Sabres’ Eichel quietly putting up solid stats
Patrik Laine is on pace for the most rookie goals in 11 years. Auston Matthews is chucking gasoline on the Calder Trophy fire. Connor McDavid is, well, Connor McDavid.
Jack Eichel? Just background noise.
Considered the best American prospect since Patrick Kane in the lead-up to the 2015 NHL draft, Eichel is traditionally a top-of-mind talent. Right now, though, it feels like he is an afterthought.
His generational player peers (McDavid, Matthews and Laine) are all enjoying excellent seasons yet, even lately, as Eichel stockpiles points (at least one in 17 of his last 20 games), the 20-yearold appears to be garnering little fanfare outside of Buffalo, where he does his thing on behalf of the Sabres.
Let’s take a look at potential reasons why and evaluate his season as a whole. Eichel was inactive for the Buffalo Sabres’ first 21 games. The sophomore centre suffered a high ankle sprain on the eve of the regular season and did not return until late November.
Out of sight, out of mind. But since his debut, Eichel has been dominant.
Eichel is ninth in league scoring over that span, his 49 points sandwiched between Erik Karlsson’s 48 and Brent Burns’s 50.
“His speed, it separates him so easily. His overall game, too — great stick, great shot, great hands — and I think it has been showing the past few months. He’s a first-class player,” said Chicago Blackhawks forward John Hayden, Eichel’s teammate on the 2012-13 U.S. National Team Development Program.
ABOUT THOSE POINTS
Eichel has made up for lost time, but how does his 20-year-old season stack up against others? In a word, splendidly: The list of recent 20-year-old NHLers more productive than Eichel is short.
Eichel’s 0.96 per-game rate (49 points in 51 games) is bested by six players in the salary-cap era — Sidney Crosby (1.36), Alex Ovechkin (1.31), McDavid (1.13), Steven Stamkos (1.11), Evgeni Malkin (1.09) and David Pastrnak (0.98).
Eichel finished second in rookie scoring last season, with 24 goals and 56 points in 81 games. Buffalo has 10 games left this year, so Eichel, who has 20 goals this season, is on pace to tie or break his rookie goal total.
What’s more, Eichel has proven he can dominate on the power play. Last year he put up 21 points on the man advantage. This year, he is tied for second in the NHL in PP points with 20.
ABOUT THOSE SHOTS
Sometimes a statistic is so unexpected it deserves to be double-, triple- and quadruple-checked. Exhibit A: Eichel is averaging four shots per game this year.
He is the co-leader in that category, tying Burns, and leads in shots since his debut.
Eichel’s 204 shots on goal is 11 more than teammate Evander Kane, the No. 2 generator. Eichel has recorded a shot in every game this season, hitting the 10-shot mark on two occasions.
SOME CONTEXT
Eichel is probably the hardest player out of the McDavid-Eichel-Matthews-Laine crew to get a handle on statistically.
His work without the puck leaves something to be desired and despite throwing everything on net, his puck possession numbers are curiously in the red once again (46.8 per cent in 201516; 46.6 per cent this season). To boot, he is unreliable on faceoffs (40.6 per cent for his career).
Sabres head coach Dan Bylsma told buffalohockeybeat.com that he is pleased with Eichel’s progress but stopped short of calling him a complete player.
“He’s worked hard on both sides of the puck — playing defence, defensive positioning, being a reliable and steady guy in the defensive zone,” Bylsma said in early March.
“The next level for Jack is being a guy who can play on both sides of the puck, (a) 200-foot game, being reliable and strong defensively and also be a guy that lugs the mail and is offensive on the other end of the rink.”