Better GOALscoring season: Ovie 07-08 vs Matthews 23-24

[Nadal On Clay]

2007-08:
#1 (Ovechkin) - 65, #2 (Kovalchuk) - 52, #10 (Lecavalier) - 40, #20 (Sundin) - 32

2023-24
#1 (Matthews) - 69, #2 (Reinhart) - 57, #10 (Kucherov) - 44, #20 (Tkachuk Jr) - 37

Percentage leads, Ovechkin vs. Matthews
Over #2 25% vs. 21%
Over #10 62.5% vs. 57%
Over #20 103% vs. 86.5%

Clear edge Ovechkin no matter how you cut it.

Also, beating peak Kovalchuk by 13 goals is different from beating Sam Reinhart by 12.

That literally doesn’t matter, though. Is it Matthews fault Sam Reinhart had a career yeah and finished 2nd in goals instead of like, Nate MacKinnon?

 

[authentic]

That's not how that works. The better you are defensively the less time you end up spending in your own end because you cause a change in possession and transition to offense. If all you do is chase, you waste a lot of shifts on the wrong end of the ice.

When you expend more energy playing defense that usually does not help you offensively as much as letting your team play defense while you wait for a breakout pass all game and expend your energy solely on offense

 

[Zuluss]

That literally doesn’t matter, though. Is it Matthews fault Sam Reinhart had a career yeah and finished 2nd in goals instead of like, Nate MacKinnon?

Not his fault, but Matthews was lucky this season that his competition was Reinhart and not Pasta or McDavid's version from last season. So, his lead over #2 is probably bigger than it should have been.

Let's take a 5-year window around Ovechkin's 2007-08. Here are the best goal-scoring campaigns:
56 - Cheechoo 05/06
54 - Jagr 05/06
52 - Lecavalier 06/07, Kovalchuk 05/06 and 07/08
51 - Crosby 09/10, Stamkos 09/10
And then there is Ovechkin with 65 goals, really different from the rest - even though 2005/06 in this sample was a really high-scoring, lots-of-PP year.

In Matthews' case, just last season, 2022/23, gives us McDavid with 64 goals and Pastrnak with 61 - so there is less separation between the 2023/24 goalscoring campaign by Matthews and the best goalscoring seasons of the same period.

 

[Bouboumaster]

Ovechkin, obviously

 

[cvaicunas]

Also Matthews just led the league in posts hit (NHL record) with 20, a little more luck and he could’ve actually scored around 80 goals

Right, but you could also suggest that this stat leans to Ovechkin's favor. Your counting a miss as a positive. Who's to say during Ovechkin's season, he simply scored on those opportunities.

 

[bobholly39]

I voted Matthews - but why are we talking defense in the first few replies? I thought this was goal scoring only., but overall season.

If we're asking best overall season - Ovechkin. He won the Ross, Hart and Lindsay that year. Matthews won't win either of those.

Best goal-scoring only - I'm leaning Matthews, very slightly. It's close though.

 

[BraveCanadian]

It’s close but still Ovi

 

[WhiskeyYerTheDevils]

Matthews by a hair. The biggest differentiator is that Matthews' goal scoring comes from such a high variety of shot types and locations on the ice. So many of Ovechkin's goals were just him standing still on the PP and ripping one timers from top of the left circle. That's obviously impressive, but easier to game plan against.

Matthews can score goals at high volumes literally any way you can imagine. Deflections, tips, rebounds, dekes in tight, wrist & snap shots off the rush, one timers, dekes off the rush, slap shots, stationary wrist shots, backhanders from the slot, wraparounds... the dude may have the most well rounded goal scoring arsenal we've ever seen.

 

[Montreal Shadow]

Better offensive and overall player: Ovechkin and easily.

Better goal-scoring: Even or tiny edge to Matthews.

 

[Shark Finn]

Matthews by a hair. The biggest differentiator is that Matthews' goal scoring comes from such a high variety of shot types and locations on the ice. So many of Ovechkin's goals were just him standing still on the PP and ripping one timers from top of the left circle. That's obviously impressive, but easier to game plan against.

Matthews can score goals at high volumes literally any way you can imagine. Deflections, tips, rebounds, dekes in tight, wrist & snap shots off the rush, one timers, dekes off the rush, slap shots, stationary wrist shots, backhanders from the slot, wraparounds... the dude may have the most well rounded goal scoring arsenal we've ever seen.

Not in 07-08. There's literal video evidence against this comment.

 

[Midnight Judges]

So many of Ovechkin's goals were just him standing still on the PP and ripping one timers from top of the left circle.

That's false.

Ovechkin's office wasn't established until years later.

Back in 2007-2008 Ovechkin was carrying the puck quite a bit and scoring off the rush - much more than Matthews does.

You can watch all 65 goals here:

 

[KapG]

Considering matthews played like 200 minutes less on the power play iirc I’ll 100% take matthews 69 goals. Not surprised Ovie is winning though with all the leafs bias.

Ps. This site is f***ing unusable now with all the ads popping up everywhere.

 

[WhiskeyYerTheDevils]

Not in 07-08. There's literal video evidence against this comment.

That's fair, It wasn't as prevalent that year as it eventually became, but it was still very much a big part of his goal scoring.

 

[EdJovanovski]

Ovi AINEC

 

[ijuka]

Well, I'd say that if you put 2008 Ovechkin in today's NHL, 69 goals would be paper to him. So I'd have to go with Ovechkin.

Top 5 points scorers on the Caps team:

Ovechkin 112
Bäckström 69
Green 56
Kozlov 54
Syomin 42

Top 5 points scorers on the Leafs team:

Matthews 107
Nylander 98
Marner 85
Tavares 65
Rielly 58

Point is, it's easier to score when you have many assistants and star players that your opponent needs to focus on.

And Ovechkin was also much better at generating his own chances. He made things happen out of nowhere. I have never seen Matthews with that ability. He's more opportunistic.

 

[Ol' Jase]

I’ll vote in the next thread that pops up on this subject, which will likely be a few days from now.

 

[AhosDatsyukian]

Matthews scored more goals. So yeah…Matthews. Easy answer.

NHL & WHA Single Season Leaders and Records for Adjusted Goals | Hockey-Reference.com

1. Brett Hull (78), 2. Alex Ovechkin (72), 3. Mario Lemieux (71), 4. Cooney Weiland (70), Phil Esposito (70), 6. Wayne Gretzky (69), 7. Babe Dye (68), Wayne Gretzky (68), Steven Stamkos (68), Auston Matthews (68)

www.hockey-reference.com

 

[NVious]

Toss up, you can't go wrong with either guy nor is one clearly above the other

 

[notbias]

NHL & WHA Single Season Leaders and Records for Adjusted Goals | Hockey-Reference.com

1. Brett Hull (78), 2. Alex Ovechkin (72), 3. Mario Lemieux (71), 4. Cooney Weiland (70), Phil Esposito (70), 6. Wayne Gretzky (69), 7. Babe Dye (68), Wayne Gretzky (68), Steven Stamkos (68), Auston Matthews (68)

www.hockey-reference.com

We are going to have to start adjusting a lot of Gretzky's records...

Howie Morenz has the most points in a season.

Brett Hull has the most goals in a season.

Can start there, but I also think there needs to be a discussion about how good Gretzky was... he is appearing far less in the top 10 when we adjust it.

By the way, McDavid and Kucherov only hit 98 assists this year when we adjust it, shouldn't even be nominated for the Hart, scrubs.

 

[vippe]

I think the 07-08 season of hockey is one of my if not my favorite season to watch of all time. One of those reasons were the Capitals 07-08 season because it was such a crazy ride, never did I see a team change like how the Caps changed with Hanlon -> Boudreau, the second half season surge was a blast.

Ovechkins goalscoring season that year is probably one of the most impressive things I ever saw in Hockey and in the way he did it - it was extremely fun to see it happen. Him being almost 40 goals and north of 40 points ahead of the second best scorer on the team, tells you just a bit of how important he was to the Caps

69 goals is more than 65 so in that regard Matthews is better.
But 65 goals in 07-08 is more impressive than 69 in 23-24 to me.

Both are very impressive though, no doubt.

 

[Bileur]

This is about goal scoring only, how would you figure it’s Ovechkin easily?

So both are about equally as dominant but one does it while abandoning all defensive aspects of the game (which to be fair he was able to do and still be dominant overall) and the other plays an elite two-way game with a little over half the powerplay time and he’s somehow had the clearly worse goal scoring season?

Your two paragraphs seem contradictory.

In the first saying the thread is about goal scoring only, in the second giving Matthews a style boost to his goal scoring based on two way play.

Ovechkin had 220 hits that season. Not winning a Selke any time soon, but he made himself known when his team didn't have the puck.

EDIT - if we're going to list a bunch of things that don't actively deal with GOALscoring seasons.

Agreed, suggesting Ovie was one dimensional ignores a huge part of his game.

 

[Montreal Shadow]

Considering matthews played like 200 minutes less on the power play iirc I’ll 100% take matthews 69 goals. Not surprised Ovie is winning though with all the leafs bias.

Ps. This site is f***ing unusable now with all the ads popping up everywhere.

Having prime Marner and Nylander is far more valuable than PP minutes + rookie Backstrom.

 

[amnesiac]

We are going to have to start adjusting a lot of Gretzky's records...

Howie Morenz has the most points in a season.

Brett Hull has the most goals in a season.

Can start there, but I also think there needs to be a discussion about how good Gretzky was... he is appearing far less in the top 10 when we adjust it.

By the way, McDavid and Kucherov only hit 98 assists this year when we adjust it, shouldn't even be nominated for the Hart, scrubs.

so to you Bernie Nichols 70G season was better than Matthews and Ovie here? Gotcha.

Adjustment is necessary when comparing eras. It does get fuzzy when you get to the O6 and pre WW2 eras, but I think its pretty damn obvious that scoring between 1980-93 was a lot easier than from say 1997-03.

Just because Gretzky's numbers are inflated, it doesnt mean he still wasnt the greatest ever. He is, even after adjusting..... But if you think his 92G or 215P is equivalent in today's game (or during the DPE) youre absolutely kidding yourself.

 

[amnesiac]

I’ll vote in the next thread that pops up on this subject, which will likely be a few days from now.

Ill let you post all the "Goalscoring: Ovi 08 vs Matthews 24" threads already done.... im waiting.

 

[notbias]

so to you Bernie Nichols 70G season was better than Matthews and Ovie here? Gotcha.

Adjustment is necessary when comparing eras. It does get fuzzy when you get to the O6 and pre WW2 eras, but I think its pretty damn obvious that scoring between 1980-93 was a lot easier than from 1997-03.

So is era adjusted good or bad? Not following.

I'm sure with era-adjusted stats Gretzky is not Gretzky anymore... is Lemiuex the consensus #1 or is there someone else?

It's almost like just posting that link and nothing else is silly.

For example, it doesn't take into account the insane amount of PP time that Ovechkin got.

You want to add context to 06 and pre-WW2? I think all eras need context.