from James Mirtle of the Globe and Mail,

There’s no doubt it may take some getting used to, if indeed the NHL goes this route. In fact, 3-on-3 is so uncommon that the 3.3 minutes the Leafs and Avs played the other night constitutes 90 per cent of the 3-on-3 in the NHL this season and 4 per cent of the 3-on-3 played league-wide in the last eight years. It occurs so infrequently that there is only about 11 minutes of 3-on-3 each season, spread over all 1,230 games. There’s no question that those have been exciting parts of games, however.

In a typical NHL game, teams generate roughly 2.4 goals and 29 shots per 60 minutes of 5-on-5 play. That rises to 2.8 and 32 shots per 60 minutes if you go to 4-on-4.

But 3-on-3 is a whole new animal. Teams have put up more than 60 shots and scored more than eight goals per 60 minutes, with all the odd-man rushes and chaos proving great fun for everyone but the coaches.

The quality of chances is so high that the average shooting percentage at 3-on-3 is more than 13 per cent, way up from the 8 per cent average at 5-on-5.

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