This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Denton Mateychuk
Columbus Blue Jackets Defense
45 games at 21, 5-11, and a defenceman whose development matters more to this club than anybody's.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024-25 | CBJ | 45 | 4 | 9 | 13 | +4 | 20 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 44 | 9.1 | 18:02 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 45 | 4 | 9 | 13 | +4 | 20 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 44 | 9.1 | 18:02 |
This Season So Far
The 2025-26 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
4 goals and 9 assists in 45 games for 13 points, plus-4, on 18:02 a night in his first NHL season.
47 per cent at five-on-five, the 24th percentile, over 657 minutes. His on-ice goals were 41-34 against an expected 23-26, which is 18 goals of finishing above expectation — the rating and the plus-4 both need discounting heavily.
The Finesse Game
The skating is the whole player and it is very good — he escapes pressure by changing direction, he carries out of his own zone under control, and he is comfortable joining a rush at 21.
The puck decisions are already better than most first-year defencemen’s. 44 shots in 45 games is modest volume and the offence has not translated yet; the passing is where the value will be.
The Physical Game
5-11 and 188, and it is the whole question. He cannot clear a net front, loses board battles to NHL forwards, and against a heavy forecheck the puck goes in behind him.
20 penalty minutes over 45 games is a high rate for a rookie of this size, and it reflects being beaten more than being aggressive.
The Intangibles
A first-round pick, a dominant junior career, and 45 NHL games at 21 in a top-four role on a club that was in a playoff race.
He is the second-most important development in the organisation after Adam Fantilli. The pattern to watch is the one every small offensive defenceman faces: whether a system and a partner can be found that let the skating matter more than the size.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 657 minutes
- Expected goals
- 47%
- 24th pct
- Shot attempts
- 45.1%
- 12th pct
share of the chances while he was out there
share of the attempts while he was out there
Goals while he was on the ice: 41 for, 34 against. Expected: 22.9 and 25.9.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 7 points of one another. It was written for a back edition, with the seasons that followed already known. Neither the agreement nor the gap says anything about the eye, and this report is excluded from the club-level comparison for the same reason.
Both bars are percentiles among the 357 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 69 on their own scale — against every other report's mean. The numbers bar ranks his share of expected goals. A gap is a disagreement about where he belongs, not two scales talking past each other.
Usual linemates
2024-25 · 657 minutes at five-on-five
Share of his five-on-five ice time spent alongside each player, measured from shift charts. Special teams are excluded: a power-play unit is not a line.
Why the numbers land there
Five-on-five, 2024-25
- The club
- CBJ took 48.3% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 47.0% — 1.3 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- Second pair, 657 minutes at five-on-five — 25th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ivan Provorov | 46.1% | 49.8% | 48.9% |
| Dmitri Voronkov | 47.6% | 46.7% | 49.3% |
| Adam Fantilli | 46.4% | 47.2% | 44.1% |
46.1% together, 49.8% for him apart and 48.9% for Provorov apart. He was better away from Provorov, who was no worse away from him — the pairing cost him more than it cost Provorov.
Expected-goal share while both were on the ice, and for each man in the minutes he played without the other. Apart is the pair subtracted from his own totals. It does not settle who was carrying whom — apart from each other, both were still playing with somebody — but it does say whether the share travelled when the pairing broke up.
Where he shoots from
goal on goal missed
69 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 4 of them goals. His median goal came from 43 feet. 10% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 61% from beyond forty.