After starting the second round with three straight losses, the Carolina Hurricanes officially turned this streak into a series of back-to-back thrilling victories in Games 4 and 5.
This is more like what many expected from this series before it began – a close fight between the two titans of the Metropolitan Division. While it certainly looked that way on the ice, with an early three-game, one-goal series, the series result obviously said otherwise.
On Thursday night in Game 6, the Hurricanes will have a very real chance to reverse this scenario, as they will be a relatively powerful favorite at home and will push the series to Game 7 with their third straight victory.
This may make Rangers fans swoon, but for hockey fans in general, it’s a sporadic treat. It would be the first time since 2014 that a team forced a Game 7 after starting the series on a 3-0 run, when the Los Angeles Kings rallied in the first round to eliminate the San Jose Sharks.
The fact that a whole decade has passed since the last such case is crazier than it seems at first glance.
Perhaps there is nothing more invigorating in sports than a comeback, a fallen team coming back from the dead against all odds. Taking it game by game, hockey fans have been blessed in this regard over the past few seasons. The “most hazardous lead in hockey” remains, but it also includes the three- and four-goal advantage, which has been disappearing at a much greater rate in recent years. No lead is really safe and sound in this sport.
And yet, this growing comeback mentality did not extend to the playoff series. Over the past decade, a 3-0 series lead may as well have been a foregone conclusion. It is a guarantee without hope for the oppressed.
It’s not even that there weren’t any comebacks; the thing is, there wasn’t a team that even came close to winning, with zero games 7 to speak of in those situations.
This may seem untrue to some, given its rarity in hockey history. A 3-0 series lead is a grip you can’t shake, and it’s a feat reserved only for the greatest choke artists.
Despite the raise in parity during the salary cap era, we should have seen a few more of them over the last decade, quite by accident. There is always a chance that even the most unexpected thing will happen, and the fact that these chances will not be realized is fascinating.
Since 2015, there have been 30 occasions when the team has lost 3-0, and 60 percent of them ended unceremoniously. Only four teams (13 percent) have even made it to Game 6, where the Hurricanes currently are, and last year’s Dallas Stars were the first to do so in eight (!) seasons.
While the odds are never in favor of the team losing 3-0, they are also not zero. At least they shouldn’t. There is a myth that 3-0 deficits only happen to the worst teams, ones that are very unlikely to crawl out of such a hole to begin with, but it can happen to even the best teams.
Before the series began, the 30 teams were between 17 percent underdogs and 77 percent favorites (hello 2019, Tampa Bay Lightning), based on series prices from sports betting history. From the beginning, the prediction was that 13 of the 30 teams would win. On this basis – and taking into account the team’s poorer reputation after three straight losses – the chances of at least forcing a seventh game ranged from four to 20 percent. The chances of returning ranged from one to 13 percent.
On average, we’re talking about a one in 10 chance of forcing a Game 7 win and a one in 20 chance of winning the series after a 3-0 loss. These are clearly diminutive odds, but over 30 runs, these slim chances add up.
Given both teams’ chances after trailing 3-0, we should see three Game 7s with one or two full comebacks. Instead we have zero. In low, we were robbed.
Some will be quick to point out the human element of it all, and that is a very valid point. Leading 3-0, many teams showed the killer instinct needed to close out the series. With the score 3-0, many teams gave up at the thought of the mountain approaching. Sometimes teams that are down 3-0 just aren’t as good as expected after the jump. Or a 3-0 team is much better.
While these points may seem significant, the likelihood of a team not seeing a 3-0 Game 7, let alone making a comeback, is still very low – so low that even true quality metrics can’t explain it. Given the 30 cases where the average chance of seeing Game 7 is 10.6%, there is a 97% chance that we should see at least one game. A 5.2% chance of returning in 30 cases gives us an 80% chance of seeing at least one on this front.
The risk of chaos has been high enough over the past decade; they just didn’t manifest. This can happen with diminutive samples; The 30 Series definitely qualifies for this.
However, in a larger sample size, the playing field tends to level out, most clearly seen at the beginning of the salary cap era. The courses there perfectly reflect reality.
From 2006 to 2014, there were 38 series in which the team lost 3-0, but these teams clearly showed a little more fight in them. A larger percentage won at least one game (57%), two forced a Game 7 and lost (Detroit and Chicago in 2011), and two of those teams won (Los Angeles in 2014 and Philadelphia in 2010 r.).
Their average chances? Same as the last decade: 11 percent to force a Game 7 and 5 percent to complete the comeback.
Add in all the odds, and over those nine years there was exactly the amount of dramatic chaos that was expected: 4.1 Game 7s and 2.1 comebacks. This is a stark contrast to what we have received over the last decade. Hockey fans are long overdue.
Delayed doesn’t mean it will happen. It’s wrong to suggest that there will be more No. 7s and comebacks after a team loses 3-0 just because it hasn’t happened in a long time. However, this does not mean that such a situation is more likely to occur in the near future. The average odds for Game 7 are still one in 10 and one in 20 for a comeback.
But we’re as close as we can get thanks to the Hurricanes.
For Carolina in particular, the odds changed after winning Games 4 and 5. There is now a greater than 60% chance of forcing a Game 7 and a greater than 30% chance of getting back into the game. For the first time in a decade, we have a sedate chance to witness history.
In this case, the odds for Rangers to win are still high, 3-2, and no one expects the Presidents’ Trophy champions to get the necessary fourth victory. But the Hurricanes also have a great team that has a real chance to live up to their slogan: “cause chaos.”
(Photo by Joshua Sarner/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
