Whistlemania! -- Are we fixing something that isn't broken?

[ticapnews]

Re: Whistlemania! -- Are we fixing something that isn't broken?

	gp	pen	pen/gp	pim	pim/gp
2016-17	280	2061	7.36	4666	16.66
2015-16	274	1366	4.99	3111	11.35

Penalties are up almost 50% over this time last season.

The 2015-16 Arizona State squad was the most heavily penalized team, averaging 6.86 per game through seven games. This year that average would put them at #35 out of 54 teams. Only two teams had surpassed 100 penalty minutes by this time a year ago. This season Arizona State has already exceeded 200 with another 14 teams over 100.

50 of 54 teams have seen their penalties per game increase since last season, with nine teams having more than doubled. Penn State has gone up a whopping 143%.

[St. Clown]

Re: Whistlemania! -- Are we fixing something that isn't broken?

Seems like most of the calls being made aren't related to player safety at all. It's more about "slowing the game down," though anyone with a brain could tell you that teams playing 45 minutes of a 60-minute game not at full strength will do more to damage the game than clutch-and-grab defense ever could.

The way most seasons start, you see a lot of calls made by officials to keep the clutch-and-grab play from happening too much. Then players start to shape up, and the need for those calls diminish over the course of the season and the flow of the games really start to set in for the teams.

[kdiff77]

Re: Whistlemania! -- Are we fixing something that isn't broken?

I mean, I'm all for player safety. But did coaches get enough guidance from the rules people to teach their kids what to do or not to do?

Seems like most of the calls being made aren't related to player safety at all. It's more about "slowing the game down," though anyone with a brain could tell you that teams playing 45 minutes of a 60-minute game not at full strength will do more to damage the game than clutch-and-grab defense ever could.

[Yuppie Scum]

Re: Whistlemania! -- Are we fixing something that isn't broken?

I mean, I'm all for player safety. But did coaches get enough guidance from the rules people to teach their kids what to do or not to do?

[Split-N]

Much has been written and discussed on this and other forums about the enforcement crackdown (aka Standard of Play) that has seemed, at times, to make 5-on-5 hockey something of a rarity. But everything that’s been said so far is long on opinion and short on facts, so I thought it might be useful to try and convert the discussion into something quantifiable. To this end, I went back and did quick calculations of the average number of penalties (not penalty minutes) called each week and broke it down by conference. Here’s what I came up with:

Conference Comparisons: Average Number of Penalties Called per Game
(Number of games comprising each average indicated in parentheses)

Week | Atlantic | ECAC | HEA | B1G | NCHC | WCHA
Week 1 | 16.1 (8) | 23.5 (4) | 24.0 (12) | 13.4 (4) | 15.2 (7) | 17.3 (13)
Week 2 | 17.4 (5) | 19.0 (5) | *17.3 (16) | 10.3 (4) | 12.3 (8) | 15.0 (10)
Week 3 | 19.1 (16) | 18.3 (13) | 17.7 (17) | 13.1 (5) | 11.9 (9) | 13.8 (16)
Week 4 | 11.7 (4) | 13.0 (2) | 14.5 (2) | 12.0 (1) | 11.4 (7) | 12.0 (8)
Week 5 | 10.37 (6) | 17.1 (6) | 18.8 (16) | 10.7 (6) | 12.7 (8) | 12.1 (7)
Avg: | 14.9 (39) | 18.2 (30) | 18.5 (63) | 11.9 (20) | 12.7 (39) | 14.0 (54)
*Does not include an additional 20 penalties assessed at the end of the 10/7
Notre Dame-Arizona State Game

Clearly, there is a marked disparity in the way the Standard of Play is being implemented in two of the eastern conferences compared with the three western conferences. I’m not smart enough to know the reason(s) why.

If what is happening is an attempt to generate more offense, I’d rather see some legislation to reduce the ridiculous size of some of the goalie equipment before emphasizing offense at the expense of legitimate defense. I’ll be the last person on this board to defend “clutch-and-grab” tactics that unfairly penalize highly skilled players. But I really haven’t seen much of this over the last few years and, where it did happen, it tended to be penalized. So I’m left to wonder if we’re going too far with this initiative and maybe fixing something that really isn’t so broken.

I have no problem with the game officials, who have no choice but to call games the way the various conferences want them called. But I do think their bosses may need to take a step back and make appropriate mid-course corrections, at least in terms of consistency between conferences.

PS: Sorry I couldn't get the columns to line up better.