This is the 2022-23 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Elias Lindholm
Calgary Flames Center
Forty-two goals at 17.9 per cent, 2:07 shorthanded at the 95th percentile, and 59.0 per cent of the chances.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 | CAR | 58 | 9 | 12 | 21 | -14 | 4 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 70 | 12.9 | 14:32 |
| 2014-15 | CAR | 81 | 17 | 22 | 39 | -23 | 14 | 4 | 0 | 4 | 170 | 10.0 | 16:25 |
| 2015-16 | CAR | 82 | 11 | 28 | 39 | -23 | 24 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 176 | 6.3 | 18:07 |
| 2016-17 | CAR | 72 | 11 | 34 | 45 | -2 | 16 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 151 | 7.3 | 18:11 |
| 2017-18 | CAR | 81 | 16 | 28 | 44 | -8 | 18 | 6 | 0 | 4 | 153 | 10.5 | 17:54 |
| 2018-19 | CGY | 81 | 27 | 51 | 78 | +30 | 20 | 9 | 1 | 5 | 182 | 14.8 | 20:02 |
| 2019-20 | CGY | 70 | 29 | 25 | 54 | -8 | 22 | 8 | 0 | 7 | 169 | 17.2 | 19:43 |
| 2020-21 | CGY | 56 | 19 | 28 | 47 | +10 | 22 | 6 | 0 | 4 | 130 | 14.6 | 19:54 |
| 2021-22 | CGY | 82 | 42 | 40 | 82 | +61 | 22 | 10 | 1 | 9 | 235 | 17.9 | 19:57 |
| 2022-23 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 663 | 181 | 268 | 449 | +23 | 162 | 51 | 3 | 38 | 1436 | 12.6 | 18:21 |
This Season So Far
The 2022-23 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
42 goals and 40 assists in 82 games — 82 points at 19:57 a night, plus-61, with 22 penalty minutes.
59.0 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 1,186 minutes, the 97th percentile among forwards. His ice went 85-38 against an expectation of 64.67-44.87 — twenty more goals for than the chances promised and seven fewer against, which is what a plus-61 is made of.
Forty-two goals is a career high by thirteen, in his ninth season.
The Finesse Game
17.9 per cent shooting is the 93rd percentile among forwards, on 235 shots from a median of 23 feet with 56 per cent from the slot. 2.99 even-strength points per 60 is the 93rd percentile.
He is a shooter who takes his shots from the right places, and 42 goals off 235 attempts is a finishing season rather than a volume one. 23 per cent of his points came on the power play, the 66th percentile — most of this was five-on-five.
The Physical Game
6-1 and 200. 2:07 a night shorthanded is the 95th percentile among forwards, on the 2nd-best penalty kill in the league, and 2.02 takeaways per 60 is the 76th percentile.
2.42 hits per 60 is the 26th percentile and 0.37 penalties taken per 60 is the 17th — 22 penalty minutes in 82 games from a first-line centre who plays both special teams.
22.0 mph is the 26th percentile among forwards and 9.39 miles per 60 is the 29th. He is not fast, he does not cover ground, and he plays twenty minutes a night as the best two-way centre on a 111-point team. The value is entirely in position and anticipation, which nothing here measures.
The Intangibles
Fifth overall in 2013 by Carolina, and 663 games with 449 points at 27.
He played 2,027 attempts with Johnny Gaudreau and 170 without him. There is no sample of Lindholm apart from Gaudreau worth reading. What can be read is the other split: without Matthew Tkachuk he was at 61.0 per cent across 352 attempts, which is the best evidence on this roster that at least one member of that line was carrying his own weight.
What kind of player
The searchable half of the report. The first group is computed from the season's own data; the rest are read out of the prose above, and each one carries the sentence that produced it. A subject the report never raised is simply absent.
- measuredcomputed here from the season's own data
- a strengthread out of the prose, and claimed
Each computed tag also says how well its measure holds up from one season to the next, because a tag describes a season that has finished and a reader will assume it predicts the one coming. Some do and some do not, and the gap is wide: five-on-five workload repeats well, scoring late does not repeat at all.
- durable· was available
82 of 82 games
Season to season, this measure repeats weakly (0.32) · 53% keep it
- drives-play· the shot clock turns his way while he is out there
59.0% of the expected goals at five-on-five with him on, 53.4% for his club in the minutes he sat: +5.6, 91st percentile among forwards
Season to season, this measure repeats moderately (0.39) · 29% keep it
“2:07 a night shorthanded is the 95th percentile among forwards”
“The value is entirely in position and anticipation, which nothing here measures.”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2021-22 · 1,186 minutes
- Expected goals
- 59%
- 97th pct
- Shot attempts
- 56.3%
- 92nd 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: 85 for, 38 against. Expected: 64.7 and 44.9.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 6 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 649 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 72 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.
Tracked
NHL Edge, 2021-22 · 82 games
- Top speed
- 22.0 mph
- 45th pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 1.32 a game
- Distance
- 3.12 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 90.1 mph
- 67th pct
fastest he was clocked all season; the league's average best is 22.0
how often he reaches that speed, not how fast he goes
skated, all strengths
one shot; the league's average best is 84.1
A top speed is a season's best, and a man who takes more shifts gets more tries at one; the percentile is the feed's own, against every skater, and says less between a top-pair defenceman and a fourth-line wing than it does between two men in the same job. The counts are shown per game for the same reason.
Usual linemates
2021-22 · 1186 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, 2021-22
- The club
- CGY took 55.2% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 59.0% — 3.8 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- First line, 1,186 minutes at five-on-five — 84th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Johnny Gaudreau | 59.2% | 56.7% | 62.6% |
| Matthew Tkachuk | 60.8% | 47.5% | 61.0% |
| Rasmus Andersson | 59.6% | 58.6% | 55.3% |
59.2% together, 56.7% for him apart and 62.6% for Gaudreau apart. Gaudreau was better away from him while his own share held, which is a mark against him more than for him.
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
307 unblocked shots in 2021-22, 42 of them goals. His median goal came from 25 feet. 41% of his shots came from inside twenty feet.