NHL Hall of Famer Ray Bourque scored 173 power-play goals, the most by any defenseman in league history. His record will not be approached anytime soon, if ever.
Shea Weber, whose career is over, leads all active defensemen with 106 man-advantage goals. Zdeno Chara retired with 93. Brent Burns is at 80.
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“They don’t make them like them that much anymore,” the Bruins’ Chris Wagner says of muscle-bound, long-range rocket launchers.
Indeed, slap-happy strikers like Weber, Chara and Burns used to stand at the point, raise their sticks and strike sizzlers that made goalies tremble. In 2016-17, for example, Montreal’s power play centered on Weber’s chance creation from the blue line. You can see it clearly in this heat chart, with the high-shot-volume areas in orange:
That has changed. With the adoption of the 1-3-1 power-play formation happening leaguewide, the point man has become a distributor first.
The shot to score, particularly the slap shot, has become an afterthought.
You can see it in the stats. Since the NHL began tracking shot types, the number of power-play slap shots per game has been nearly cut in half, from 2.68 in 2009-10 to 1.40 in 2021-22, per the NHL. That doesn’t correlate perfectly with point shots, because slap shots from the flank are also common, but it does suggest what we’ve seen to be true. So do other stats. Capitals winger Alex Ovechkin has led the league in power-play slap shots each of the past eight years. The four seasons before that, point men led the league (P.K. Subban and Dustin Byfuglien). Boston, which had 2.5 or more power-play slap shots per game in 2009-10, 2010-11 and 2011-12, when Chara was on the point, has averaged 1.5 per season over the past four seasons.
You can see the shift in heat charts also. Last season, for instance, the Rangers’ top-unit power-play quarterback was Adam Fox. His priority was to get pucks to Mika Zibanejad (15 power-play goals), not fire it himself (38 shots), as seen here:
Fox and Quinn Hughes are considered two of today’s sharpest power-play quarterbacks. Bourque’s standard is in neither of their sights. The two have each scored just three power-play goals in their careers. They combined for zero in 2021-22.
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It didn’t limit team success. Fox’s Rangers were fourth in the NHL on the power play, converting 25.2 percent of their opportunities. Hughes’ Canucks were ninth, at 23.5 percent. Overall, the league average rose to 20.6 percent from 19.8 percent a season earlier. In 2022-23, through Wednesday, teams have been successful on 21.2 percent of opportunities. A decade ago, in the heyday of Chara and Weber, it was 17.9 percent.
These are not isolated cases. They’re the products of evolution in NHL power plays, which players and coaches helped lay out for The Athletic.
From the top to the flanks
Panthers coach Paul Maurice has had at his disposal the owners of plenty of hammers over the years, from Bryan McCabe in Toronto to Joe Corvo in Carolina to Byfuglien in Winnipeg.
During his time with the Maple Leafs, Maurice regularly sent out McCabe and Tomas Kaberle to work the point on his No. 1 power-play unit. From what Maurice recalls, the point of emphasis shifted from the blue line to lower in the formation in the 1990s. He credits the Canadiens, with Saku Koivu serving as the primary shooter, for first making it a regular occurrence.
The movement exploded upon Ovechkin’s arrival in the NHL. It did not take former Capitals coach Glen Hanlon long to figure out Ovechkin’s lethality from what would become his left-side office. As a rookie in 2005-06, Ovechkin scored 21 power-play goals, sixth-most in the league.
Seventeen seasons later, Ovechkin is still firing. With each man-advantage goal he scores, he adds to his NHL-best sum. And his favored spot has not grown less profitable:
Meanwhile, understudies such as the Lightning’s Steven Stamkos are adding their stylistic touches.
Stamkos, you can see, usually sets up even lower in the left-side setup than Ovechkin:
In Winnipeg, Maurice identified his own half-wall specialist in Patrik Laine. In 2018-19, Winnipeg had the league’s No. 4 power play (24.8 percent). Laine scored 15 power-play goals. Byfuglien, the thundering point presence, had one.
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“The Ovechkins of the world changed it. Ovechkin and Stamkos,” Maurice says. “Guys that can hammer the puck on the flank, they became the shooters. Even the big-number guys like Byfuglien, when our power play ran fourth and you’ve got Patrik Laine on the one side as the shooter, their goal numbers go way down. Because they’re just feeding those guys.”
Coaches are stationing their most talented finishers on the elbows. The shooters are usually on their off sides, free to whistle one-timers or walk the puck off the walls to shoot or pass. Penalty kills are designed to acknowledge the elbows as the primary threats.
“We don’t want the half-wall,” says the Panthers’ Aaron Ekblad. “Because some of the best players in the world are on the half-wall.”
It is not just a matter of talent. Even Ovechkin’s shot is relatively manageable if he uncorks a stationary slap shot.
The lethality of the half-wall presence is a combination of talent and puck movement. If Nicklas Backstrom threads a pass from the right-side half-boards through the penalty-killing box and into Ovechkin’s wheelhouse, few netminders can handle what’s coming.
A goalie would first have to respect Backstrom’s shot. He would then have to push from left to right to follow the pass, square up to Ovechkin and be in a position to deny the top power-play finisher in the history of the game. According to Clear Sight Analytics, flank shooters are seven times more likely to score a power-play goal following a dish across the slot line than off a pass from the top.
“It’s cross-ice,” Bruins goalie Linus Ullmark says of the biggest PP threat. “Across the middle. Especially if it goes twice. The more times it goes through the middle, it’s harder for us to keep track of it and keep beating the pass. That’s the toughest one.”
What makes it even harder is how power plays are deploying their other attackers. In Washington’s formation, T.J. Oshie is present in the bumper. Evgeny Kuznetsov is lurking as the goal-line presence. Penalty killers are tasked with shadowing these dangermen. That makes for a jungle of legs and torsos and sticks in a goalie’s sight.
“It’s a lot of bodies in front,” Ullmark says. “You have six, seven guys standing basically in the middle of the zone between the dots whenever there’s a pass going cross-ice. There’s a lot of bodies and sticks in the way. It can get deflected. Maybe you lose track of the puck while it’s going to the other side. It’s easy when it goes cross-ice and there’s no one in front of you. It wouldn’t be an issue. As soon as you implement more and more bodies in front of you, the more chance there is for you to lose it.”
Meanwhile, defensemen who used to pound point pucks have become few and far between.
Movement, smarts, vision
John Carlson has been Washington’s blue-line quarterback for the better part of a decade. Between 2013-14 and 2021-22, he scored 199 power-play points. Among defensemen, only Keith Yandle (207) and Victor Hedman (204) recorded more.
During that time, Carlson had 393 shots, the ninth-most among defensemen. So while Carlson shoots to keep penalty kills from overcommitting to Ovechkin, his first task is to move the puck.
“He’s pretty poised,” says the Bruins’ Charlie Coyle. “He just seems like a calm guy, a calm player. It seems like he doesn’t overthink a lot.
“Sometimes you don’t know what those guys are doing with the puck. They’re not committed to one thing. They adjust. Of course, you’ve got Ovi over there on the flank. So that can open some things up. You’ve always got that threat there. But he’s good at getting shots too. Whether it’s a little subtle fake or a look-off to Ovechkin or the other guy on the half-wall, he slides one through you. It doesn’t need to be a hard shot. If you get it through and there’s traffic there, there’s guys for tip-ins. They have some guys around the net who play it very well.”
In 2021-22, Fox (33 assists) and Hughes (31) were first and third, respectively, in power-play helpers among defensemen. While Fox’s top priority was to get pucks to Zibanejad, Hughes’ was to distribute to Bo Horvat (13 power-play goals), Brock Boeser (11) and Elias Pettersson (10). In comparison to Burns (13.2 shots per 60 minutes of PP time), neither Hughes (10.4) nor Fox (9.9) was focused on shots.
Adam Fox looks for a play. (Brace Hemmelgarn / USA Today)
“Their ability to move the puck quickly,” Bruins coach Jim Montgomery says of the qualities elite point men share. “The puck moves quicker than anyone’s feet. So their reads on when to allow the puck to do the work. Then when they don’t have anything, using their God-given ability and feet to make things happen. Any time you can shift the box with puck movement or their feet makes it hard on the four. Because the two-on-ones become more evident.”
The point defenseman has evolved into a mover, thinker and distributor. He shimmies along the blue line from wall to wall, looking for passing seams and the occasional shooting lane.
You could make the case that Fox (24 years old), Hughes (23) and the Avalanche’s Cale Makar (23) are the present and future of the position. Makar in particular.
Change coming?
In the opening round of last season’s playoffs, the Lightning scored on 21.2 percent of their power plays against Toronto. They improved to 26.7 percent in Round 2 against the Panthers. They were at 21.4 percent in the third round against the Rangers.
They dropped to 10.5 percent in the Stanley Cup Final against Colorado. Stamkos did not have a power-play goal. Nikita Kucherov had one. Corey Perry was the only other Lightning to score on the power play.
“All of the great power-play shooters are on the flanks right now. They’re pretty darn effective with it,” Maurice said. “But there’s been a change over the past couple years. When you look at the way Colorado killed against Tampa, with the Stamkos and Kucherov connection, it’s more of a diamond. They’re more in shot lanes. There’s more direct-lane pressure.”
In the playoffs, the Avalanche ran their power play through Nathan MacKinnon. He scored six goals on 38 shots. Makar scored twice on 12 shots.
But in the regular season, Makar was a more robust scoring presence, scoring nine power-play goals, second-most on the team after Mikko Rantanen (16). Of those nine goals, four were via point wristers, like this walk-and-snap snipe against Nashville on April 28.
Makar one-timed three from the top of the left circle. He did not score any off a straight slap shot.
Through 182 career games, Makar had scored 17 power-play goals, giving him an average of 0.093 per game. It’s well above the 0.014 rates of Hughes and Fox — and closer to Bourque’s 0.107 pace.
“He’s very good on his feet and his edges where he can get guys to slide out of the way, then shoot one in from the point with traffic in front,” Coyle says of Makar. “You see more of those guys lately. I feel that’s just how the whole league’s going. You’ve got to be able to skate. All these defensemen who can control it up there, they’re just great skaters. They’re so crafty with it. They can make plays, passes, getting shots through. It makes it fun to watch. But not fun to play against those guys.”
It’s possible Makar could be a goal-scoring unicorn. The 23-year-old is both young and talented enough to make a run up the career scoreboard. He would do so by using up-top wristers with reinforcements in front.
“I still think it’s a dangerous shot if they have two net-front guys,” says the Bruins’ Connor Clifton of a shot from the point. “A lot of teams play the 1-3-1. So they’ve got that high presence and the low presence net-front. It does become a dangerous shot, whether it’s (Chara) going 100 miles an hour or an Adam Fox wrister from the point. I think it is dangerous, especially when you give the high forward the ability to tip it.”
Another shift could be pending, too. There is too much penalty-killing presence at the flanks to continue ignoring the point.
“The guy at the top’s going to have to start shooting the puck more,” Maurice says. “It’s an evolution of the shooter.”
Stylistically, a return to the days of juggernauts banging slappers is unlikely. Deception will be the wave of the future. A wrister with traffic is a lot easier to disguise than a roof-scraping slap shot.
Goalies do not like the releases they cannot see.
(Top photo of Alex Ovechkin: Christopher Hanewinckel / USA Today)