Brandon Bussi

Thirty-one wins in thirty-nine games, on a .894, which tells you everything about the team in front of him.

Season	GP	W	L	OTL	GA	GAA	SO	SA	SV%
2025-26	39	31	6	2	97	2.47	2	912	.894
Career	39	31	6	2	97	2.47	2	912	.894

Last Season

Thirty-nine appearances, 31-6-2, a 2.47 goals-against average and a .894 save percentage with two shutouts. His first NHL season, at 27, undrafted.

The Physical Game

Six foot four, 218, and he plays the modern positional game — deep, square, letting the puck find him. Against the volume of low-danger shots a team like this concedes, that works.

The technique is unremarkable and the athleticism is ordinary. When he has to make a save that is not already in front of him, it is visibly harder work than it is for the better goaltenders in this book.

The Mental Game

An undrafted goaltender who reached the NHL at 27 and won thirty-one of thirty-nine, which requires a temperament even if it does not require much else.

Over his last ten appearances, .868 on 235 shots, which is a genuinely alarming finish and the reason this page carries a warning rather than a celebration.

The Intangibles

Thirty-one and six is one of the best won-lost records any goaltender will ever post and it is almost entirely not his. He stopped .894 — below the league median of .896 — behind a club that led the NHL in shot-attempt share at 59.8 per cent and finished first on the penalty kill.

Carolina’s goaltending came in thirteen goals worse than the chances it faced would predict. This was the one weakness on the best possession team in hockey, and it is the reason a club that generated 201 expected goals at five-on-five scored 184 and gave up more than it should have.

He is 28 with 39 games. The record will not repeat and the save percentage has to improve, or this club will keep losing games it comprehensively controlled.