(Courtesy http://graphzoo.tumblr.com)

Welcome back to another week of hockey related analytics links. I think The best way to develop your own research is to learn what other people are working on. With that in mind, here are a collection of links from the last week to help you think of new ideas. Or just to kill a slow day of reading at work. 

This week we have a look at why zone entries matter, why penalties in game sevens aren’t called, why trading Evgeni Malkin would be a bad idea for the Penguins and much more. Take a look after the jump.

Here’s our list:

• Various experts in their respective fields all define what exactly analytics are in the context of sports usage [Sports Analytics Blog]
• Joe Delessio writes an opinion based piece on the use of analytics within the NHL [Sports on Earth]
• Manny reviewed the 2013/14 Binghamton Senators in the AHL using a number of different AHL analytics [the 6th Sens]
• Ryan Stimson looks at why “Setup Passes” are unreliable using the context of the 2013/2014 New Jersey Devils [In Lou We Trust]
• Our own Dimitri Filipovic looks at both analytics and systems in analyzing just why Zone Entries matter in the context of the Anaheim Ducks [Sporting News]
• Nate Silver looks at the lack of penalties being called within game 7s in the playoffs [FiveThirtyEight]
• Travis Yost looks at the power play usage of Chris Neil on the Ottawa Senators and highly suggests the experiment stops [Hockey Buzz]
• Thats_Offside releases results on both the OHL and WHL Quality of Competition for the most recent season.
• Nick Emptage does great work daily dealing with predictions of games and series and analyzes why teams lose.  Most recently he has looked at how team’s systems can effect their PDO [Puck Prediction]
• Benjamin Wendorf looks at the issue of regression and stabilization within a player’s shooting % [Hockey Visualized]
• James Mirtle looks at the issue of size in players in the NHL and using the Habs to show that size doesn’t really matter [Globe and Mail]
• Arik Parnass looks at why teams who score first win more often [Habs Eye on the Prize]
• Robert P looks at some of the underlying numbers from the recent Kings v. Ducks series [Jewels from the Crown]
• Rob Vollman looks at the top shutdown players in the playoffs so far using a slideshow format [Bleacher Report]
• As part of the potential tearing down of the Pens, Rhys J looks at the usage of Malkin and why trading him would be bad idea [Thats Offside]
• Jared Sexton address the many labels that Rick Nash has been given these playoffs by addressing his scoring [Rangers Unlimited]
• A few comparisons between Toews being better than Crosby have been making their way around twitter this week.  Tyler Dellow addresses this to not be true [Sports Net]
• The Department of Hockey Analytics also weighs into the debate [DoHA]
• Pensburgh weighs into the issue of Bylsma being “out-coached” by A.V. [Pensburgh]
• While everyone is talking about the Boston Model, the Chicago Model and the Detroit Model, few people are addressing the elusive Buffalo Model [WGR 550]
• Chris Boyle introduces some really interesting goalie analytics looking at the mediocre play of Lundqvist [Sports Net]
• Chris Boyle also wrote about the adjustments to the Habs system and how it has improved their overall play [Sports Net]
• Gus Kataros released a “close” analysis of Jason Spezza [McKeen’s Hockey]

There’s also some work that is not directly hockey analytics but are in related side fields that still may inspire your own work with new methods and approaches.

• Xu et Harvey look at the “Hot Hand” within gamblers and the fallacy that it exists in online gaming.  This has been applied to works in Basketball and likely has similar results for hockey [Science Direct]
• A Study out of UBC looked at the age NHL players peaked using +/-.  While they manage to cite some popular works in this area they come to the conclusion that players peak at 29 which differs from many other works which suggests it is closer to mid-20s [UBC]
• Knowmkt shows how analytics is a growing field within the sports management side of the house (no surprise there) [Knowmkt]
• J. Weissbock (that’s me) recently published a paper on using textual pre-game data to predict within the NHL and touches on the issue of an upper bound within hockey and sports predictions [Springer]

That’s it for this week!  Hopefully it keeps you busy.  If you find anything interesting, or if you write something, send it my way and I will include it next time!