DSP on Top Line Cost Caps a Playoff Game

Playoff hockey, as every cliché-riddled columnist has explained ad nauseam, is decided by inches. The smallest of details. The slightest of adjustments.Thus, it is rare that there’s one poor decision that everyone can point to as a satisfying explanation for a loss. As Capitals forward Joel Ward once explained: hockey is rife with random variables and trying to pin down a single cause can be a recipe for a simplistic disaster.

That caveat aside, tell me if something in this line deployment chart from Corsica doesn’t, well, stand out just a bit:

(Quick note: blue is advantage home team, and the darker the blue, the bigger advantage for the home team.) You’ll notice, amidst the sea of slightly…