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Welcome back my friends to the SMJHL Quarterly Report after a roughly twenty season hiatus. It has been a fast paced season so far and we have reached the midpoint in the blink of an eye. This first segment of the Quarterly Report will be a scaled down version when compared with the show back in the day.
To begin, I would like to announce that I have recently been hired by the SMJHL awards committee.  I’m looking forward to working with this team that I am just now getting to know. With that in mind, I have decided to evaluate a selection of players who are tracking to be candidates for the Brandon Holmes trophy for the best two way forward in the SMJHL.

I thought it might be interesting to elaborate on the process that I’m using to evaluate these candidates to present them to the committee. This is in fact elaborating on a section of my application for the job. To many of us, a great defensive forward drives puck possession and puck possession in the modern game is measured largely by shot counting statistics. I have been influenced by the hockey that I have seen, and by far, I have seen more Sabres games than games played by any other hockey team in any league. Given that point of reference, I’m using some NHL players to try to extrapolate from their statistics, how to best evaluate players in the SMJHL for the Brandon Holmes award.

I’m thinking of one player in particular who is in my mind, the poster child for not relying on shot statistics too much as a proxy for puck possession. I’m looking at Evander Kane’s nhl.com puck possession statistics from 212 games from 2017 to the current season. Anyone who has seen Evander Kane play knows by the eye test that he is a physically gifted, low hockey IQ, volume shooter. He leads his team with 10.66 individual shots attempted per 60 minutes, but his offensive zone time is eighth among forwards on his team during the span at a mediocre 49.1 percent.  I compared these stats to Anze Kopitar. Kopitar’s shot attempt stats over the same period cover 306 games where his shot attempts per 60 minutes are among the bottom on his team. His offensive zone time is directly at the bottom at 45.0%. Yet, Kopitar has been nominated for the Selke three times and has won the award once. Kopitar’s measurables that actually do contribute to puck possession appear to be that he wins the majority of his face offs and leads his team in takeaways over the period, with 171. It’s interesting to note that he has given the puck away 216 times over that same span of games.

Intuitively, more hits are given by forwards when forechecking than when in either the neutral zone or in the defensive zone. I see hitting by forwards as more of an offensive statistic than a defensive one. It is used to attempt to maintain possession in the offensive zone and to wear down the opposing defense. A player who runs around head hunting too much will often take themselves out of position, hindering their ability to be considered as the top defensive forward in the game.  Kopitar is a power forward at 6’ 3” and 224 pounds, but his hits per 60 minutes over the time span being analyzed are the second lowest among forwards on his team at 1.97.   Kane, on the other hand, is not perfectly fitting into my argument, since his takeaway to turn over ratio of 131:127 is actually better than Kopitar’s over the time span. However, Kane is complying with another element of my argument by being second on his team in hits with 6.48 hits per 60 minutes. No one is going to consider Kane for the Selke.

I want to bring the discussion into the realm of the SHL/SMJHL, but I believe that I need one more Selke winner to compare. I’m choosing Aleksander Barkov, the last Selke award winner.  Barkov has decent shot percentage statistics that lead his team over the 292 games that he played in the selected time span. His individual shots per 60 minutes are in the middle of the pack among the players on his team that played at least 100 games over the span. (I had neglected to mention this additional arbitrary criteria earlier.) Barkov’s takeaway to turn over ratio of 294:224 is the best yet of the three players compared, while his hits per 60 minutes, is the lowest at 1.18.

These comparisons are anecdotal. However, except for the inclusion of Evander Kane, they are not cherry picked. From these anecdotal comparisons, I’m drawing some conclusions, perhaps with some noted confirmation bias. The best defensive forwards are well positioned disciplined players with a high hockey IQ who do not take themselves out of the play. One statistic that I overlooked was blocked shots per 60 minutes. Here we have Kopitar at 2.21, Barkov at 1.95, and the volume shooter poster child, Evander Kane at 1.18.

My SMJHL candidates will combine high takeaway to turnover ratio, high blocked shots, high plus minus statistics relative to their teammates, low penalty minutes and high defensive game ratings. From the FHM manual, the defensive game rating is described as:

An indicator of how well the player performed defensively during the game, particularly in relation to his assigned defensive and penalty killing roles. Affected mainly by successes or failures while the team is in its defensive zone or defending a rush, e.g. being on the ice when the opposing team scores a goal will bring most players the largest possible defensive score decrease, while getting a takeaway will mean a large increase.

Hits will largely be ignored, or even discouraged if there is too much aggression. Shot counting statistics will be considered, but will be given weight only as a consideration only to break ties among the players selected using the core criteria.  Now that I have established my criteria, I will scan the SMJHL for players to watch over the second half of the season. I’ll be back with that after a word from our sponsors from the defense department.





Disclaimer:  The commercials were not intended to disparage any branch of the US military. They were inserted as part of a random association with the term “defense” and were included to break up the article and make fun of the recruiting commercials often seen during televised sporting events in the US. I'm also having some fun with the friendly rivalry between the armed forces.


Since I have takeaways versus giveaways as my first criteria, my first group of players will be what I am calling:

The SMJHL Thieves Guild


Erik Andrews C NL

Andrews simply does not give up the puck. He has only one turn over so far through one half of the season. This has helped to lead him to an incredible  takeaway to turnover ratio of 16:1! Andrews is achieving this while playing only an average of 12:18 minutes per game. However, Andrews is currently inactive and may have less consideration for an award for that reason.

Stephan Gill C ANA

Gill is the leading forward in takeaways with 28, versus only 14 turnovers. Oddly, Gill has one of the lowest plus minus stats on his team at -14 despite all of his takeaways. He can’t be considered the best defensive forward with those numbers.

Strawberry Sailfish C VAN

Well, this individual must never be landlocked. I hope they are able to make it to a coastal area when they move to the SHL next season. Sailfish has a 20:12 takeaway to turnover ratio and is a plus 9 on the season so far with the very powerful Vancouver Whalers. This player will remain in the conversation.

Gordie Goodenough C REG

Goodenough combines a takeaway to turnover ratio of 15:9 with a - 5 rating on a bad team where most players have plus minus ratings in the minus double digits. He is indeed good enough to make the first cut.


The Misers

The following players have some of the lowest goals against per 60 minutes in the SHL. They simply find a way not to let the opposing team score. Since this is the whole point of defense, the following list of forwards automatically make the first cut in consideration for the Holmes. It must be noted however, that their performance is helped along by the virtue of playing for very strong teams.

Maxwell King, Tommy Tightpants and Valters Denisova of Newfoundland
Porg Garros and Andrew Jackson of Quebec
Malach Skoda, Tim Riggins and Chris McZehrl of Kelowna


The Politicians

These are the best at getting votes from the SIM engine itself, with the best average defensive game ratings supplied by FHS 6.

Miles O’Brian LW MET       - 73
Uhtred Ragnarson C VAN - 70
Mikhail Novikov C ANC     - 70
Max Manning C COL         - 70
Eric Andrews C NL           - 69
Ahlo Kysoka  C NBB         - 68
Grogu Mandosson C GFG  - 68

The Peacemakers

Those irrespective of gender who take few penalties and are disciplined players who do not engage in extreme physical play. You don’t help the goals against when you’re in the penalty box giving the opposition a power play.

Andrew Jackson 0 PIM, 3 Hits
Chris McZehrl    0 PIM, 15 Hits
Archangelo Scaradog Jr.  0 PIM, 1 Hit


The Brave and the Bruised.

These are the who are the shot blocking leaders among forwards in the SHL so far.

Bernard Metivier C DET   99
Wet Jeans          LW DET 77
Top Cheddar      RW STL 73
Lebron Brady    LW  STL 72
Conner O’Bryne C ANA   70

Blocked shots should matter to the best defensive forward conversation. However, any familiarity with the league tells us that the category is dominated by forwards who play for poor defensive teams who give up the most shot attempts. This is no knock on these players' skills. The observation is only that their numbers are inflated by the poor play of their teams.

Putting this all together:

After all this time and effort, we have a somewhat muddled mess. I’m going to need to take a step back and refine this. I’ll try to pick some players who stand out. Both Eric Andrews and Andrew Jackson show up among the leaders in at least two categories.  However, neither Andrew Jackson or teammate Porg Garros are getting significant playing time, nor are they playing on the penalty killing units.

I like Charlie Goodenough’s performance relative to the team, so he makes the second cut as well. I’m noticing that the list is very center heavy in general, so left wing Miles O’Brian stands out from the “politicians” group.  Mikhail Novokov ihad a good takeaway to giveaway ratio that could easily reach the top five before the end of the season. In addition he led his team with a plus 18 rating. Ahlo Kysoka is another strong two way candidate who fell just outside being included in the “Thieves Guild'' with a 15:10 takeaway to giveaway ratio. He was very close to being among the leaders in two defensive categories while leading his team in scoring and plus minus at the same time. I’m also adding Tim Riggins of the Colorado Knights. He has a positive takeaway to turnover ratio, leads all players for the knights including defensemen in blocked shots with 46, and is second on his team with a plus 18. That is getting the most mileage that you possibly can out of 253 TPE and less over the course of the season so far. Riggins has to be in the conversation for SMJHL rookie of the year. But, that is a conversation for another show, if indeed Riggins’ performance is even allowing there to be a conversation.

There we have it. My top five candidates for the Brandon Holmes award if the season ended today.

Eric Andrews
Charlie Goodenough
Miles O'Brian
Mikhail Novokov
Ahlo Kysoka


It’s been a long journey and I hope that anyone who has stuck with it has enjoyed it. I still have a lot to learn and look forward to another installment.

Until Then...