NHL Players adjusting to rules

The obstruction new rules are being called by the officials, but it hasn't made a big difference.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
There are signs that NHL players are adjusting to the new rules regarding obstruction.
Through Wednesday night's games, those calls were up slightly from last season -- 6.5 per game this year compared to 4.8 a year ago. As far as penalty minutes on a whole, this year there are 13.1 minutes being served as opposed to 12.3 in 2001.
"We're happy with where the officials have taken this," NHL director of officiating Andy Van Hellemond said of obstruction. "Give the players credit, they're buying into it and not doing it near as much as they did earlier in the season. We are right where we want to be."
Less clutching and grabbing
The lack of clutching and grabbing away from the puck might be why scoring is also on the rise.
There are an average of 5.4 goals scored per game this season, up 0.3 over last year. Power-play efficiency percentages are also on the rise -- a 16.6 percent success rate this year compared to 14.9 in 2001. Goalies are having a tougher time as well, recording only 24 shutouts so far, compared to 45 this time last year.
"There's been more up-and-down hockey and zipping around, more scoring chances," Van Hellemond said. "We tried to create more open ice and we've done that.
"I really believe the neutral zone is cleared up. Guys aren't getting held up and hooked and taken down. That's what we were told to address, and we've done that. We've done what we said we were going to do."
What the NHL has also said is that games would be faster, and boy are they. Quick faceoffs, which allow for only 20 seconds for line changes after play stoppages, cut 16 minutes off games in the preseason from last year's regular-season average.
Even NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said he didn't expect that to carry over into this regular season, but it has -- even topping it.
In the first quarter of last season, the average game time was 2 hours, 37 minutes. Now, it's down 17 minutes to 2:20.