Ramblings: More Shots for Celebrini, Boldy & Dorofeyev; More Power-Play Production for Raymond, Necas & Strome (June 9)

Brennan Des

2025-06-09

With Sunday being a rest day in the Stanley Cup Final schedule, it's a good time to reflect on the regular season. I thought we could discuss players who elevated their shot totals or power-play production, achieving elite status in that respective category. Let's get right into it!

Shots on Goal

Macklin Celebrini

2024-25: 3.37 shots/game (Rank: 13th overall)

2023-24: Not Ranked 

Celebrini racking up shots in his debut NHL campaign shouldn't come as a huge surprise. After all, he placed third in shots during his final NCAA season, posting 179 over 38 games. Most 18-year-olds aren't trusted with nearly 20 minutes of action a night, but Celebrini's elite talent demanded a high-volume of opportunity, and he used that time to put pucks on net. On the power-play, Celebrini shared the ice with Tyler Toffoli, who's been a shooting threat throughout his NHL career. Still, it was Celebrini who led the team in both shot attempts and actual shots with the man advantage. As San Jose's primary trigger man, Celebrini brings great value to the shots category in fantasy leagues.

Matt Boldy 

2024-25: 3.30 s/g (14th overall)

2023-24: 3.03 s/g (41st overall)

An increase of 0.27 shots per game may seem insignificant, but over the course of a season that's 22 extra shots, which could very well be the difference between sweet victory and bitter defeat in fantasy leagues. One of the things that helped Boldy shoot the puck more this year was more ice time. He saw 20 minutes and 17 seconds per game, up from 18:55 last year. Now, you may be wondering if Boldy shot the puck more often because superstar teammate Kirill Kaprizov wasn't in the lineup for half of the season. It's a fair question to ask, but my answer would be no. Boldy played 41 games with Kaprizov and 41 games without Kaprizov this season, ending up with five more shots in the latter sample. Sure, it's a difference, but not significant enough to cause concern that a healthy Kaprizov will hinder Boldy's shot rate next year. Boldy has come into his own as a star player and high-volume shooter in this league. He deserves to skate 20 minutes a night again next year, and doing so would help him match or improve on this year's shot rate. 

Pavel Dorofeyev

2024-25: 3.10 s/g (18th overall)

2023-24: 2.06 s/g (184th overall)

Increased opportunity was key to Dorofeyev's shooting binge this season. Last year, he saw just 13 minutes of ice time a night, holding a measly 20% share of Vegas' time with the man advantage. This year, he averaged 16 and a half minutes a night and saw 60% of Vegas' power-play time. Dorofeyev led the Golden Knights in power-play shots, illustrating his skillset as a shooter. Being trusted as the trigger man on a unit that also features Jack Eichel is no small feat. (In fairness, Eichel was just one PP shot behind Dorofeyev despite playing five fewer games, but the point still stands). While top unit PP time was undeniably beneficial for Doro, he wasn't overly reliant on the man advantage to boost his shot totals. From early December to early January, he was mostly relegated to the second unit and tallied just six shots on the power-play over 17 games. Although the power-play wasn't a great source for shots during this stretch, he still managed a respectable 2.76 shots per game because he's not afraid to shoot the puck, even at even strength. That willingness to shoot is reinforced by iFF, a stat that measures all unblocked shot attempts – goals, shots on net, and misses. Not only did Dorofeyev lead all Golden Knights in unblocked shot attempts at even strength, he ranked 20th across the league (via Natural Stat Trick). The 24-year-old forward is solidifying his identity in the NHL, and it seems that putting pucks on net is in his DNA. 

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Power Play Points

Lucas Raymond

2024-25: 37 Power Play Points (T3 overall)

2023-24: 16 PPP (113th overall)

There were a few key ingredients to Raymond's recipe for power-play success this year. For starters, he saw 67% of Detroit's total time with the man advantage, which is a significant jump from the 50% he saw last year. One might say that Raymond actually enjoyed decent power-play opportunity in his first two NHL campaigns, where he saw at 55-60% of Detroit's total PP time. There are two main reasons why the reps he saw on PP1 back then can't be compared to what he saw this past season: 1) he's made great strides and is a much better player at 23 than he was at 20 or 21 and 2) his supporting cast on the power play is better now than it was back then. To better illustrate that second point, let's review the Red Wings that saw top-unit time with Raymond in those early years. In Raymond's rookie campaign, it was Tyler Bertuzzi and Robby Fabbri. In his sophomore year, those two were replaced by David Perron and Alex Chiasson. This year, it was Patrick Kane and Alex DeBrincat. I don't think it's outlandish to suggest that Kane and DeBrincat represent a sizeable upgrade on the PP compared to past duos.

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With a now elite Raymond skating alongside four offensive dynamos, it's no surprise that Detroit posted a franchise-best PP success rate this season at a whopping 27%. A lot of that top-unit offense ran through Raymond as he registered a point on 72.6% of PP goals scored while he was on the ice. Now, that's higher than the 60% PPIPP Raymond posted in his previous three years, and for some players (see Strome below), it might be a red flag to suddenly start picking up more points than usual with the man advantage. However, that isn't as much of a concern here because Raymond is still young, so it's fair to view this season as his new normal now that he's develop into a better player, instead of as an anomaly had he been older and this came out of nowhere. To further dispel concerns about an inflated PPIPP, consider that Detroit's power-play configuration this year was different than previous years. That creates different dynamics, making it plausible that Raymond is more of a play driver with this group than he was before. If Kane re-signs and Detroit can get the band back together next year, I think a healthy Raymond hits 30 PPPs again.

Martin Necas

2024-25: 37 PPP (T3 overall)

2023-24: 13 PPP (137th overall)

I touched on Necas' power-play contributions when talking about Carolina's PP in last Sunday's Ramblings, so I won't spend too much time on him here.

We saw a glimpse of Necas' power-play prowess in 2022-23, when he racked up 26 PPPs thanks to consistent top-unit time for the first time in his career. For some strange reason, Carolina relegated him to the second unit the next season (last year), which is why he only managed 13 PPPs in 2023-24. He returned to the top unit this season and showed everyone that he's way too good for PP2. Necas racked up 22 PPPs in 49 games for Carolina, and then carried that success into Colorado, posting 15 points with the man advantage through 30 games after he was traded. The Avs' PP success rate went from 20.4% before the Necas trade, to a league leading 32.2% afterwards. Of course, Colorado dealt with a bunch of injuries in the first half which left PP1 in flux, so it wouldn't be fair to attribute that increase to Necas alone, but it's reassuring to see that he didn't mess with any MacKinnon or Makar mojo. If he remains in Colorado all year, he should be able to crack 30 PPPs again.

Dylan Strome

2024-25: 34 PPP (T7 overall)

2023-24: 22 PPP (T57 overall)

A minor increase in power-play success rate for Washington – from 20.6% to 23.5% – but a significant increase in power-play production for Strome. What gives? Well for starters, Strome registered a point on 83% of the PP goals scored while he was on the ice this season. In recent years, that number hovered between 50% and 70%, so this was certainly a sizable increase and some, myself included, might even call it an anomaly. It takes a really strong power-play driver to consistently get a point on 80% of their team's PP goals over a large sample. In fact, that honour has really only been reserved for Nikita Kucherov and Connor McDavid in recent years. As talented as Strome is, I just don't think he's on McDavid or Kucherov level, so I don't expect as much of Washington's PP offense to flow through him next year. Another red flag about Strome's power-play production is his lofty PP shooting percentage of 24.32%. While it's not outlandish for a strong shooter to post that kind of rate with the man advantage, this efficiency was unusual for Strome, whose previous PP shooting percentages in Washington were 13.6% and 11.11%. Although his impressive PP total is worth recognizing, given the unsustainable IPP and shooting percentage that fuelled it, I wouldn't expect him to repeat this feat next year. 

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Thanks for reading! Hope you have a great week ahead :)

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