Friday, December 26, 2014

2014-2015 First Half Hockey East Ref Stats

The break between semesters is a good time to look back at the first half in a number of different areas. We could take a look deeper into why BU is so damn good but it's pretty obvious why they are. It begins with "J" ends with "el" along with some other big jumps in performance from some returning players as well as the play of Matt O'Connor and the freshmen in the defensive corps. We really have very little to complain about how the #1 BU Terriers are playing currently but we wanted to air our greviences so we turned to a different topic, officiating. This past fall, I calculated the average penalty minutes called in a game for each referee last season. I do realize that this lumps the two refs together who are calling the game but overall, it gives a pretty good indicator of who is calling the most penalties. There is no way to regulate how many should or shouldn't have been called in a given game but in general, I think all fans will agree that the less the officials are involved in a game the better. The numbers for this season don't surprise me at all given my opinion on each referee in the listings.

Now on to the numbers *Yes I know I don't have a life

League Average: 21.49 penalty minutes/game

The +/- indicates whether the number of penalties called are up or down since last season

1. Cameron Voss- 10 games, 29.1 penalty minutes/game,  +3.2 pms/game
2. Kevin Shea- 9 games, 23.9 penalty minutes/game,  -6.5 pms/game
3. Tom Quinn- 6 games, 23 penalty minutes/game,  -2.63 pms/game
4. Curtis Marouelli- 9 games , 22.22 penalty minutes.game, first season in HE

*See the decent refs numbers after the jump



5 .Ryan Hersey- 12 games, 21 penalty minutes/game, -6.84 pms/game
6.  Tim Low- 6 games , 20.8 penalty minutes/game, +2.75 pms/game
7. Geoff Miller- 10 games, 20.7 penalty minutes.game  -6.09 pms/game
8. Terrence Murphy- 14 games, 20.5 penalty minutes/game, N/A
9. Bob Ritchie- 7 games , 19.9 penalty minutes/game, N/A
10.  Dave Hansen- 9 games, 19.88 penalty minutes/game,  +3.28 pms/game
11.  Scott Hansen- 9 games, 19.6 penalty minutes/game, -.8 pms/game
12.  Kevin Keenan-10 games, 19.4 penalty minutes/game, -1.18 pms/game
12. Tom Fryer- 8 games, 19.4 penalty minutes/game, -0.4 pms/game
14. Jack Millea- 14 games ,19 penalty minutes/game, - 8.48 pms/game
15. Tim Benedetto - 9 games , 18.6 penalty minutes/game, -1.9 pms/game
16. Jeff Bunyon- 12 games, 18.5 penalty minutes/game,  -1.5 pms/game
17. CJ Hanafin- 7 games , 17.6 penalty minutes/game, N/A
18.  Chris Federico- 3 games 17  penalty minutes/game, -3.0 pms.game
19. Andy O'Brien- 9 games, 15 penalty minutes/game, N/A
20. Marty Hughes- 6 games , 12 penalty minutes/game, N/A
21. John Gravalese- 9 games , 11.66 penalty minutes/game,  -9.8 pms/game

Most Improved: Jack Millea/ John Gravelese

 Top Linesmen:
1. Chris Millea
2. Everybody else

Overall, the number of penalty minutes being assessed is going down which is a good trend that is consistent with a majority of the referees as compared to last season. Referees have numerous opportunities throughout the game to call penalties and the more they let go and allow the game to be played 5 on 5 is better for the quality of hockey played. Nobody wants to watch each team go on the powerplay 7 times. Then, the game turns into who has the better special teams as opposed to who has the better hockey team.

Now, obviously just saying whoever calls the least amount of penalty minutes is the best ref is not the best evaluation system. When there are clear penalties, they should be called. However, does anyone actually believe that Cameron Voss sees four more minor penalties per game than the league average? The answer is of course not but he likes to make the game about him so he calls the penalties. The fact that there are only 4 refs above the league average means that 81% of the refs that work games are calling less penalty minutes than the league average. This number should not be this high and indicates some great inconsistencies between refs. I understand that it is impossible for every ref to be consistent but I also feel like it is possible to be within 2-4 minutes on average with a few games being outliers. Below are a number of tweets that further justify the numbers that you see above. The guys with the most amount of penalties called also have the most complaints about them this season. Every ref in the complaints below are either in the top 4 of penalty minutes called or is calling more penalties than he did last season.

The average of 21.5 penalty minutes/game needs to continue to drop in the second half. As the games get later in the year, they get more important and it is crucial for these games to be called consistently. Look at the NHL playoffs where little to no penalties are called because the officials know that they do not want to get in the way of a playoff game. The refs need to let the players play and if they are unable to swallow their whistle on borderline calls, then stop giving them games in the second half.




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