US Div Seasons on the Rise

The US division of WHL has quite a following and I have proof.  I was going over the attendance averages for the past season and the average attendance seems to be another good season for the teams south of the border.  The chart below has the seasons average for the past 5 years.

                           2008          2009          2010          2011          2012

Everett               6425          6030           5701         5807           5278
Spokane             6557          6656           6453         6439           6643
Seattle                4082          4181           3853         4096           4206
Tri City              4245          4424           4480         4702           4653
Portland             4460          3648           4437         5594           6075

The most interesting part of the data is that the worst attendance season for the division was 2010 with an overall average for all 5 teams being 4,984.8.  The 2012 season was best attendance season for the division for the past 9 years with an average of  5,371 people attending the games.

Son Of a Goal

Courtesy WHL.ca

The stats would suggest that Calvin Pickard is an average goalie, but if you have seen him play, you know, that he is a goal tender destined to follow his brother to the NHL.

Night in and Night out Calvin faces more than 30 shots per game.  He has shown his face in 32 games, and taken 1163 shots so far.  Now lets compare, Tyler Bunz of the Medicine Hat Tigers has played 35 games and faced 37 fewer shots, or Luke Seimens of the Moose Jaw Warriors who has played 32 games and faced 280 fewer shots.  Tyler and Lukes' stats are a close sampling of the level of play Calvin has been tasked to face when he steps out on the ice.  What dose this suggest?  Defense

Seattles Defense is iffy at best, the boys rarely go down to defend a shot for their goalie.  T-birds D-men's sticks are always in both hands while behind the blue line, nor are using they busy stick technique to defend their zone, nor to do they dig in while occupying the natural zone.  The D-men are willing to place the W on Calvin's Shoulders who routinely takes home one of the 3 stars of the game.

The Defensive end must increase their intensity to seek the puck.   They are the first string net minders, and winning those one-one battles are what keeps the puck out of the blue ice.