08-06-2021, 11:54 AM(This post was last modified: 08-06-2021, 12:06 PM by CptSquall.)
The Anaheim Outlaws came into the playoffs after finishing just barely in the bottom half of the conference, despite a winning record on the season. The team started off strong before entering an absolutely brutal losing streak towards the end of the regular season. But the post season offers a chance at redemption as they face off against Maine in the opening round. Maine comes into the postseason tenth in the league with a .333 win percentage and a dismal -97 goal differential. Hopes were high in the Anaheim locker room that we could turn things around and pick up a series win. The sim had other ideas.
The Outlaws would lose in seven games to Maine, with two of the four losses coming in extra time. Goalie Zhen Roza played all seven games for the Outlaws, allowing an incredible 1.17 goals per game and saving over 95% of shots faced. This is particularly impressive, considering that both of those stats are significantly better than Roza’s performance was during the regular season. During the season, Roza was the netminder for 26 wins and 26 regulation losses, with an additional 5 OT losses factored in. Zhen’s save % was .911, which while still impressive isn’t quite .952. Similarly, Roza’s GAA fell dramatically from 3.23 in the regular season to the playoff mark of 1.17. That level of stepping up one’s game is exactly what you want to see from your key players, particularly the ones in net. It was an impressive performance, truly.
Jeziak lead the team in points during the regular season, wracking up a team leading 31 assists during the campaign. The playmaking winger did his best to keep this up during the postseason. Jeziak continued to make a difference during the post season, leading the team in points with 4. Again, most of those came on assists. Where I thought the Outlaws were strong during the playoffs, though, was that they managed to spread their scoring around. Instead of relying on a few key playmakers to make things happen, they had 11 different players score goals, with only Jonathan Hagan, the defenseman, scoring more than one goal in the series.
I suppose there are a couple ways you can look at it. You could say that Maine did an excellent job shutting down playmakers like Jeziak and Cheddar, who had 18 and 17 goals respectively during the regular season but only combined for 2 in the playoffs. If you compare that to Maine, you’ll see that they had only 8 individual players who scored during the playoffs, but three of those players managed to notch more than one goal. The alternative perspective is that Anaheim managed to find some incredible depth scoring and get a lot of individual players involved in the offensive game. With the incredible goaltending going on behind them, getting that much involvement in the offensive zone seems like a tremendous recipe for success.
Unfortunately for the Outlaws, it wasn’t enough. After cruising to a 3-1 victory in the first game, the Outlaws would manage only 9 goals in the remaining six games of the series. Their inability to score goals when it counted was a crushing blow. Five of those six final games in the series came down to a single goal, and most of the scoring came in a 4-0 domination that kept the series alive and sent us to game seven. The Outlaws just couldn’t manage to get a goal when it counted in close games. It was feast or famine and not a whole lot in between.
ephenssta
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