Armchair Hockey Scout Beta

This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →

47

Jayden Struble

Montreal Canadiens Defense

Fifty-six games in a first season at 22, and 57 penalty minutes to go with them.

SeasonTeamGPGAPTS+/-PIMPPSHGWSS%TOI
2023-24MTL563710-357000476.416:07
2024-25 so far
Career563710-357000476.416:07

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

56 games, 3 goals and 7 assists for 10 points, 57 penalty minutes, 16:07 a night and minus-3. He took 44.9 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 865 minutes, the 21st percentile, and his ice went 32-36 against an expectation of 33.68-41.26.

Two goals of scoring that did not arrive and five fewer conceded than the chances called for. A minus-3 in a first season on a club that finished 28th is a good outcome however it was reached.

The Finesse Game

68 attempts at a median of 58 feet with 72 per cent from beyond 40, converted at 6.4 per cent.

Seven assists in 56 games. That shot median is the longest on the roster and it describes a defenceman who puts the puck at the net from the blue line and goes to work. There is very little puck-moving and the skating is better than the passing.

The Physical Game

He is 6-0 and 207 and hits well above his weight.

57 penalty minutes in 56 games at sixteen a night is a high rate for a rookie. He clears the crease, will fight, and takes liberties on men who have taken them first.

The Intangibles

A second-round pick in 2019 out of Cumberland, Rhode Island, three years at Northeastern, one season, and 56 games.

He is 23 and got 16:07 a night in a first season. On a blue line with Guhle at 22, Barron at 22 and Xhekaj at 23, he is one of four young left-handers competing for three jobs.

The numbers underneath

On the ice

Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 865 minutes

Expected goals
44.9%
21st pct

share of the chances while he was out there

Shot attempts
45.8%
21st pct

share of the attempts while he was out there

Goals while he was on the ice: 32 for, 36 against. Expected: 33.7 and 41.3.

The eye and the numbers

Hindsight
Report
58th
Numbers
21st

The report ranks him 37 points above where the numbers do. 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. Why the numbers land there sets out the club he did it on, the minutes he played and the men he played them with.

Both bars are percentiles among the 415 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 67 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 · 865 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, 2023-24

The club
MTL took 46.1% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 44.9% — 1.2 below the club he did it on.
The role
865 minutes at five-on-five — 45th percentile in ice time.

With and without

TeammateTogetherHim apartMate apart
Jake Evans43.0%45.7%45.8%
Joel Armia49.7%43.1%50.8%
Brendan Gallagher49.4%43.1%50.5%

43.0% together, 45.7% for him apart and 45.8% for Evans apart. Splitting them up moved neither man. Whatever is driving the share, it is not this pairing.

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

68 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 3 of them goals. His median goal came from 21 feet. 9% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 72% from beyond forty.