With more than half of their inaugural season already in the books, a succinct recap to-date of the Coachella Valley Firebirds’ debut campaign requires but a single word.
Superb.
Through 44 games of their 72-game regular season schedule, the desert’s first-ever, full-time sporting franchise hasn’t simply skated toward lofty levels of expectation – it has far surpassed them.
“I would have a tough time imagining that it could have gone better,” Firebirds’ head coach Dan Bylsma said late January. “At the beginning of the year, as a group, we did talk about how many games we thought we could win and made a goal as to what we could win, and that goal was a little ostentatious maybe, but the guys have been on that pace. And now, we’re probably a little bit better.”
Sporting a 31-8-4-1 mark as of February 18, the Firebirds own the best win percentage (.761) in the American Hockey League. Home cooking has proven a palpable part of the win recipe for the ‘Birds since unveiling their Acrisure Arena home ice on December 18, with CV claiming a 12-1-0-1 home mark to-date and charting among the top attendance team’s in the league.
“We’ve hopefully been able to establish our home games and our home arena,” Bylsma continued . “The fans have done an amazing job of making it an energetic place, and the guys, I think, have given the fans some great games.”
From the ice sheet to the desert sands, the head coach has felt valley-wide buttress before a puck was ever dropped.
“Even before we opened the arena, I think the guys felt the support from the community,” added Bylsma, “and that’s come from young, old, snowbirds, permanent residents, it’s come from a lot of different areas of the valley. And that’s been evident, game in, game out.”
With more Bylsma breakdown, here’s a further look at the Firebirds mid-season form.
FLYING ON OFFENSE
Having fast established a rep for speedy, skill-set driven play, the Firebirds’ success comes in large part by virtue of scoring early and often.
“You set expectations and parameters and talk about how you want to play each game,” Bylsma explained. “But the players kind of make that their own; each team makes that their own. We’ve gotten it from our opponents and from the fans – we play fast, we play aggressive and we play at you in waves. The guys have bought into that, and when you play the CV Firebirds, that’s what you’re gonna’ get.”
Scoring a shade under four goals a game, the perch from the bench views a coalesced offensive effort.
“When I look at our stats, I’m excited to see five, six, seven guys having really big years with outstanding offensive production,” said Bylsma. “Scoring goals really is a team game; you score goals together.”
Among individual numbers at the deep-season stage:
- Team captain Max McCormick, by virtue of a torrid 15 points in a 10-game stretch (Jan. 13- February 17), has taken the team co-scoring lead with 47 points, good for 9th in the AHL; the hot run earned McCormick an AHL “Player of the Week” nod on Jan. 22
- Sweden’s Jesper Froden is also right there with 47 points, including a CV-best 25 goals, good for 2nd-best in the AHL; Froden also sports and a team-high +24 in the plus-minus category; in October, he was named the league’s “Player of the Month”
- Saskatchewan-native Kole Lind has tallied 42 points, matching 17 goals with 25 assists
- Andrew Poturalski, two-time defending AHL scoring champ, also has 42 points on the year; in mid-February, it was announced that he had surgery to repair a lower body injury, with a recovery timeline of four-to-six months
- In early January, Poturalski and defenseman Ryker Evans were named to the AHL All-Star team; McCormick would eventually take Poturalski’s spot
“Throughout our lineup, guys are contributing to these goals. Peetro Seppala, he’s making great offensive plays, putting the puck on Max’s stick, on Andrew’s stick, on Froden’s stick.”
The Firebirds’ frontman is also quick to point out the growing promise of 21-year-old Evans, the 35th overall pick by the Seattle Kraken in the 2021 draft.
“You see the evolution of Ryker Evans,” Bylsma said. “It’s tough to come out and watch us play and not see Ryker taking over a game at some point with both his skating ability and offensive ability.”
From the ice sheet to the metric sheet, Coach Bylsma finds extended proof of purchase by dipping into the analytics pool of “Expected Goals (xG).” The number-inside-the-numbers is described by Seattle Kraken analyst Alison Lukan as:
“In the broadest sense, expected goals (xG) is a measure that seeks to address the concern that not all shots are created equal. xG considers a variety of factors and then mathematically assigns a value to each shot attempt that represents the probability of that shot becoming a goal.
Said Bylsma of the metric:
“An analytic that pops off the page to me is our ‘Expected Goals For’ versus our ‘Expected Goals Against.’ At least by our measure, we have been at the top of ‘Expected Goals For’ and at the top – or, at the bottom; whichever way you view that stat – of ‘Expected Goals Against.’”
MINDING THE NEST
Coupled with a potent offense, the Firebirds have enjoyed stellar play from netminders Joey Daccord and Christopher Gibson.
While the duo has often been put to the test — facing nearly 30 shots a game on average — Daccord’s 19-5-2 mark represents the AHL’s third-most net wins, while Gibson has gone 9-3-3 between the pipes.
“Over the course of the first half of the season, that story has unfolded and maybe not in a way we anticipated,” detailed Bylsma. “With the tandem of Joey Daccord – who, I think, is beating on the door of being an NHL goaltender – and Christopher Gibson, with the two of them, it’s been a big part of what we’ve done as a team.”
Daccord has authored a solid 2.54 goals against average, while the addition of Gibson has given the team versed presence.
“We had Joey for the start of the season and then he was up with Seattle for two or three weeks,” added the head coach. “Christopher Gibson kind of came in out of the blue. Gibby’s a guy who I coached last year in Charlotte, and proved to be a veteran goalkeeper who has shown he can play at the NHL level, doing a great job in net throughout his career.”
PRETTY SPECIAL
Bylsma sees Special Team statistics as a measure of in-game results rather than a broad lens.
“I view them as a nightly test and a nightly factor in-game; they’re a key to every game,” he said. “The percentages, I’m not so concerned with. It’s a nightly consideration of, ‘Are these aspects being a factor and helping us win in each game.’”
As of February 18, the Firebirds’ Power Play tracks at 20.3%, good for 12th in the AHL, while the team’s improving Penalty Kill is a more modest 80.7%, charting at 17th in the league.
“Both have been effective and strong. Early on, in many of those early road contests, the power play is what pushed us over the edge to get a win,” Bylsma offered. “The penalty kill has seen a ton of tests throughout the season; we’ve had some poor games and taken some lumps on the penalty kill. But I think the guys have done a great job in bouncing back in that regard, and the kill has been a deciding factor in a lot of our wins.”
Per the Kill, Bylsma noted that the measured ranking may be slightly skewed.
“There’s a portion of three games early on, when we were still in Seattle, where our numbers were abysmal,” candored the coach. “If you erase those games, the numbers are really good.”
A CONSTANT ROSTER
Based on the relative heath and equally-impressive play by the parent club in Seattle, the Firebirds have enjoyed a roster of consistency throughout the first half of the year and beyond.
Having capturing the notice of the hockey universe with a 31-18-6 record, the Kraken’s need for reinforcements have been few thus far.
Among the seasonal call-ups, Daccord played one game for Seattle on the first day of November, while veteran defenseman Gustav Olofsson has appeared in three games for the Kraken this year; Olofsson, now back in the desert, hasn’t appeared in a game since December 18 due to injury.
Of more recent note, veteran forward John Hayden, with 25 points in 36 games for the Firebirds this season, has been recalled by Seattle thrice since in mid-January, having since been return to CV. McCormick was recalled by Seattle in late January, but returned to the desert two days later.
“Team and personal success is rewarded for everybody when someone gets called up,” Bylsma said. “The goal of all these guys is to get called up to the National Hockey League. And it can’t be everybody at once. This season, it’s come a bit few-and-far-between. The good thing for us is that how we’ve played, there’s a number of players who have shown that they’re ready for that call-up, if and when it comes. That’s our job down here; we want guys to be prepared for the call-up when it comes.”
Hayden, an undoubted leader of the Firebirds who mixed notable point totals with a physical presence, has appeared in five games for the Kraken, scoring two goals.
SECOND HALF SKATE SCHEDULE
After an odyssey of road games and travel while awaiting the unveil of their new home at the season’s onset, the January calendar presented the team with its first real homestand of substance. The February calendar has the team on home ice six times, while the March slate will see CV at home on nine occasions, the most of any month this season. Come April, the final month of the regular season, the Firebirds will enjoy a 13-day homestand (with six games at Acrisure between the 1st – 12th) before concluding the regular season with back-to-back contests at Bakersfield on the 14th and 15th.
THE 2022/23 SEASON SCHEDULE
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