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ddrector · 12-28-2020, 06:57 PM

[Double Media Week - Holidays Edition]

SMJHL Forward Analysis

When I saw the announcement of the double media week for the holidays I knew I wanted to write something to get some money, as I am very broke. It’s hard to maintain a decent bank account in three separate leagues. I wasn’t sure what I was going to write about and I juggled a few different ideas in my head. I thought about writing a fun piece about a crazy Whalers Christmas party, but in the end I settled on looking at the forwards in the SMJHL this season so far and seeing who has been the best. At the time I’m writing this we are almost done with the regular season as all the players have played between 40 and 46 games of a scheduled 50. I’ve decided for this article I’m going to just look at the top 10 for each stat and then we’ll see which players show up the most.

Goals:
Asclepius Perseus Flitter - 28
Zdenko Beranek - 22
Valtterri Kauppinen - 20
Yngve Simonsson - 18
Jst Maro - 17
Theo Kondos - 17
James Kimanje - 17
Freyja Hellstrom - 17
Jesse Seppanen - 17
Vincent Wolfe - 16

Flitter stands out prominently when looking at the top goal scorers as he has 6 more than the next player down on the list. He has played in 5 more games than Kauppinen, so theoretically Kauppinen could catch up if he scores a lot of goals in his last 10 games of the season compared to Flitter’s last 5, but I don’t think anyone will catch Flitter who will more than likely surpass 30 goals scored in the season by the end.

Assists:
Josh Dolphin - 29
KnockedOut byOvechkin - 27
Jst Maro - 25
Stan Q. Next - 25
Jarmo Kekalainen - 24
Mikael Koskinen - 24
Lemo Pihl - 24
Zdenko Beranek - 23
Kynwyl Pearce - 23
Slava Petrov - 23

Unlike the goal scorers this group is much more tightly bunched. I’m happy to see my own player Kobo making the list with the 2nd most assists among forwards. Lots of Centers unsurprisingly on this list. Only a couple players appear on both lists so far and that’s Zdenko Beranek and Jst Maro. I suspect those two will be at or near the top of the next list.

Points:
Zdenko Beranek - 45
Jst Maro - 42
Valtterri Kauppinen - 42
Josh Dolphin - 41
Kobo - 39
Jarmo Kekalainen - 39
Asclepius Perseus Flitter - 39
Kynwyl Pearce - 37
Yngve Simonsson - 37
Mikael Koskinen - 36
Theo Kondos - 36

As predicted the two players that appeared on both the goals and assists list were the top two points getters among forwards. I was a bit surprised to see Kauppinen come in tied for 2nd, but he just barely missed the assist list, so not that surprising. Unsurprisingly, all the players that made the top 10 Points appeared in at least one of the Goals or Assists list.

+-:
Lemo Pihl - 34
Slava Petrov - 35
Vladmir Petrov - 31
Zdenko Beranek - 23
Mikael Koskinen - 23
Kev Kevens - 21
William Salming - 20
Jst Maro - 18
Stan Q. Next - 18
Tres Sombreros - 18
Paul Binder - 18

This is a fun stat to look at, but I don’t really think it tells you who the best forwards were and more just tells you who was on the best overall teams. This list is dominated by Anchorage Armada and Quebec City Citadelles players. The majority of the players on this list don’t even appear in the other previous lists. Zdenko Beranek and Jst Maro do both appear on this list. They are both Citadelles players, so not surprising there.

PPP:
Josh Dolphin - 19
Zdenko Beranek - 18
Jst Maro - 17
Valtterri Kauppinen - 17
Mikael Koskinen - 16
Lassi Suhonen - 15
Zelma Zuntnere - 15
Hubert Andrews - 15
Euro Makinen Jr. - 14
Long John Donair - 14
Kobo - 14

I decided not to worry about PIM, PPG, or PPA. Penalty minutes are not gonna play a big factor in who the best forward is. Points in general on power plays is more important than differentiating power play goals and power play assists. I find it interesting that there are a few players on this list that haven’t made a previous appearance. That means they are elite power play scorers, but they don’t score that many points outside power plays. It’s no surprise to see Beranek and Maro near the top of this list. They have been mainstays so far. Next up I’m going to combine both Shots on Goal and Shooting Percentage together.

SOG/SH%
Asclepius Perseus Flitter - 162/17.28%
Zdenko Beranek - 141/15.6%
Liam Slate - 140/8.57%
Jarmo Kekalainen - 135/11.11%
Yngve Simonsson - 128/14.06%
Kynwyl Pearce - 125/11.2%
Zelma Zuntnere - 123/11.38%
Theo Kondos - 119/14.29%
Mikael Koskinen - 119/10.08%
Long John Donair - 118/12.71%
Valtterri Kauppinen - 117/17.09%

Flitter not only takes the most shots, but also scores at the highest rate among the players who take the most shots, which is impressive. This is the first list Maro doesn’t make an appearance and that’s probably due to Maro getting lots of assists and taking less shots. There’s a few elite scorers here that really get the puck in the net at an impressive rate. I would say anyone on this list above 14% is impressive and that’s Flitter, Beranek, Simonsson, Kondos, and Kauppinen.

Hits:
Juni Panda - 214
Kermit Murphy - 139
Niccolo Livius - 116
Raivo Helminen - 115
Daedalus James - 112
Jonathan Granstrom - 110
Jonas Caspari - 110
Jesse Seppanen - 104
Chet Hillier - 102
Friedenreich Hundertwasse - 93

Right off the bat it’s clear that Juni Panda is on a different level when it comes to getting Hits. With that many Hits also brings a ton of Penalty Minutes for Panda who currently has a staggering 135 penalty minutes. I was shocked that there weren’t that many Defensive players in this upper echelon of hitters. There were a few, but the majority of the players getting a lot of Hits are Forwards.

Giveaways/Takeaways:
Stan Q. Next - 22/36
Taisto Jutila - 17/33
Ryu Jones - 21/32
Patrik Money - 32/30
Dee Centerman IV - 32/29
Luukas Lilja - 14/26
Grape Fruit - 28/26
William Salming - 11/25
Jonathan Granstrom - 25/25
Niccolo Livius - 20/25

I wasn’t sure initially how to show these stats. If I had more time I would take all the players and figure out who had the best Takeaways - Giveaways and show those 10 players, but without that info readily available I just decided to take the top 10 players according to Takeaways and also show their Giveaways. This allows to highlight players with a lot of Takeaways, but make sure that they aren’t overvalued. For instance, both Money and Centerman are high on this list, but they both ended up with more Giveaways than Takeaways unlike a player like Salming further down the list who had an impressively low 11 giveaways.

Shots Blocked:
Kian Hamilton Jr. - 99
Xavier Doom - 93
Stan Q. Next - 88
Dwayne Gretzky - 84
Sammy Blaze - 83
Stein Nilsen - 77
Luukas Lilja - 71
Niccolo Livius - 69
Walton Stromberg - 68
Calvin Hobbes - 66

The last of the defensive minded categories is shots blocked. Some of the same names have now started becoming familiar for these defensive categories. I would expect to see more Defensive players than Forwards high on the overall list, so it’s nice to see some Forwards high on the list. Hamilton while first among Forwards was third among all players.

Well that’s all the stats I’m going to go over. After looking over everything I would say Zdenko Beranek is the current favorite for best Forward this season. There’s a few players that could sneak by him though depending on how these last games of the season go. Maro and Kauppinen are both close on Beranek’s heels and Kauppinen has played 4 less games. Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and Go Whalers! Until next time, it’s been a pleasure to serve you.

bbp · 12-28-2020, 07:16 PM

nicccccccccco

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