Quote:
Originally Posted by Jay Random
Goal differential tells a really interesting story just now.
The four division leaders are all +60 or better. Every other team is under +40.
All four first-place teams have to be pretty heavy favourites to make the conference finals. Of course, there will almost certainly be at least one upset, as usual, but individually their odds are pretty good.
|
Actually, the odds in hockey are never really "pretty good".
In the first 8 series, there will likely be 3 upsets.
Generally, the favourites are likely to only be about a 60 % chance of winning each series, and those odds start going down the farther a team goes.
So, the chance of each division favourite advancing to the final 4 is about 36%. (60% x 60%) All 4? About 1.68% (36% x 36% x 36% x 36%).
Last year, the record of the higher seeded team in the 4 rounds of the playoff was as follows:
3-5
1-3
0-2
1-0
So, the lower seeded team won 10 of the 15 series.
If you go back to the last pre-pandemic playoff (in 2019), you'll see the exact same result, the lower seeded team won 10 of the 15 series.
That's the randomness of hockey. Generally most sports actually.