After another series going the distance, the Comets managed a game-7 win to advance to the third round of the Calder Cup playoffs.  The Comets first ever game-7 saw Jacob Markstrom out-duel the Oklahoma City Barons goaltender Richard Bachman, while Alexandre Grenier, the Canucks next power-forward, emerged from the game a hero. 

Moving on to the Calder Cup Conference final, Utica’s opponents are only looking to become tougher and tougher.  In this round, the Comets will be facing the Grand Rapids Griffins (affiliates of the Detroit Red Wings).  To see how the two teams stack up, continue past the jump.

The third round of the Calder Cup has the same format as the second round with a 2-3-2 schedule to save on travel costs.  As the Comets have won the Western Conference, they maintain their home advantage in this series and will start and end the 7-game trek with games at the Aud. 

Home ice advantage has helped the Comets as they have won the final game of their first two series at home and many of the players are citing the energy in the crowd as a huge motivating factor for themselves. 

This home advantage will not necessarily continue should both the Comets and the Manchester Monarchs make the Calder Cup finals.

For the Utica Comets, this match up is similar as it was with the Oklahoma City Barons.  The Griffins have outperfomed the Comets in terms of higher goal scoring per game, but they also have had a high team level shooting percentage and a higher team level save percentage.  They ended the season with a 102.04% PDO compared to the Comets 100.64%.

Utica outperformed the Griffins in all shot based metrics.  They have had a strong season average Estimated Fenwick Close, they outshoot their opponents by more, and they prevent shots at a better rate.  The gaps between those numbers are not that great though, so the Comets advantage here isn’t huge.  The Comets have also allowed fewer goals against per game.

Of course the team level possession numbers don’t explain how a team is performing now.  Here is their current 25-game rolling estimated Fenwick Close numbers.

The Comets started off as an elite team, lost a number of players due to recalls, and towards the end of the season Utica started to recover.  The Griffins have been a good possession team and have been fairly consistent in that facet all year long.

The trend towards the playoff is that the Griffins have been on a downward slope while the Comets continue to improve.  In team based possession and shot metrics the edge goes slightly to the Comets.

The two regular season games between the Griffins and the Comets, set nearly a week apart, were complete opposites of each other.  The first game saw the Comets play at home where they controlled possession (58.82%) and thanks to a positive PDO the Comets won 4-2.

Nearly a week later, with Utica traveling to Michigan, the Comets were dominated in possession (41.86%) and they did not get the bounces to help them either – the end result saw Utica lose to the tune of 1-5.  

The two game series saw the possession edge lean towards Grand Rapids (50.65%) thanks to a single dominant period. 

The Detroit Red Wings have been a successful team in their scouting results has allowed them to keep their farm team stock with talented young players.  Leading the way for the Griffins are a number of young players such as Teemu Pulkkinen, Andy Miele, Tyler Bertuzzi and even some younger guys further down the line up such as Xavier Ouellet and Anthony Mantha.

Pulkkinen and Bertuzzi are one of the main reason the Griffins are still in the playoffs thanks to their 13 and 6 goals in 10 and 8 games respectively.  Their goal scoring also matches a sky high and unsustainable shooting percentage of 28% and 37.5%.  The Comets will need to shut down this top line if they wish to continue to the Calder Cup final.

The Griffins also added the Red Wing’s 2014 1st round pick, Dylan Larkin, who spent the last year with the University of Michigan.  In his first year in the NCAA, he scored 15 goals and 32 assists in 35 games.  He also played for the United States at the World Championships and in the World Juniors earlier this year.  It’s unknown how much ice time he will receive, or how he will influence the team, but we know that addition is going to make the Griffins that much tougher.

On the Comets side, Carter Bancks is injured, and he has been replaced by Jake Virtanen.  It is unknown if that replacement is an improvement or hindrance to this team in the short term.  Ben Hutton has also been deemed to be so far down the depth charts that he has been shuttled to Vancouver to continue his off season training, while Ludwig Blomstrand has gone home to Sweden.

Grand Rapids has a pair of good goaltenders during the regular season but during the first two rounds Tom McCollum has been performing below playoff average.  Jacob Markstrom has also taken a step back in the playoffs but it still just above average.

In Tom McCollum’s first 3,000 shots against was an AHL replacement level goalie posting a .890 save percentage.  In the last two seasons, in the 2,292 shots he has faced, McCollum’s save percentage has jumped up to a .919.  He’s emerging as a really good AHL goaltender but Jacob Markstrom has the longer history of success and likely is the best goaltender in this match up.

Also, at one point in this season both teams had shared the same goaltender in Pat Nagle.

An area of advantage the Griffins have over the Comets is in their special teams.  During the regular season, the two teams have been nearly identical on special teams, with the Griffins placing just ahead of the Comets in both PP and PK success. 

This success has translated to the post-season where the Comets abysmal power play is currently ranked 13th with a success rate of 12.8% compared to the Griffin’s 6th ranked 22.0% success rate. 

The penalty kill is a similar situation with the Comets ranked at 9th with an 80% success rate compared to the Grand Rapid’s 4th best, 86.5% success rate.

Edge in this series for special teams goes to Grand Rapids.

Here is where the story gets interesting.  Despite the Griffins seemingly being a very strong team, that success has not necessary converted into the playoffs for themselves. 

In the first round the Griffins were facing the Toronto Marlies and they had found themselves down 0-2 in the series and losing in game 3.  Since then the Griffins have only lost 1 game.  In terms of possession against the Marlies it was not clear that the Griffins were out playing them.  In the second round, against the Rockford IceHogs, the 4th best league possession team, the Griffins were out-played. 

It seems that the Griffins have made their way through the first two rounds by PDOing their way to the top.  Their save percentage has been below average but their shooting percentage has been really high posting a 11.61% and a 12.77% team shooting percentage in rounds 1 and 2.  

If the Comets are going to win, they will have to hope their shooting percentage normalizes and their PDO finally claws its way above 98% these playoffs while shutting down the Griffins’ top scorers to lower their high shooting percentages.

It also wont help that the Griffins have been sitting, resting, recovering and recuperating for the past 2 weeks while the Comets were fighting tooth and nail with Oklahoma City.

Unlike the past two series this one is not as clear cut.  There are facets where the Comets have the advantage (possession, shot based metrics, goaltender) and there are areas where Grand Rapids have strength (PDO, special teams, top end forwards). 

We know this that it is unsustainable to keep winning with a sub-98% PDO in the playoffs.  Either it will regress and the Comets will keep winning, or they will have a lot of trouble keeping pace with a team very similar in strength to themselves.  Unfortunately we know the nature of the beast of playoffs suggest that the winner will likely be influenced by PDO in a 7 game series, and there’s no reason why Utica’s percentages can’t stay low and Grand Rapids’ can’t stay high. 

The one good facet we know is that the Griffins have been out played by two opponents who are much weaker than the Comets, and Teemu Pulkkinen isn’t going to shoot at nearly 30% forever.  Utica is the better defensive team with the better goaltender, so the Comets should be able to beat the Griffins in a tight series and move on to the Calder Cup finals.