Ilya Solovyov

Last Season

One goal and seven assists in 30 games — eight points, even in plus-minus, at 12:45 a night with 16 penalty minutes.

The Finesse Game

Almost none. Forty-one unblocked attempts from a median of 57 feet, two per cent from inside twenty, one goal. Twelve points in 45 career games.

Seven assists in 30 games is the whole of it, and it is more than his role usually returns.

The Physical Game

Six foot three, 208, and he defends soundly without imposing. Sixteen penalty minutes in 30 games.

The Intangibles

Sixty point nine per cent of the expected goals — the hundredth percentile, the highest figure of any player in this edition — and 55.7 per cent of the shot attempts, 92nd, across 374 minutes, with the chances 20.9 to 13.4 in his favour.

That needs every warning attached at once. Three hundred and seventy-four minutes is a fifth of a season; it was a sheltered third pair; and Pittsburgh finished fourth in the league at generating even-strength offence.

A number that extreme in a sample that small is a description of the minutes, not the man.

He is 26, a two hundred and fifth overall pick — the seventh round — and he has 45 NHL games. That is already more than the pick implies. Ask again at two hundred.