New York Rangers: Five stats that need improvement for 2017-18

1. Shot Attempts %

Shot attempts, also known as Corsi, is the count of all shots on net, missed shots and blocked shots generated by a team. It is broken up into attempts for and against a team and often also represented as percentage of the total amount of shot attempts. Therefore, shots attempts for percentage would be number of shot attempts for a team (on the opposition’s net) over the total amount of shot attempts in that time frame.

This type of metric is used as a proxy for puck possession, shots for percentage, and unblocked shots (shots on net and blocked shots) for percentage at 5-on-5 has been a good predictor for playoff success.

The Rangers ended last season with a shot attempts for % (SAT%) aka Corsi For % (CF%) of 47.95% (courtesy of NaturalStatTrick). This was the lowest mark among all playoff teams.

The Rangers have not been a possession positive (i.e. greater than 50%) team since 2013-14, coincidentally the year they made the Stanley Cup Final.

It what will be a running theme for this article, the addition of Kevin Shattenkirk should greatly help in this department. Especially since the player he will be replacing is Dan Girardi.

This, coupled with the departure of Kevin Klein and a full year of Brendan Smith, should put the Rangers on the right track in the possession department.