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Disclaimer:

Evan Schemenauer is a Saskatoon based NLL writer. Random thoughts is a weekly column which outlines a wide variety of thoughts that Evan has on the NLL and lacrosse world!

The opinions in this column are Evan's personal thoughts. They do not reflect the opinions of other members of the LC Daily Staff.

My random thoughts…

We’re roughly now at the midway point of the NLL season.  Although it’s a strange midway point in that some teams have already played ten games and Buffalo has played just six.  And we’re coming into a week with eight games. 

With 14 teams, you would expect that every team is playing and two teams play twice.  But that’s not the case here.  Four teams, Buffalo, Calgary, Saskatchewan and Las Vegas will play doubleheaders this weekend and two teams, Colorado and Georgia., have bye weeks.

If there’s a chance to knock off the Bandits and Rush, this might be it as both teams play their second game on Saturday against someone that isn’t playing Friday night.  But on the flipside, if these teams get weekend sweeps, they’ll get some significant separation between themselves and the rest of the pack. Either way, I looking forward to their meeting on March 1st which could go a long way to deciding the #1 seed.

Double Header: Home and Home?

I’ve said this before, but my preference with these doubleheader weekends is to have teams play a home and home battle.  Both teams have the same travel schedule, the same rest, and you sometimes get a heated game ending in the first game that boils over into the second game.  Those that recall the ending of the game between the Rush and Rock on Easter weekend in 2016, both teams flew on the same plane to Saskatoon and all hell broke loose to start the next night.

Calgary vs Saskatchewan is that good of a rivalry that a doubleheader weekend would be phenomenal.  San Diego and Buffalo also play next weekend.  A Buffalo vs San Diego doubleheader weekend is harder to pull off without there being a day in between.  But a Toronto vs Buffalo doubleheader, that’s something we would want to see.

With all that said, since we’re at the halfway point of the season, here’s my midseason picks for the NLL awards.  Let’s see what my nominees look like now, and how many of these are still nominees come the end of the year.

Goaltender of the Half Year

Winner: Zach Higgins

Nominees: Aden Walsh, Dillon Ward

Some people might be surprised here.  A goaltender with a record of 4-4 is your goaltender of the year so far?  Yes, and the stats back this up.  The goaltender with the best GSAA so far this year is Higgins with 12.23.  In three of his four losses, he allowed 10 or less goals.  Without Higgins, the Black Bears are likely near the bottom of the standings. 

The reason his GSAA is so low, its partly about how few goals he’s allowed and how many shots he’s faced.  Higgins is facing 0.82 shots per minute of play, or 49.4 shots per game.  The only goaltender near the top of the stats board facing more shots per game is Dillon Ward with 0.89 shots per minute or 53.6 shots per game.

That stat above is exactly why Ward is on the nominee list at the halfway point.  As for Walsh, here’s a goaltender many of us wrote off last season, who started playing the season in a no-win situation with the constant rumors about a trade coming. He has shined this year, and Walsh has played well enough that the pressure for Vancouver to make a trade has gone away.

Defensive Player of the Half Year

Winner: Robert Hope

Nominees: Kyle Rubisch, Matt Hossack

Here’s an interesting stat.  When you look at the league leaders in loose balls, Hope has the lead with 101.  The next highest defender that isn’t a faceoff specialist is Mitch De Snoo with 84.  Granted, the Mammoth have played more games, but beyond that, its the combination of Hope and Ward that has catapulted Colorado’s major improvement in their results from last year.

I spoke at length in last week’s article as to why Hossack needs to be in consideration for DPOTY.  As for Rubisch, even though he’s been out the last few weeks, he’s playing just as great as ever.  San Diego’s struggles this season are on a lot of players, but not Rubisch.

And I’ll state this.  Buffalo’s defense has been outstanding this year.  So has Vancouver’s.  The difference is there isn’t one player in my mind just yet that stands out far more than the rest of the pack on their team.  Buffalo is also somewhat handicapped because they’ve only played 6 games.

Transition Player of the Half Year

Winner: Owen Grant

Nominees: Ryan Terefenko, Jake Boudreau

Terefenko has made this race a lot closer in recent weeks with back-to-back hat tricks.  But I’m going to ignore recency bias here and stick with Grant who had an amazing first half of the year.  Remember, there was a time where Grant was the leading goal scorer on the Warriors.  He still sits fourth overall in Warrior goals this deep into the season.

Perhaps I appreciate Boudreau’s efforts more than most given that I see him play more often, but Boudreau does deserve to be this far up the list.  As for the faceoff specialists, while there’s a lot of great performances so far this season, none of them stand out so far that puts them into the top three.  But if I had a top five nominees, you would start to see faceoff specialists on the list.  The other thing that could throw a wrench into individual’s lists is whether you consider Zach Currier a transition player or not.  As he is predominantly playing out the front door, I have left him off the list.

Offensive Player of the Half Year

Winner: Josh Byrne

Nominees: Dhane Smith, Joe Resetarits

Here’s where Buffalo’s limited schedule gives us some headaches as to comparing their efforts against those with more games played.  But perhaps, let’s simplify this a bit.  Smith has 9.67 points per game.  Byrne has 9.17 points per game.  Comparatively, Resetarits has 8.22, which is still fantastic, but is lower than Smith and Byrne.  To put these numbers into perspective, if these three players keep up their points pace and manage to play in all 18 games, Smith would end the season with 174 points, Byrne would have 165 points and Resetarits would have 148.  Byrne and Smith would blow the doors off the record for points in a season and Smith would destroy the assists record with 135.

Granted, these points paces are often difficult to keep pace simply because of wear and tear on players’ bodies as the season moves along.  Its also possible that injuries will keep players out of the lineup.

Its almost a coin flip between whether Byrne or Smith’s performance is the better one.  To put it in a hockey context, which was the better performance, Wayne Gretzky’s 1982 performance with 50 goals in 39 games and 92 total goals, or his 1986 season where he had 215 points and 163 assists?  I don’t think either player cares as long as they keep winning and get themselves a third cup.  For now, I’ll take Byrne’s goal scoring over Smith’s assists, but its by a hair.

Rookie of the Half Year

Winner: Brennan O’Neill

Nominees: Dyson Williams, Alec Statkakis

The nominees in this category were hard to figure out, the leader halfway through the season wasn’t.  Brennan O’Neill goes to show how far raw lacrosse talent can get you.  Just think about the discussions being had last August and September.  Was O’Neill going to even play in the NLL?  He doesn’t have much box lacrosse experience, how is that god given talent going to translate to the box game?  I was really hoping at the start of the season that Philly fans would give him the time to develop and not be so hard on him while he’s learning.  Well, O’Neill proved he belonged within a few games into the season.

Interestingly, Williams has just two fewer points than O’Neill this season, both playing the same number of games.  So why is the rookie of the half year so obvious?  Perhaps it’s O’Neill doing what he’s doing with a lot less box lacrosse experience.  Perhaps it’s the Wings being near the top of the standings most of the season and Albany being near the bottom.

For the other nominee, there’s a lot of players I could consider here.  Statkahis has had an amazing start to his season at the dot, winning 62% of his draws (including a recent 70% performance against Jake Withers), and he gets the nod for now.  Jake Naso could also be considered, but perhaps, is down a few rungs being out of the lineup.  Toron Eccelstone has to be considered, and I wouldn’t be surprised if I re-evaluated this in a few weeks that he’s in the top three.  With just four games under his belt, I’m not ready to put him into the top three rookies so far, but he’s making one heck of a case with 15 points in his last two games.

All I’ll say is that who the three finalists are is far from being decided.

Head Coach of the Half Year

Winner: John Tavares

Nominees: Jimmy Quinlan, Derek Keenan

First question here, with Jimmy Quinlan and Derek Keenan being co-head coaches, do you have to pick them as a package or individually?

My rationale here, with a group of teams so tight in the standings, results matter.  This award often goes to the coach who’s team improved the most in the season.  But that rationale in my mind often overlooks who is actually doing the best job.  Tavares might be leading the back-to-back champions, but his team is undefeated, and we shouldn’t ignore that.

The rationale of both Saskatchewan head coaches is similar in that results matter.  But also, Saskatchewan is such a young team that coaching is even more crucial.

General Manager of the Half Year

Winner: Steve Dietrich

Nominee: Derek Keenan

Some people might be saying “what did Dietrich do to deserve a nomination?  It’s the same team as last year.”  But that’s exactly the point.  When teams win a few titles, its not easy to keep a team that good together for another season.  The fact that Dietrich was able to navigate keeping players together, when players might think their worth is higher and where there is a salary cap and a luxury tax to consider with every player’s contract, the fact that chugger has kept this wagon going should be rewarded.

Keenan is being Keenan once again, building a winner through the draft and trades that still mystify comprehension as to why other GM’s pick up the phone when Keenan calls. The largest one of these trades being trading Mark Matthews a year ago for Zach Manns, Adam Jay and the draft pick that is Levi Anderson.  The trade to get Brock Haley and acquiring Austin Shanks in free agency are paying off well.

The other nominee took possibly the most brain power of all in these half year awards, and that’s why I’m leaving it blank for now.  Mike Board made some nice moves getting Dobbie and Dickson back, but he still hasn’t made a move with Del Bianco, and I can’t reward him for that reason.  Paul Day not only made the right call to step back as Head Coach and focus on GM duties, he stuck to drafting O’Neill and it has paid off.  He lost Ben McIntosh but still managed to have a higher scoring team.  But in the moves made to acquire Nick Damude in the dispersal draft, he traded away Higgins, the top goaltender this year.  This might pay off in the future, but not so far.  Colorado has moved up nicely in the standings, but that’s a combination of their existing players just playing better and acquiring Will Malcolm with the #1 pick in the dispersal draft.  Who the other nominee should be will probably come to me closer to the end of the year, but its just not obvious right now.

MVP of the Half Season

Winner: Zach Higgins

Nominees: Josh Byrne, Dhane Smith

The beauty of there being an offensive player of the year is we can have a genuine discussion over who is the MVP, regardless of position, whereas in the past, if a forward didn’t win the MVP, the forwards wouldn’t win an award.  This didn’t prevent a non-forward from winning MVP, it just made it more difficult.

Are the Bandits 6-0 without Byrne, no.  Are the Bandits 6-0 without Smith, no, but they’re probably 5-1.  If there’s one player that is more valuable to his team than any other player, its Higgins.  Simply put, the Black Bears’ offense is so bad right now, without Higgins and someone like Cam Dunkerley as their starter, as he was with the Riptide last season, the Black Bears aren’t even in the playoff picture.  And that’s what makes him the MVP.   

Until next time…

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