LCS Hockey - Putrid Power Plays Perturb Teams

Putrid Power Plays Perturb Teams
by Jim Iovino, Ace Reporter

Remember the days when the Pittsburgh Penguins juggernaut of the early 1990s often flirted with a 35-40 percent rating on the power play?

Well if you don't, too bad bucco, because numbers like those won't be put up again in the NHL any time soon.

That's right. The mediocrity of the NHL has even affected the power play units of most teams. The power play was once reserved for the league's elite players. In their heyday, the Penguins could easily scare the opposition into submission by sending out the big guns. Mario Lemieux, Jaromir Jagr and Rick Tocchet up front, with Ron Francis and Larry Murphy at the points. All Super Mario had to do was sneeze and the red light would go on. The Penguins' power play unit was automatic.

But in today's NHL, playing with the man-advantage just doesn't seem so threatening. The power play unit the Penguins send out on the ice these days is a far cry from those in years gone by. Today Jagr is still working his magic down low. But in place of Lemieux is Stu Barnes. Tocchet could be several players, from Martin Straka all the way down to former IHL supastar Rob Brown.

But at least Penguin fans can be thankful that they still have Jagr on ice. Thanks to expansion, most teams would kill just to find players who can make two consecutive passes without falling over, let alone a player of Jagr's caliber who can weave his way through traffic and score with ease.

Power-play efficiency has gone down significantly since the early 1990s. As a matter of fact, the current trend seems to be that the overall power-play percentage in the NHL is slipping by about one percentage point per year.

In 1996-97, the average power play in the league scored on 16.3 percent of its chances. Last season the number dropped to 15.1 percent. This season the downward spiral has continued through the early portion of the season, with the average power play scoring just 14.4 percent of the time (through Oct. 22).

This year's figures have to be quite puzzling to league officials. After all, the league did a lot over the off- season to help increase scoring in the league. Power plays were supposed to get a big boost by the extra room to maneuver in the offensive zone. More room was added behind the goal line. In order to do that without taking away some very expensive seats around the rink itself, the neutral zone was shortened to make up the difference.

In theory, the extra room gives skilled players more space to conjure up some magic. But this theory left out one key factor - thanks to expansion, the skill players in the league are now spread more thin than they used to be. Since these skill players have less talent around them per team, they have fewer quality shooters to pass to and fewer gifted playmakers to get them the puck.

If you watch a power-play unit in the NHL today, you'll rarely see two or three clean passes in a row from tape-to-tape. One-timers are as rare as a San Jose win. And end-to-end rushes, well, who can remember the last time someone made one of those?

Power-play opportunities are ideal situations for the game's great players to display their talents. Unfortunately, great players are few and far between. Never will a team like the offensively gifted Pittsburgh Penguins of the early 90s be assembled again so it can work its magic on the power play. There are too many teams in the league and not enough superior talent to go around. And even more unfortunate is the fact that the talent level will decrease even more as the league backs its way into the new millenium.

Increase the rink to twice its original size, put eight players on the ice per team at one time...no matter what you do to increase scoring, you won't be able to recreate the two essential components desperately needed - talent and skill.