Toronto Maple Leafs: Ilya Samsonov Has Earned the Net for the Playoffs

The Toronto Maple Leafs have three goalies that you can trust, and that’s a great luxury that most teams don’t have, due to the NHL rules that prevent teams from hiding players who deserve to be in the NHL in the minors

The Toronto Maple Leafs 3rd stringer is Joseph Woll, who is the best goalie in the entire world not currently in the NHL.  That is, he’s the current best statistical goalie, and his numbers this year combined between the NHL and AHL are amazing.

Keep in mind that goalies are mercurial and unreliable, not to mention unpredictable, capricious and volatile.  Outside of Vasilevskyi and Hellebuyck, with Sorokin and Shesterkin threatening to join them, there are no goalies in the entire world whose performance can be predictable.

Would anyone have been more excited last summer if the had signed Linus Ullmark rather than Ilya Samsonov? Nope, because no one could have predicted that Ullmark would suddenly become an elite goalie, just as no one can predict whether or not he’ll continue to be one (most likely he won’t).

But let’s turn our eye towards Samsonov

Toronto Maple Leafs Staring Goalie for the Playoffs: Ilya Samsonov

The NHL has 32 teams, so I set the minimum minutes for the follow exercise at 1330 to give us 32 goalies to look at.

Samsononv has played 1500 minutes in 33 games (the rest of the Leafs games have been split between Kalgren, Woll, and Murray), making him the 24th most used goalie in the NHL this year.

His 5v5 save percentage is ranked 11th, with an impressive .924. (His .915 overall ranks him 10th).

His 5v5 2.11 GAA is 5th best while his 2.41 overall is 8th best.

Samsonov’s high-danger save percentage is .898, and is the best in the NHL.  This is likely the most important goalie statistic because it is the most repeatable and the least luck-based.   Pretty much all NHL capable goalies should save every single low-danger shot, so low-danger save percentage has been shown to fluctuate wildly throughout a goalies career.

One of the main reasons goalie performances are unpredictable is because of the fact that the vast majority of the shots they face are low danger, and their performance as to those shots is, if not random, then at least highly volatile.

The fact that Samsonov leads all goalies in high-danger save percentage means that he’s having an excellent season and should be the Toronto Maple Leafs starter for game one.

This should supersede Matt Murray’s experience and Cup Rings. (stats naturalstattrick.com).

Since most voters will lean on raw numbers and wins, the chances of Samsonov being the runner up to slam-dunk Vezina Winner Linus Ullmark are low, but he does deserve that honour.

He has been the NHL’s second best goalie this season, and he should definitely start most of the rest of the games and Game 1 of the playoffs.