Cup Finals Penner has a very real chance of surpassing his season totals.

4 – The number of Phoenix Coyotes with a positive Corsi On rating. Marc-Antoine Pouliot and Gilbert Brule, two former Oilers who have become NHL journeymen, lead the way with Corsi ratings of 15.65 and 14.94, shredding the easy minutes. Daymond Langkow (3.27) and Kyle Chichura (0.69) are the other two. The Coyotes' Fenwick scores tells more or less the same story, so it's not like they're just blocking a ton of shots. With numbers like that it's pretty amazing that this team is in the conference finals.

94.7% – Jonathan Quick's overall save percentage. As if that wasn't impressive enough on its own, it's also his shorthanded save percentage. Wowsers. Mike Smith sports a .946 save percentage both overall and on the penalty kill too. The only goalie better than them was Cory Schneider, who somehow managed to lose two out of the three games he started despite only letting in four goals.

8.6 – The amount of time per game that the L.A. Kings spent playing 5-on-4, over 12% more than the next closest team. The Kings' opponent in round 3, the Phoenix Coyotes, average just 5.1 minutes/game at 5-on-4.

8.6 – Roman Hamrlik's relative corsi rating, best among Capitals' defensemen. Hamrlik was on the ice for 11 goals for at even strength compared to just 3 goals against. Hamrlik's only been playing second tough competition and second tough zone starts, and yeah his PDO is pretty high, but c'mon…the old man's still got it.

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