The baseline numbers may not jump out to you when glancing over Karson Kuhlman’s stat line so far during the 2019-20 campaign.
In 17 games played, the 24-year-old winger has failed to light the lamp in 194:08 of 5v5 ice time. His lone tally came on the man advantage back on Feb. 4, capping the scoring on a convincing 4-0 victory over the Canucks.
The Esko, Minnesota native doesn’t exactly fit the profile of the finisher that the Bruins so desperately covet on David Krejci’s line. But much as we learned from Charlie McAvoy’s extended goal-scoring drought, goals are far from the be-all, end-all when it comes to assessing a player’s ability to drive offense.
After all, Kuhlman only managed to tally two goals and five total points over 11 games last season, but his wheels and knack for generating high-quality scoring chances paid dividends on a second line with Krejci and Jake DeBrusk — with that forward trio generating a 5v5 goals scored per 60 minute rate of 7.00 in 2018-19.
That was far and away tops among B’s forward lines that logged at least 50 minutes of 5v5 TOI. For reference, the Marchand-Bergeron-Pastrnak line’s GF/60 rate last year was 4.51.
This season, Kuhlman has once again been a spark plug when it comes to 5v5 offense — even if that goose egg under 5v5 tallies draws most looks.
Among Bruins skaters with at least 50 minutes of 5v5 TOI this season, Kuhlman ranks:
- 1st in individual 5v5 high-danger shot attempts per 60 minutes (4.52)
- 4th in individual 5v5 expected goals per 60 minutes (0.69)
- 5th in individual 5v5 shots per 60 minutes (8.32)
- 5th in individual 5v5 shot attempts per 60 minutes (13.55)
(For reference on McCurdy’s individual impact charts via Hockey Viz — On the offensive side of things, you’d want to see a player providing positive numbers — with the red blobs signifying where the team is generating a majority of their shots from whenever said player is on the ice. Defensively, negative numbers are a sign that a team is snuffing out opposing scoring chances whenever said player is on the ice. As such, the blue blobs represent where the opposition’s shots aren’t regularly coming from. As seen above, the Bruins' shot rates right around the Grade-A areas of the ice really dip when Kuhlman hasn't been out on a shift.)
Of course, Kuhlman would face some stiff competition for regular minutes on that third line. Sean Kuraly has been a recent revelation with Coyle + Bjork— with Boston scoring four 5v5 goals in their 53:07 of ice time together. However, it would seem likely that Cassidy would want to eventually slot Kuraly back down to his usual spot on the fourth line, where is often tasked with driving a key cog in Boston's forward corps. Danton Heinen is also another potential candidate for regular minutes with Coyle + Bjork, although he appears to be in Cassidy's doghouse on account of his lagging O-zone production.
Add in other potential call-ups down the stretch such as Zach Senyshyn, and regular minutes are far from a guarantee for Kuhlman if Boston does indeed swing a trade for a top-six winger. That being said, a little bit of internal competition on Coyle's line could be good for all parties involved. And if cream does indeed rise to the top, Kuhlman's ability to drive play should put him near the top of the leaderboard when it comes to scooping up these coveted 5v5 minutes.
Stats and graphs via Natural Stat Trick, Sean Tierney and HockeyViz.