1. Tilted Ice: How certain National Hockey League teams are
^See Appendix 1, Model 3
*p-value < 0.05
Suspected Teams: Anaheim, Chicago, Colorado, Florida, Nashville, and NY Islanders
Tilted Ice: How certain National Hockey League teams are
manipulating the league’s point system
Michael J. Lopez/ Department of Biostatistics, Brown University/ statsbylopez.wordpress.com
What was the effect of the NHL implementing a loser point in 2004?
It encouraged nonconference overtime games
Old Points System (pre-2004)
New Points System (post-2004)
log-odds of Overtime (with 95% CI’s), nonconference vs. conference games
2) How is hockey impacted? Scoring in tied games drops vs. nonconference teams
Odds of any future goal (95% interval) given game tied with (20, 10, 5) minutes remaining
Type (vs. conference games)
20 minutes left
10 minutes left
5 minutes left
Nonconference games, all other teams
0.94 ( )
0.66 ( )
1.51 ( )
Nonconference games, Suspected Teams*
2.00 ( )**
2.33 ( )**
2.04 ( )**
*Anaheim, Chicago, Columbus, Florida, Nashville, NY Islanders **p-value < 0.05
3) And what of the 2013 realignment? A new kind of overtime game!!!
2013 rule change: Teams judged on divisional standings
30% more non-divisional conference games
to OT, comparing season to past