from Travis Yost of TSN,

The old sports adage says that defence wins championships. In the National Hockey League, that line of thinking is increasingly under scrutiny.

One of the fascinating developments in the modern era of hockey is that the offensively dominant teams are the ones realizing success, and that’s particularly true during the postseason. It does seem a bit counterintuitive, but great offensive teams tend to be deadly for two reasons. One, they pile up shots, scoring chances and goals, creating scoreboard separation easier than the average NHL team. Two, the more teams play in the offensive zone, the less they play in the defensive zone. That means fewer shots, scoring chances and goals against.

We’ve seen a lot of different styles of offence from Stanley Cup winners over the last 10 years. The Los Angeles Kings, who won in both 2011-12 and 2013-14, played a relentlessly effective dump-and-chase style of hockey and territorially dominated opponents. The Pittsburgh Penguins, who went back-to-back during 2015-17, didn’t generate the same type of shot volume as their predecessors in Los Angeles. But they were lethal about turning seemingly ordinary shooting opportunities into dangerous ones, regularly finding open shooters in the slot. Last year’s Washington Capitals were similarly effective in their ability to pierce the interior, and married it to one of the league’s best power-play units.

Over the last decade, Pittsburgh and Washington are the two teams that really challenged the ‘defence wins championships’ notion.

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