GDT: Maple Leafs vs Montréal Canadiens

Gameday Chat Post

Maple Leafs vs Montréal Canadiens
7 PM HNIC game on CBC/Sportsnet

Let’s have some Quant Hockey fun with the newest Maple Leaf.

Ryan O’Reilly is at 978 games played, 40th on the active player list and three behind John Tavares. Yes, this means the Leafs are going to pony up for some more silver. If O’Reilly plays every game, he’s due to be at 1,000 when the Leafs are home to play the Blue Jackets on April 4th.

O’Reilly is 34th in points by active players with 691 behind Tavares, who is in 13th place with 950.

In goals, O’Reilly is in 46th place with 252, a couple ahead of fellow 2009 draftee Nazem Kadri and well back of Tavares (and, it should be said, the incredible Auston Matthews, who is already 29th).

Even though they were drafted in the same year, Tavares at first and O’Reilly at 33rd, they didn’t seem to play each other much as kids. Tavares joined the OHL out of grade five, and O’Reilly didn’t join him until 2007. He has 129 OHL games played as he went straight to the NHL post draft. He has never played in the AHL.

In O’Reilly’s first year in the OHL, Tavares was third in the league in points, and O’Reilly was 73rd. Their second year together in that league, Tavares was first in points and O’Reilly was 38th.

In the NHL, Tavares is at 43.7% of his points as goals. For reference, a really unusual player in Auston Matthews is at 55.7% and an unusual player in the other direction is Mitch Marner at 30.2%. O’Reilly is at 37.5%. Considering the size of his career, it’s safe to call him a setup man rather than a goal scorer.

Other than the NHL and multiple Team Canada appearances, O’Reilly has played 12 games in the KHL in 2012. He also has more playoff games played than Tavares and, I would expect, anyone currently on the Leafs, even Matt Murray. “I would expect” is a generic term meaning, I ain’t looking that up, but you can.

O’Reilly is sticking with #90:

And Noel Acciari insults nerds everywhere with his number choice.

That’s it for now, Go Leafs Go!