The Biggest Surprises of the 2015 NHL Playoffs so Far

Sometimes, the most interesting stories in the NHL playoffs are the really surprising ones.

There's something grand about watching a team that is widely recognized as elite push its way through the postseason, methodically dispatching its opposition. But it's at least as much fun to see that mighty juggernaut crash, brought to its knees by some Cinderella club.

The playoffs can be a showcase for an acknowledged star who pushes his game to new heights, but they can also put the spotlight on an unlikely hero—some fourth-line grinder or third-pairing defenceman who transforms into a hockey-playing Midas, turning everything he touches into goals for a few weeks.

It's still early in the playoffs, but not so early that there haven't been surprises. The following slideshow highlights some of the moments—both good and bad—that caught us a little off guard.

Evgeni Malkin's Pointless Playoffs

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It wasn't really a surprise to see the Pittsburgh Penguins bow out early in this year's playoffs. Given the decimated state of the club's blue line, a late-season swoon that coincided with that pain and the quality of the New York Rangers, there really wasn't much reason to expect the Pens to advance.

What was surprising was how irrelevant Pens center Evgeni Malkin was for his team.

In five games, Malkin failed to record a single point. He managed just five shots over the series' first four games, and even some increased output in the final match between the two clubs left his shot totals at roughly half of what they usually are in the postseason.

What makes this so surprising is how good Malkin has been in the postseason over this career. He had 111 points in 96 playoff games entering the year and had topped the point-per-game mark in five of his last six postseason runs.

He's a proven performer under intense pressure. He just didn't get it done this year.

The Plucky Calgary Flames

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These playoffs lack a really compelling underdog story, as we've already seen all but one of the eight lowest-seeded teams eliminated. The exception, Chicago, should surprise exactly nobody.

The Calgary Flames stand out, however.

Perhaps the biggest surprise is the way the Flames made the playoffs. Engaged in a heated neck-and-neck battle with the Los Angeles Kings down the stretch, conventional wisdom suggested that L.A. would find a way to close the gap and pass its rivals.

After all, the Kings had won two of the last three Stanley Cups, while the Flames were a favourite to finish near the bottom of the Western Conference.

But when the dust cleared, it was Calgary with 97 points and L.A. with 95.

The Flames continued to exceed expectations in the playoffs, knocking off the favoured Vancouver Canucks in the first round. Though eliminated in five games by a much stronger Anaheim Ducks club, the Flames showed spirit and can hold their heads high after a surprisingly successful season.

Steven Stamkos' Scoring Scarcity

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Tampa Bay Lightning forward Steven Stamkos is one of the NHL's most feared goal scorers, an elite offensive weapon who routinely finishes at or near the top of the league in that department.

That makes it more than a little weird to scroll through the NHL's playoff goal leaders and see him tied with people like Karl Alzner, Tom Gilbert and Brandon Bollig (all with two).

It's really not that surprising in the grand scheme of things, since he has a 6.7 shooting percentage through the playoffs so far. History is full of players who have had nasty shooting percentage runs over 30-shot samples, owing to injury, tight checking, a loss of confidence or even simply the vagaries of playing NHL hockey.

But we do tend to expect the best players to lead the way in the postseason, and Stamkos simply hasn't done that to date.

The Winnipeg Jets' Inability to Hold a Lead

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The media has for the most part been pretty kind to the Winnipeg Jets in the wake of their sweep at the hands of the Anaheim Ducks, and understandably so.

The Jets hadn't played playoff hockey in ages, Winnipeg fans were obviously pumped, and the series against the Ducks saw lots of highly physical games in which the score was close.

But it is a little shocking how incapable of holding a lead the team was.

In each of the series' first three games, the Jets entered the third period with the lead. However, from the start of the third period on, Anaheim outscored Winnipeg by a 7-0 margin over those three contests, winning every one of those games in the process.

Braden Holtby's Uncanny Imitation of a 4' X 6' Chunk of Plywood

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Braden Holtby is a very good goaltender. He's been that for some time now, both in the regular season and in the playoffs. I recently wrote a whole column which basically said that he'd long been underrated and it was nice to see that changing.

With that said, his 2015 playoff performance has been much more than very good. It's been among the best in NHL history.

With a .944 save percentage, Holtby is running neck-and-neck with the numbers posted by Jonathan Quick during his Conn Smythe-winning postseason with L.A. in 2012 (.946). Holtby has a modest 6-6 record despite his brilliance.

He, more than any other player, is keeping the Washington Capitals alive in these playoffs.

Duck Dominance

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The Anaheim Ducks finished third in the NHL in 2014-15 with 109 points and entered the playoffs as the No. 1 seed in their division, so some would argue that it isn't surprising to see them playing so well through two rounds.

It is, however, at least a little shocking to see the margin by which they are winning their games.

Anaheim scored 236 goals and surrendered 226 during the regular season, good for a plus-10 goal differential over 82 games. That's a thoroughly mediocre number. The Ducks ranked No. 17 in the NHL in terms of goal differential and only won so many games because they came away with the win in virtually every close contest.

That isn't how the club has won in the playoffs.

Through nine games over two rounds, Anaheim has outscored its opposition 35-18, meaning it's jumped from a per-game goal differential of plus-0.1 during the season to plus-1.9 in the playoffs. That is shocking.

Corey Perry Being on the Receiving End of a Questionable Hit

Anaheim Ducks winger Corey Perry has a long record as a skater who plays right on the edge of the rules and sometimes even on the wrong side of the line. So when there's an incident involving him, it's generally a safe bet that he was the aggressor.

Not so on Sunday, when he took a nasty-looking shot from Calgary's Matt Stajan, a player who doesn't have much history with this sort of behavior.

Fortunately, Perry wasn't seriously hurt and returned to the game. He even scored the overtime winner which clinched the series for Anaheim and ended the Flames' season.

The Washington Capitals Are the Most Physical Team in Hockey

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At least according to hit counts.

Puck Daddy's Greg Wyshynski put the spotlight on the Capitals on Friday, noting that the team's 46 home hits per game are 5.5 more than the NHL-leading Los Angeles Kings in last year's playoffs:  

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The Washington Capitals have apparently dished out 459 of them in 11 games, more than hundred more than the No. 2 ranked Montreal Canadiens have in 10 games–334 hits. 

Now, how could the Capitals arrive at such an elephantine number? Why it’s because they’ve been credited with 276 hits in their six home games.

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My immediate reaction was to laugh, because while the Caps have been plenty physical, the NHL's official hit count is one of those things that lives in the grey area between fact and fiction. But it's too simple to just discredit the data.

First, while Washington does have some history of generous home counting, 2014-15 actually saw the team get more credit for hits in away games than at home.

Second, the Capitals are also the league's road hit leaders in the playoffs.

What we can say with certainty is that head coach Barry Trotz has the Capitals playing the kind of heavy, physical hockey they haven't been known for in years past.

Statistics courtesy of NHL.com and War-on-Ice.com.