NHL Season Analysis: How Game Metrics Change Over a Season
Quite often I find myself thinking - does the game evolve during regular season? It would make sense that there are less goals towards the end of the season, more penalties in the first months of the season, and so on. Also one thing that at least I hear quite often, is that youngest players typically have good start to the season, which is followed by less productive period after 20-25 games. If the game really evolves within a season, that should be visible from the data. Game statistics I took the data starting from season 2010-2011 (excluding the seasons 19-20 and 20-21, since they had special schedules), and plotted average numbers from regular season games by game ranges (Games 1-10, 11-20, etc.) So let's take a look at the results, starting with numbers that stay consistent through the season. What stays the same Looks like that amount of goals, shots on goal, blocks, takeaways and average goal difference of game stays fairly consistent, although there seems to...