Conventional Skater Stats

What’s a goal? What’s the point of points? How do I calculate plus/minus? If you have ever asked yourself these questions, you’re in the right place.

In this entry of the Hockey Handbook we are going to quickly run through the absolute basics of NHL skater (i.e. not goaltender) stats. Many hockey fans already know these stats inside-and-out but, if you want a refresher, stick around! If not, click HERE to browse through other Hockey Handbook entries.

Goals, Assists and Points

Goals, assists and points are the stats cited by the vast majority of the hockey world when comparing and/or evaluating forwards (and defensemen to a lesser degree). In other entries in the Hockey Handbook we will discuss why that is a flawed approach, but for now let’s content ourselves with discussing what these stats are.

Goals are self-explanatory – almost to the degree that they do not warrant an explanation. But, for the sake of completeness: A player is deemed to have scored a goal when they are the last player on their team to touch the puck before it enters the opposing teams net. An important point to stress here is the differentiation from soccer, where a defensive player can score an “own-goal” if they are the last player to touch the ball before it enters their net. “Own-goals” do not exist in hockey – a defensive player can deliberately shoot the puck into their own net and the goal will simply be awarded to the last player to touch the puck on the offensive team.

Assists are slightly more complicated than goals. Generally, the last two players on the offensive team to touch the puck before the goal scorer are awarded assists – but there are many caveats to this. For every goal scored two, one or zero assists can be awarded.

• Zero assists are awarded if the player who scores the goal is the first player on their team to gain “control” of the puck before the goal is scored. This means a player on the opposing team last had control before the goal scorer.
• A primary assist is awarded to the last player to have control of the puck before the goal scorer if that player is on the goal scorers team
• A secondary assist is awarded to the player who had control of the puck before the primary assister if that player is on the goal scorers team

Points = Goals + Assists. The NHL does not differentiate between primary and secondary assists in this calculation, both are worth one point. A forward’s point totals are a great indicator of how skilled and effective they are, but not a perfect indicator. For one, secondary assists are largely “luck-driven” and often can inflate an unskilled players point totals who has the benefit of playing with more skilled players. There is a lot more I can (and will!) say on the topic of solely points based forward evaluation, but we’ll save it for another entry of the Hockey Handbook.

Plus/Minus

Plus/Minus is a commonly cited stat so I will mention it here, but it should never be used for player evaluation. Ever. Full stop. It is a garbage stat. Seriously, if you are lucky enough to not know what Plus/Minus is, don’t read the next paragraph. You’re better off clicking on whatever advertisement you currently see on this page.

A player is awarded a “plus” (+1) if their team scores an even-strength, 6-on-5, or shorthanded goal while they are on the ice, and a “minus” (-1) if the opposing team scores an even-strength, 6-on-5, or shorthanded goal while they are on the ice. A player’s Plus/Minus is the sum of their pluses and minuses.

Much of the mainstream hockey media uses plus/minus as an indicator of a players defensive ability – a positive value indicating the player is strong defensively, and a negative value indicating a player is weak defensively. We will deconstruct this flawed approach in a future entry of the Hockey Handbook.

Shots and Shooting Percentage

A player is awarded a shot if they shoot the puck and:

1. They score
2. The opposing goalie stops them from scoring (i.e. makes a “save”)

Thus, if the player shoots and the puck misses the net, is blocked by an opposing skater, or hits the post they are not awarded a shot.

A player’s shooting percentage is their total goals divided by their total shots. It is that simple. Shooting percentage is one of the hallmarks of “luck analysis” in hockey, so expect me to revisit it frequently in the future. For now I’ll leave you with the figure below and a general statement: even for the most elite of shooters it is very hard to consistently maintain a shooting percentage above 20%.

Penalties

If a player breaks a rule, they are given a penalty by the referees. In reality it is more complicated than this simple statement – lot’s of analysis’ have shown that factors other than rule breaking have a large impact on the frequency and amount of penalties handed out. But I digress… As I have said about many other topics already, this is a discussion better suited for a future entry of the Hockey Handbook.

There are two main types of penalties – minor penalties and major penalties. Minor penalties are awarded for minor infractions such as hooking, slashing, cross-checking, tripping, elbowing, high-sticking, holding, etc. Major penalties are awarded for (you guessed it!) major infractions, such as fighting, hitting from behind, spearing, intent-to-injure, etc. You can learn about all the types of penalties HERE. 

We’re not going to dive deep into the intricacies of different penalty calls as we are more concerned about the stats side of penalties. A minor penalty results in a player having an additional 2 penalties-in-minutes (PIM) added to their stat line, whereas a major penalty results in an additional 5 PIM.

Wrapping Up

In this entry of the Hockey Handbook we broke down the fundamental stats of NHL skaters. Here is a quick, point-form review of the key concepts:

• Goals: Scored when a player’s shot enters the opponent’s net.
• Assists: Awarded to players involved in the scoring play, with caveats based on puck possession.
• Points: Sum of goals and assists, used for player evaluation but can be misleading.
• Plus/Minus: Flawed stat based on team goal differentials that is often used to glean a player’s defensive ability.
• Shots and Shooting Percentage: Shots awarded for on-target attempts; shooting percentage is goals divided by shots.
• Penalties: Result from rule infractions, categorized into minor and major penalties, with the corresponding penalty minutes added to a player’s stats.