This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Erik Haula
Nashville Predators Left Wing
Signed out of New Jersey to kill penalties and win defensive-zone draws on the 2nd-best unit in the league.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 | MIN | 46 | 6 | 9 | 15 | +14 | 29 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 56 | 10.7 | 10:09 |
| 2014-15 | MIN | 72 | 7 | 7 | 14 | -7 | 32 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 92 | 7.6 | 12:09 |
| 2015-16 | MIN | 76 | 14 | 20 | 34 | +21 | 24 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 99 | 14.1 | 12:44 |
| 2016-17 | MIN | 72 | 15 | 11 | 26 | +5 | 28 | 1 | 0 | 4 | 134 | 11.2 | 13:49 |
| 2017-18 | VGK | 76 | 29 | 26 | 55 | -16 | 37 | 11 | 0 | 4 | 175 | 16.6 | 17:22 |
| 2018-19 | VGK | 15 | 2 | 5 | 7 | +1 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 26 | 7.7 | 16:35 |
| 2019-20 | CAR/FLA | 48 | 12 | 12 | 24 | +1 | 22 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 92 | 13.0 | 15:50 |
| 2020-21 | NSH | 51 | 9 | 12 | 21 | +4 | 14 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 85 | 10.6 | 16:00 |
| 2021-22 | BOS | 78 | 18 | 26 | 44 | +19 | 47 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 141 | 12.8 | 15:06 |
| 2022-23 | NJD | 80 | 14 | 27 | 41 | +13 | 47 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 164 | 8.5 | 16:38 |
| 2023-24 | NJD | 76 | 16 | 19 | 35 | -1 | 54 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 155 | 10.3 | 16:53 |
| 2024-25 | NJD | 69 | 11 | 10 | 21 | -6 | 39 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 110 | 10.0 | 14:42 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 759 | 153 | 184 | 337 | +48 | 383 | 25 | 8 | 22 | 1329 | 11.5 | 14:50 |
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
69 games with New Jersey, 11 goals and 10 assists for 21 points at 14:42 a night, on 110 shots at 10 per cent. 39 penalty minutes. Minus-6. He signed with Nashville in the summer.
That is a fourth-line season and roughly what he has produced for four years running: between 20 and 30 points, a defensive assignment, and a faceoff percentage a club can build a penalty kill around.
The Finesse Game
The release is still decent and 10 per cent on 110 attempts is respectable for the role and the ice time.
He does not create off the rush any more and he does not carry the puck through anybody. The faceoff work is the marketable skill — he is genuinely good on a defensive-zone draw, which is precisely why a club with the 2nd-best penalty kill in hockey went and got him.
The Physical Game
191 pounds and an honest checking game without much force behind it. He finishes checks and does not punish anybody.
39 penalty minutes is slightly more than a fourth-line role should generate, and on this club that matters more than it would elsewhere.
The Intangibles
A seventh-round pick, more than a decade in the league, six organisations, and a Stanley Cup Final with Vegas in 2018.
He knows exactly what he is for at 34 and has never pretended to be anything else, which is why clubs keep signing him to do it.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 799 minutes
- Expected goals
- 46.7%
- 23rd pct
- Shot attempts
- 48.4%
- 36th 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: 29 for, 37 against. Expected: 29.5 and 33.6.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 18 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 — 60 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 with NJD · 799 minutes at five-on-five
- Paul Cotter48%
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
- NJD took 50.7% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 46.7% — 4.0 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- Third line, 799 minutes at five-on-five — 36th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paul Cotter | 45.3% | 48.1% | 51.7% |
| Dawson Mercer | 45.5% | 47.4% | 51.4% |
| Stefan Noesen | 48.6% | 45.5% | 54.9% |
45.3% together, 48.1% for him apart and 51.7% for Cotter apart. Cotter 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
158 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 11 of them goals. His median goal came from 14 feet. 41% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 23% from beyond forty.