Lord Stanley's Pool 2019 - Opening Analysis

Lord Stanley's Pool 2019 is all about the Tampa Bay Lightning. The Bolts are the most heavily favoured team in pool history, with 58.5% of Cup picks (204 of 349), a remarkable 50% margin over 2nd place Calgary (8.6%, 30 Cup picks). Tampa Bay also has 78.2% of their possible player picks (819) to Calgary's 50.2% (526), a margin of 28%. Both of these margins shatter previous records.

It's not simply that the Lightning had 62 wins during the year, three of the top scorers and the top goalie. There is also no consensus of a clear challenger from the West, though Calgary has the edge based on their own first place finish.

The 2001 Colorado Avalanche (Ray Bourque's Cup year) had 67.5% of Cup picks (27 of 40) and 90.8% of player picks, the most dominant in both of those categories, but with the '01 New Jersey Devils in the East (81.7% of picks), the margin between them was much smaller than Tampa vs Calgary, and no other team has come close to any of these numbers.

The Lightning have at least one pick on 296 of 349 entries, with 243 of them being the maximum three players.

So what does this mean for the pool? If the Lightning prove their worth and win, or go to the finals, it will very much depend on which team makes it to the Finals from the West and who is able to capitalize not only on that team, but also the top players from the losing conference finalists. Goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy's performance compared to the Tampa scorers could also provide some variance. On the other hand, if Tampa Bay fails, it provides an advantage to the smaller group that did not pick them - provided they chose correctly from both the East and West. Either way, it could be a very close pool right to the end, though with little leverage to move up after the first couple rounds.

Other teams to watch after Tampa Bay and Calgary: Washington (387 picks, mostly Alex Ovechkin and John Carlson), Winnipeg, Nashville, and Pittsburgh, all of which have over 200 picks and 10 or more Cup picks, while Boston has 23 Cup picks though just under 200 players.

Kucherov was picked 275 times, only player ever to have broken the 200-mark.

In much the same way that Tampa Bay and its top forward dominated picks, goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy was picked significantly more than any other goalie. Vasilevskiy was selected 185 times, and is just the third goalie to get over 50% of picks (Brodeur '01 67.5%, Rask '14 57%). The difference between Vasilevskiy's 185 picks and the 244 entries with three Lighning players highlights the choice these poolies needed to make between three Tampa forwards and a different goalie, or switching a forward in order to take this goalie.

As we know, goaltenders can have a significant impact on the pool, especially if they string together multiple shutouts and separate their performance from the rest. In that context the other goalies who could shake up the standings include Pekka Rinne (32 picks), Braden Holtby (26), Marc-Andre Fleury (19), and St. Louis super-rookie Jordan Binnington (18), all of whom have between 5% and 10% of picks.