Snapshot comparison of analytics use from Ruff, Hitchcock

DallasNews.com’s Mike Heika relays some July comments from Stars bench boss Lindy Ruff on specific instances of how he’ll use analytics, and where coaching experience itself comes in for him.

 “I like looking at those numbers. I like looking at scoring chances. I like looking at our entries and the other team’s entries. There are a lot of things you look at after the game on the video to confirm what you’ve seen,” Ruff said. “But I also know that when I’m watching a game, I know a player’s last five shifts and I know what he’s been doing and I can assess quickly how I want to use him. Information is always good - accurate information - but I also know that watching the game and reacting to what’s going on, it’s tough to react in a timely manner and use information at a time when you might need it most. I think you have to have a combination of preparation with the information and then the ability to react during a game.”

As a point of somewhat broad comparison, Ken Hitchcock offered this last month on how he tends to employ advanced stats.

"I think you've got to be careful that you don't get overwhelmed by it. There's good information there. I use it specifically for match-ups and I use it for chemistry. So each coach uses it differently. I use it for what I consider are good match-ups and bad match-ups and I use it - it's very helpful for me on my own in-house chemistry. So, you know, these three guys don't work well together, whereas if you put this guy with these same two guys it works well together.

"There's great analytics that can really help you there. But as far as scoring chances, and all that stuff, I don't use it that much. I want to eyeball that.

"One area that's going to come, I think every team is going to use it in the next couple of years, and that is the starting points of your players. Because there's great analytics that when certain players start in certain situations, on the ice, faceoff dot-wise, they have very - a higher level of success or a higher level of failure. And I think that's information you can get and that's very helpful in how you place your players on the ice, when you put them out, and what their success ratio is. So I think that's the part of analytics that it wouldn't surprise me in the next couple of years everybody is using."

Source: Mike Heika, DallasNews.com

Source: Nichols’ Notes