Stats in the Wild

Tonight’s Panthers/Capitals game lasted an improbable 20 rounds, with the teams recording the following round by round outcomes (X for misses, 0 for goals)

Washington: X X X O X X O X X O O X X X X X O X X X

Florida: X X X O X X O X X O O X X X X X O X X O

Estimating the likelihood of a shootout reaching 20 rounds is actually fairly straightforward, provided that you make some reasonable assumptions.

Assumption 1: The save percentage for each goalie is 67%.

For starters, the overall NHL save rate on shootouts is about 67%. And while I have made the point that not all NHL goalies are created equal in terms of stopping shootout attempts, in this game, both Florida goalie Roberto Luongo (67.3% save rate) and Washington counterpart Braden Holtby (66.0%) are nearly identical to…