Beat the Traffic

Everybody loves a thrilling third period come back. But what are the odds of that happening? I decided to take a look at the records of every CCHA and WCHA team when trailing after two periods last season in conference play.

Alaska-Fairbanks: 0-12-1
Bowling Green: 1-15-0
Ferris State: 2-8-3
Lake Superior: 0-11-0
Miami: 0-4-2
Michigan: 1-6-0
Michigan State: 1-4-2
Nebraska-Omaha: 1-8-2
Northern Michigan: 1-10-0
Notre Dame: 1-12-1
Ohio State: 2-10-1
Western Michigan: 1-14-3

Yikes. That's a combined record of 11-114-15 which is good for a winning percentage of 13.2%. Ferris State wins the Captain Comeback Award with their impressive 26.9% winning percentage when trailing after two periods.

Now lets look at the WCHA.

Alaska-Anchorage: 0-15-1
Colorado College: 2-8-0
Denver: 1-6-2
Michigan Tech: 0-15-3
Minnesota: 1-3-0
Minnesota-Duluth: 0-17-0
Minnesota State: 0-13-0
North Dakota: 0-8-0
St. Cloud: 2-7-0
Wisconsin: 0-7-1

That's a combined record of 6-99-7 for a winning percentage of 8.5%. Minnesota had the best team winning percentage with 25%, but was also only trailing going into the third period half as many times as the next best team.

The two leagues combined for a total of 17 comeback wins and 22 comeback ties when a team was trailing going into the third period, out of a total 252 chances, giving them a winning percentage of 11.1%. No team had more than 2 come from behind victories when trailing after two periods.

You always hear the old cliche about the third period being the most period, but these numbers would seem to indicate otherwise. As long as one team has an advantage going into the third period, the game is pretty much over around 90% of the time.