This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Jason Zucker
Buffalo Sabres Left Wing
Six hundred and ninety-seven games, three clubs in one season, and eighty-one penalty minutes at thirty-two.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011-12 | MIN | 6 | 0 | 2 | 2 | -2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10 | 0.0 | 11:02 |
| 2012-13 | MIN | 20 | 4 | 1 | 5 | +4 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 34 | 11.8 | 11:16 |
| 2013-14 | MIN | 21 | 4 | 1 | 5 | +2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 40 | 10.0 | 12:59 |
| 2014-15 | MIN | 51 | 21 | 5 | 26 | -9 | 18 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 124 | 16.9 | 15:04 |
| 2015-16 | MIN | 71 | 13 | 10 | 23 | -4 | 20 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 158 | 8.2 | 15:35 |
| 2016-17 | MIN | 79 | 22 | 25 | 47 | +34 | 30 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 172 | 12.8 | 15:17 |
| 2017-18 | MIN | 82 | 33 | 31 | 64 | +8 | 44 | 7 | 1 | 7 | 222 | 14.9 | 16:58 |
| 2018-19 | MIN | 81 | 21 | 21 | 42 | -9 | 28 | 7 | 0 | 5 | 214 | 9.8 | 17:05 |
| 2019-20 | MIN/PIT | 60 | 20 | 21 | 41 | -4 | 21 | 7 | 0 | 4 | 111 | 18.0 | 16:20 |
| 2020-21 | PIT | 38 | 9 | 9 | 18 | -8 | 21 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 67 | 13.4 | 15:41 |
| 2021-22 | PIT | 41 | 8 | 9 | 17 | -2 | 15 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 102 | 7.8 | 14:49 |
| 2022-23 | PIT | 78 | 27 | 21 | 48 | -4 | 47 | 2 | 0 | 5 | 197 | 13.7 | 15:39 |
| 2023-24 | ARI/NSH | 69 | 14 | 18 | 32 | -9 | 81 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 150 | 9.3 | 13:49 |
| 2024-25 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 697 | 196 | 174 | 370 | -3 | 337 | 34 | 3 | 30 | 1601 | 12.2 | 15:28 |
This Season So Far
The 2024-25 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
14 goals and 18 assists in 69 games for Arizona and Nashville — 32 points at 13:49 a night, minus-9, with 5 power-play goals on 150 shots at 9.33 per cent, and 81 penalty minutes.
51.5 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 842 minutes, the 65th percentile. His ice went 46-37 against an expectation of 38.24-36.01 — eight goals scored above expectation.
The Finesse Game
150 attempts at a median of 25 feet, with 39 per cent from inside 20 and 19 per cent from beyond 40, converting at 9.33 per cent against a career 12.24.
He drives the net off the wing and takes the puck to the paint, and 196 goals in 697 career games is a genuine scorer’s record — three seasons of twenty or more, and one of thirty-three.
18 assists. He is a finisher rather than a distributor and always has been.
The Physical Game
5-11 and 198. He forechecks hard for his size and he finishes checks, and he plays through traffic rather than around it.
81 penalty minutes in 69 games and 337 in 697 for his career — a high rate for a top-nine winger who is not an enforcer, and a fair share of it is retaliation. He answers back.
The Intangibles
Fifty-ninth overall in 2010 by Minnesota, and 697 games and 370 points at 32 across four clubs, with a long history of injury behind him.
He signed here in the summer. On a club whose power play was 29th, a winger with 34 career power-play goals and a willingness to stand in front is a specific and sensible addition, and he is also 32 on a roster whose oldest forward otherwise is 29.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 842 minutes
- Expected goals
- 51.5%
- 65th pct
- Shot attempts
- 48.4%
- 39th 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: 46 for, 37 against. Expected: 38.2 and 36.0.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 4 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 201 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 68 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
2023-24 with ARI · 627 minutes at five-on-five
- Logan Cooleynow UTA43%
- Alexander Kerfootnow UTA35%
- Michael Carconenow UTA31%
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, 2023-24
- The club
- NSH took 52.5% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 51.5% — 1.0 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- 842 minutes at five-on-five — 43rd percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Logan Cooley | 53.4% | 50.6% | 48.2% |
| Alex Kerfoot | 44.8% | 53.7% | 47.9% |
| Michael Carcone | 45.2% | 53.5% | 45.4% |
53.4% together, 50.6% for him apart and 48.2% for Cooley apart. Cooley was worse away from him while his own share held — the pairing was doing more for Cooley 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
217 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 14 of them goals. His median goal came from 13 feet. 39% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 19% from beyond forty.