Yikes.

You’ve seen them several autumn evenings, but we have yet to give them a name. They grab your attention and raise your heart rate, and they certainly keep Bulldog’s Twitter Engagement Rates high. They are the 3rd period Buffalo Sabres, who have appeared to hang on for dear life when they have gotten third-period leads. Sometimes this works and Dustin Tokarski does his best Dominik Hasek impression. Other times the Rangers break your heart with four-tenths of a second remaining. 

Is this parking of the bus only a third-period thing? Is it only one goal-up thing? Is it even a thing? Let’s take a look.

We’ll be using 5v5 Corsi as our metric of interest with that being the best estimate we have of puck possession where the offense is actively registering attempts to score. A true “park the bus” game would be one where the 5v5 shot attempts are both (a) one-sided to the Sabres disadvantage and (b) different from the flow of the rest of the game. Score effects would suggest that the trailing team will approach the noticeable difference in shot attempts in the third period, but that would, on average, not be expected until the final half or even final third of the final period. This first game is an example where the score effects didn’t show up until the later third. 

I’ve narrowed the scope down to 7 games where there was a potential for the bus being parked. Since this is a study in inference, the sample size being small isn’t a disadvantage. We’re looking for initial signs that this may be a trend as opposed to determining a concrete conclusion, especially because this is fluid and could change at any point in the season and we will all go on with our lives. If it doesn’t change, then we will be able to recognize it and account for it in further analysis.

• October 25 vs Tampa Bay: The Sabres led 2-1 after two periods, during which they gave up 20+ 5v5 shot attempts, including Tampa registering 68.75% of the shot attempts in the second period. The Lightning only outshot the Sabres at 5v5 15-11 in the third, and the Sabres scored three times, all at 5v5, so I don’t think the bus was parked here.
• October 28 vs Anaheim: The Sabres led 3-2 after two. After the second goal, however, is when the Ducks turned the corner and started to take control of the game. It’s not necessarily the same parking of the bus when the game is tied and a team is trying to send the game to overtime for the free point, but the Ducks outshot the Sabres 17-7 in the third quarter and the Sabres only got three shot attempts in the final 10+ minutes. Was it the Ducks dominating? The Sabres being in no rush to try and play offense? Both? (It’s probably both – Bus = Parked)
• October 31 vs Los Angeles: The Sabres led 2-1 after 2 and started the third period on the powerplay. The Kings had a shot advantage percentage in each period in the high-50s and tied the game early in the third, so there’s nothing really here.
• November 6 vs Detroit: The Sabres had a 2-1 lead after 2 and made it 3-1 and then continued to put up the shots before taking a penalty, and once that was over, the Red Wings took control of the game and scored twice to tie the game and then continued to have the possession advantage until forcing OT. Bus appears to have been parked.

• November 12 vs Edmonton: Okay here it’s the Edmonton Oilers we’re talking about so an 18-9 advantage in a single period wouldn’t surprise anyone, especially coming off a second period where the Oilers outshot the Sabres 18-12 at 5v5. But hanging on for dear life counts for this exercise, and that’s definitely what happened in this one.
• November 16 vs Pittsburgh: The poster child for this exercise. There were four powerplays in the third period, three of them were the Sabres, and with that shots were 16-4 in favor of the Penguins in the third period. The only argument against the Sabres formally parking the bus here is that the Penguins dominance began about 10 minutes prior to the third after the Sabres scored their second goal, with shot attempts being 17-8 in favor of Pittsburgh, but there’s no denying that third period was textbook. Let’s throw a bone to the eye test.

• November 21 vs New York Rangers: Since it was tied after 2, this doesn’t fit the exercise too well, but this game after the Penguins game in less than a 7 day span was the motivation to open Google Docs and Natural Stat Trick and go to work. This is a case where it appears that even while the Rangers had a 19-6 advantage in shot attempts in the third period, the multitude of long (in NHL context) segments of time between shot attempts from both teams. Maybe after the barrage of goals in the middle of the second both coaches decided they wanted a point? Who knows for sure, but that’s what it looked like.

So seven times here were games that were bus parking candidates, and in five of them, the numbers supported that they probably parked the bus, including each of the last four. Not enough for a conclusion, but it’s something to monitor until there’s enough to suggest that there’s no concern about the Sabres’ ability to protect a lead. With a 48.22 CF% and 46.85 5v5 xGF% on 47.83 5v5 GF%, the Sabres have still shown this season that they are a team that can compete to a, relatively, near match to their opponents independent of the results at minimum with the shot attempts they registering at 5v5. 

To pair with this, however, Micah’s site shows an interesting predicament with score effects. When up 1, the Sabres have a substantially better 5v5 shot profile when up 1 when compared to when they’re down 1, when that would expect to be reversed, and it’s the only instance where there isn’t the patented right point red blob on offense. The up one-goal defense supports the parking the bus inference, as opponents are registering 24.4% higher expectation of goals compared to the league 5v5 average.

So in hockey terms, it appears that when they have the puck up one, they are working to “get a good one” and not forcing shots unless they are mostly high quality, which is good, but the team as a whole will need to learn to compliment that with having the puck at league average as well since that would diminish the number of opportunities their opponents would register in this time and score state. We’ve seen Don Granato has been picking his spots with his lineup based on the opponent (Ex: Matching Cozens up with McDavid, Matthews, and Crosby while playing him on the fourth line against Columbus), so I wouldn’t be surprised if he is also picking his spots with when to push in the third period and up a goal versus when they step back offensively, even as the tendency has more often appeared they prefer to play more defensive in the final frame. 

Regardless, this is all a sign of a young team finding its identity and gaining more experience, which is, when all is said and done, the goal for this season.

Thanks for reading

Photo Credit: Bill Wippert/NHLI via Getty Images