How did the Brave lift the Cup?

The Canberra Brave won their third Goodall Cup just over a fortnight ago, in their 10^th anniversary year. So what was the secret to their incredible weekend? We take a look at the numbers to pick out how they got the job done.

So, what did they do?

Goaltending stepped up. With the Brave having the luxury of splitting the weekend between Aleksi Toivonen on Friday night, and Alex Tetreault Saturday and Sunday – they used their in-net resources to their advantage.

Table 1: Canberra Brave goaltending performance, regular season versus Finals

• Toivonen went from a save percentage during the season of 0.902 to 0.976 on Friday night (stopping 40 of 41 shots)
• Tetreault had 0.891 during the season, stepped it up to 0.973, with 71 saves on 73 shots

The defence was strong over the weekend. They did allow more shots per game (allowing 38 per game at Finals, versus 31.7 during the season), but these shots largely came from less dangerous areas. Then when they did come from danger-zones, the two goalies bailed them out.

Even strength play is where they stood out as well. Conceding only one 5v5 goal all weekend (to Lucas Herrmann of the Sydney Bears).

Special teams were strong, meaning that when the Brave were short-handed they could handle it. They conceded just two goals (one of which was an own goal) on the PK, and scoring one shortie themselves – much to the abject shock of goal-scorer Matt Harvey.

When on the powerplay though, is where the Brave really shined on Sunday. Their high-passing, patient PP has had mixed results throughout the season, with a success rate of only 18.3%, but on the weekend they scored 4 goals from 15 attempts for a 26.7% success rate.

Figure 1: Canberra Brave special teams performance – regular season versus Finals

On the scoring front, a strength of the Brave all season has been the spread of players hitting scoreboard. This stayed true through the Finals weekend, with the 56.25% of points contributed by Jake Ratcliffe, Austin Cangelosi and Casey Kubara the lowest share of points contributed by the top 3 scorers of any of the six teams.

Anything go badly?

If you wanted to split hairs, they were outshot across the weekend by an average of seven shots per game. It’s hard to see that stat through the Furphy-drenched Goodall Cup.