You Gotta Score First - Part One

Every year, I always go through the Canada West women's hockey gamesheets to determine the importance of scoring first. In 2021, the Alberta Pandas ran the table as they went 16-0-0-0 when scoring first which is an impressive feat on its own. I'll spoil the surprise right now: no team went all regulations wins this year, but there were some impressive records posted by a few teams. Overall, the trend will remain true in that teams who score first in Canada West generally find success, but not every team followed that rule this year.

I'll note here that Game #103 on January 27, 2023 between the Calgary Dinos and the Mount Royal Cougars was the Crowchild Classic played at the Scotiabank Saddledome, and those two teams battled through 70 minutes with no goals. The game would be won in the shootout by the Cougars by a 1-0 score, but there clearly wasn't a first goal scored in the game with both teams unable to find the back of the net.

The other 125 games played did have a first goal scored, though, so we can talk a lot about those statistics. Overall, teams who scored first went 84-20-11-10 - that's a .800 points percentage! If you want an easier way to think about it, Canada West teams that scored first had an 80% chance of recording at least a point in those games. When it comes to two-point games, teams that scored first won 95 of 125 games - a 76.0% chance of winning the game! That's incredible!

One of the things we always see is that teams are still working things out in October as the season starts, and the record for scoring first certainly reflected that as teams that scored the opening goal in the season-opening month were 22-10-4-2. If you're doing the math, that means that teams were 62-10-7-8 from November to February, so that first month is where it seems teams can't quite build upon on early lead. Nonetheless, the other months saw November having a record of 23-4-4-1, December was 5-0-1-2, January was 21-4-2-4, and February was 13-2-0-1.

Taking a deeper look into that October record of 22-10-4-2, road teams were a rather brutal 4-7-3-2 when scoring first in October while home teams were 18-3-1-0. Clearly, playing at home and having that last change in October really helps when it comes to building on a lead. Two of the four wins were recorded by the Mount Royal Cougars which partially explains their hot start last season, but they also dropped an overtime decision.

Expanding on that idea of home and road records, scoring first at home led to a 47-9-5-1 record - an .847 points percentage - while road teams compiled a 37-11-6-9 record - a .754 points percentage. When you consider that 4-7-3-2 record in October, it's rather impressive that road teams went 33-4-3-7 over the final four months of the season. Nevertheless, scoring first whether at home or on the road led to points in four out of every five games. That helps when pushing for a playoff spot!

When it comes to when these goals are being scored, 72% were scored in the first period (90), 24% came in the second period (30), 3.2% were scored in the third period (4), and there was a lone overtime goal scored as the first goal of the game for a 0.8% mark. It should be noted that 20% of the goals came on the power-play (25) while 3.2% were scored shorthanded (4). And if you're curious, Elizabeth Lang of the Calgary Dinos scored that overtime goal against the Saskatchewan Huskies in Saskatoon on October 8 at 2:13 of double-overtime.

Tomorrow, we'll look at the individual team statistics when it comes to scoring first. I can tell you that one team had eleven different scorers register the first goal in game, and that team did very well. I can also tell you that another team had eight different scorers notch the first goal, and they missed the playoffs. I'll break down each team's fortunes based on them scoring first, and we'll see who was able to build on leads and who couldn't find enough offence to make wins happen.

I cannot stress this enough, but scoring first matters in Canada West. It has mattered every year since I started tracking this statistic, and the trend shows that teams that score first most often usually end up winning most often. It's not quite that simple when it comes to everything that goes on in a game, but getting out in front is better than trying to play catch-up in any game.

It's pretty clear that the numbers don't lie.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!