Is it better for a team to be good at offense or defense?

It’s the age old question. What’s more important to have to win you a game: a high-octane offense or a stingy defense. Sometimes you even hear that the best defense is a good offense, or the inverse of the best offense is a good defense.

Am I going to provide the definitive answer to this question? Probably not, but I thought it would be fun to weigh the pros and cons of being elite at one of these two important aspects of the game. It’s the holiday’s, so why not dig into one of those classic hockey arguments you have with relatives over some turkey and pie.

The first thing that always comes to my mind when talking about this topic is that a strong defense’s biggest goal is to prevent mistakes. If you’re able to pull this off, it’s a great strategy, and more often than not makes you a frustrating opponent to play against. But the problem with playing to prevent mistakes is that if you do make a mistake, and it costs you, getting back in the game is a much more daunting task when you lack the offense to do so.

A good example of this is the early 2020’s New York Islanders teams under Barry Trotz. They were a dominant defensive team, and they frustrated opponents in the regular season and in the first couple of rounds in the playoffs with their ability to limit scoring chances. Teams like the Washington Capitals, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins and Boston Bruins couldn’t get much going offensively, and they didn’t have the defensive prowess to counter the Islanders enough for them to not get a couple goals of their own to get the win.

But, in both 2020 and 2021, they usually met their match in the Tampa Bay Lightning. The Lightning were one of the few teams that could either match them defensively or jump on them offensively off the hop, and once the Islanders found themselves behind, it was difficult for them to get back into the game.

On the other side of the coin, this year’s Toronto Maple Leafs team is a good example of the opposite effect: while a middling or awful defense will lead you to being behind more than you’d like, having a strong offense gives you the ability to get back in the game.

There’s no better example than the Leafs’ game against the Columbus Blue Jackets earlier in December. The Leafs defense, which allows the seventh-most expected goals against and the 11th-most actual goals against at 5v5 this season, and a poor performance from Ilya Samsonov put the Leafs in a situation where after two periods they were down 5-0. And yet their offense, which creates the 10th-most expected goals for and the 14th-most actual goals, was able to get them back in the game, and surprisingly tie it, in large part due to their elite talent that contributed to four of those goals.

That’s also because it plays into another aspect of the game called score effects. For those that don’t know, score effects is what happens when a team is up by a goal or two and starts to sit back more to protect the lead, focusing more on playing it safe and limiting the chances against instead of taking risks to add to the lead. That of course gives the other team more opportunities as they pile on the pressure to get the lead back, and if you’re a high-offense team like the Maple Leafs, it might help you tie the game.

Of course, that also means that if an offensive team were to get a big lead, their focus on defense will be even more important, and they may struggle with that aspect. That said, if they have a three goal lead and allow two goals, they may be inclined to go back on offense to add to the lead again, or even if they tie the game, it goes back to even play, and you can let your offense work at an even plane again.

If you’re a team that’s more focused on defense, this works against you at both aspects. If you’re executing your game plan the way you want to, you’ll get your chances to go up by a goal or two, and then sit back for the rest of the game. If your defense can hold off the onslaught, then it all works out, but if the other team manages to come back, you’re now at the problem where your team needs to get another goal or two when your team lacks the talent. Meanwhile, if you are behind by a goal or two, you will have score effects play in your favour, but the lack of an offense will mean that it’s harder to actually generate chances and goals.

Basically, the overall reasoning here is that a team more focused on defense has very little room for error, and while they are designed to be able to withstand that, when it goes wrong, it’s hard to get back in it. On the flip side, a team more focused on offense may make more mistakes, but it also has a lot more room for error and has the ability to erase those mistakes to get back in the game.

But that is heavily dependent on the type of offense that team deploys. If a team has depth throughout their lineup, it can be overwhelming and tough to match up properly, like what we saw with both the Florida Panthers and Vegas Golden Knights in last year’s playoffs. But if it’s more based on a few star players like the aforementioned Leafs, it becomes especially easier to target and shut down for defensive minded teams, especially when injuries come into play.

If you go back to the 2021 Montreal Canadiens’ infamous upset of the Leafs in the first round, the tide shifted when John Tavares was hurt in the first game. While they went on to lose three straight games after that and found themselves down 3-1 in the series, that was mostly due to the Leafs depth pieces and William Nylander generating the offense, while the Leafs top line of Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, and Zach Hyman had generated just two goals between them in the series. Once the Leafs depth dried up, the Habs were able to take control of the series.

The reason is because the Canadiens were one of the better defensive teams in the league that season, and had one of the best shutdown lines with Philip Danault, Brendan Gallagher, and Tomas Tatar. With Tavares out of the equation, the Leafs only had one high-end offensive line for teams to focus on, and that Danault line did just that, while the few mistakes they did make were easily saved by Carey Price in his brief return to form. That then meant that the rest of the Canadiens’ lineup just needed to withstand Nylander and the rest of the team, and while Nylander did get five goals in that series, only him, Jason Spezza, and Jake Muzzin had more than one goal.

Another thing that benefits more defensive-minded teams is the fact that NHL officiating tends to prefer to keep things even, and not call a significant amount of penalties for one team. This was always thought to be the case, but then it was more or less confirmed to be a reality in 2021 when referee Tim Peel admitted to giving the Nashville Predators a soft call to even up the penalties.

The refs reasoning for it is that they don’t want to influence the game and give one team an advantage over another, but in fact, they do the opposite. If one team is controlling the play over the other and trapping them in the defensive zone, that means that the other team is more likely to make a mistake and take a penalty due to fatigue from constant defending in high-pressure situations. By focusing on keeping calls even, referees give an advantage to the defensive-minded teams by letting them get away with more if the calls are lopsided against them, while hyperfocusing on the other team’s mistakes to even up the calls. It also keeps the offensive teams from getting power play opportunities to add to the score.

In the past five seasons, only ten teams have drawn 0.5 more penalties per 60 minutes than they’ve taken, and half of those teams are from this 2023-24 season and dealing with a small sample size. In fact, only three teams in that span finished with 41 more penalties drawn than taken on the year, displaying how hard it is for a team to even average one more penalty drawn than taken over a two-game span.

Now, three of those originally discussed 10 teams were the Colorado Avalanche from 2019 to 2022 that were an elite possession team, so it does show that you can overcome this by absolutely overwhelming your opponent and giving the officials no leeway for even up calls, but that kind of play is very hard to pull off consistently.

This especially comes into play in the playoffs, where penalties are called even less as a series and the playoffs go along. While the average penalty called increases in the playoffs, a lot of that is earlier on in the series and in the playoffs as a whole, as pointed out by Cam Charron in this article written before the 2023 playoffs. So not only does this advantage play out for defensive teams in the regular season, the playoffs are literally more catered towards their style based on how officiating plays out.

Now that I’ve thrown out some of my own arguments and theories for both cases, let’s dive into the numbers a little bit. I took a look at all the teams in the past five full seasons to that were either offense-oriented (ranking top 10 in expected goal generation and in the bottom half of the league in expected goal suppression) or defense-oriented (ranking top 10 in expected goal suppression and in the bottom half in expected goal generation), and decided to stack up their results against each other.

In terms of regular season success, the results are quite inconsequential. Of the 18 teams to fall into my definition of offense-oriented, they combined for a 0.599 point percentage, or a 98-point pace in a full season, while the 16 teams that fell under the umbrella of defense-oriented had a .593 points percentage, or a 97-point pace in a full season. Both categories feature one Presidents’ Trophy winner as well, with the 2019-20 Boston Bruins being more of a defensive team while the 2021-22 Florida Panthers were more of an offensive team.

The playoffs are a slightly different story. In terms of teams to actually make the playoffs, both categories only had four teams miss the playoffs, with 14 of 18 offensive teams and 12 of 16 defensive teams having successful regular seasons.

Beyond that, the offensive teams see a bit more success. Eight of the 18 won a playoff series, three of them made it to the Conference Finals, and the 2022-23 Florida Panthers were the closest to winning a Stanley Cup by losing in the Finals in five games. For the defensive teams, only four of them won a playoff series, but none of them won more than that.

What can you take away from that? Well, mostly that if you’re a top 10 offensive or defensive team, you’ll likely be competitive so long as you aren’t really bad at the other aspect. Why do offensive teams see a bit more success in the playoffs? My best bet would be that it’s due to the fact that they’re hedging their success on players scoring goals, which is a bit more of a predictable talent to be able to acquire players for, while defensive teams will fall more at the wayside of their goaltending, which continues to be inconsistent and sees goalies waiver on a year-to-year basis. Sure, they can create strong defensive environments that most goalies can perform decently in, but there’s been many a good team sunken by poor goaltending. That might not be the only reason, but it wouldn’t surprise me if that was a big factor.

That said, offensive teams don’t exactly have consistent playoff success either, so that’s not exactly the preferred method here, as you’d ideally like to be good at both. In fact, of the 22 teams in the same span that finished top 10 in both expected goal generation and suppression, they have a combined .656 points percentage in the regular season, good for a 107-point pace, and they also make up the other three Presidents’ Trophy winners. 19 of them made the playoffs, 12 of them won a playoff series, nine of them made it to the Conference Finals, and four of them won the Stanley Cup. The only team to win the Cup without finishing top 10 in both stats? The 2021-22 Colorado Avalanche, who were only 13th in expected goal generation.

So being good at both is definitely the preferred option, but if you don’t have the personnel to do so, it’s best to lean into the players you do have. Got Connor McDavid, Auston Matthews, Jack Hughes, Sidney Crosby, or Matthew Tkachuk? Lean into your offense and let them dominate. Got a group of players and defensemen that play strong defense together like the Minnesota Wild, or an elite goalie in your crease like the Islanders or Nashville Predators? Lean into your defense and make the other team’s stars miserable.

It’s a bit of a cop out answer, but it’s the truth. There are arguments to be made for both strategies, and the results indicate that both are similarly successful, so there isn’t exactly a right answer that isn’t either “be good at both” or “build your strategy around your best players”. It’s the reality of the modern NHL game, it’s changing so constantly that there is no one right way to do things. It’s about building around your team, maintaining a competitive window for as long as possible, and then hoping to all hell that luck goes your way for a playoff run or two that you can win it all.