Goaltenders...By The Numbers

Here's a look at the numbers put up so far from Joel Quenneville's favorite position: the goalie. Note that all these stats are tabulated by hand (well, with Excel), so there may be some minor discrepancies with the NHL stats.

Collectively, the three Colorado goaltenders - Peter Budaj, Jose Theodore and Tyler Weiman - have...

• .893 Save Percentage
• 2.98 GAA

Individual Save %:

• Budaj .893
• Theodore .879
• Weiman 1.000

Individaul GAA:

• Budaj 3.12
• Theodore 2.97
• Weiman 0.00

The 3 goalies have faced 254 shots or 28.2 per game. It breaks down by period as follows:

• 1st: 79 (8.8 avg)
• 2nd: 85 (9.4 avg)
• 3rd: 86 (9.6 avg)
• OT: 4

Defensively, the Avs are the best in the first period, and start to slip as the game goes on. That shouldn't be all that shocking to anyone familiar with the team - they are kind of known to start out hard and fade from there.

So, if that's true, why have the Avalanche been behind so early lately? Well, although the shots are lower in the 1st, the goals allowed haven't:

• 1st: 10 goals allowed (.878 Save %)
• 2nd: 10 goals allowed (.882 Save %)
• 3rd: 7 goals allowed (.919 Save %)

Looking at those numbers, the goaltending starts off weak and  gets better as the game goes on. Add in the one OT game, and the Avalanche goalies have a .922 save percentage in the 3rd period. If they could get a bit better start in the 1st period, we might be looking at a few more W's in the standings.

I can't do a statistical review without picking on Theodore. Here's the Theo Roller Coaster by the numbers, period by period:

• 1st: .800 Save %
• 2nd: 1.000 Save %
• 3rd: .840 Save %
• OT: 1.000 Save %

Yes, that's correct: In even-numbered periods, Theodore is PERFECT (21 shots and he's stopped them all). Unfortunately, in the odd-numbered periods, his save % is a dreadful .822. I'd suggest that the team start some in-game platoon, but Budaj has actually been rather consistent throughout:

• 1st .908
• 2nd .899
• 3rd .868

Of course, anyone not named Joel Quenneville already knew that Budaj was the more consistent of the two. Now we have some numbers to help back that up.