This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Mattias Ekholm
Edmonton Oilers Defense
Plus-44 at 34, third in this edition, and the man who makes the other half of the pair work.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011-12 | NSH | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0.0 | 12:25 |
| 2012-13 | NSH | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | — | 16:05 |
| 2013-14 | NSH | 62 | 1 | 8 | 9 | -8 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 58 | 1.7 | 16:49 |
| 2014-15 | NSH | 80 | 7 | 11 | 18 | +12 | 52 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 86 | 8.1 | 19:01 |
| 2015-16 | NSH | 82 | 8 | 27 | 35 | +14 | 44 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 114 | 7.0 | 20:15 |
| 2016-17 | NSH | 82 | 3 | 20 | 23 | +4 | 34 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 120 | 2.5 | 23:28 |
| 2017-18 | NSH | 81 | 10 | 24 | 34 | +25 | 46 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 135 | 7.4 | 23:35 |
| 2018-19 | NSH | 80 | 8 | 36 | 44 | +27 | 47 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 146 | 5.5 | 23:22 |
| 2019-20 | NSH | 68 | 8 | 25 | 33 | -1 | 32 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 154 | 5.2 | 23:22 |
| 2020-21 | NSH | 48 | 6 | 17 | 23 | +19 | 14 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 110 | 5.5 | 22:52 |
| 2021-22 | NSH | 76 | 6 | 25 | 31 | +14 | 44 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 145 | 4.1 | 23:29 |
| 2022-23 | NSH/EDM | 78 | 9 | 23 | 32 | +28 | 28 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 135 | 6.7 | 21:29 |
| 2023-24 | EDM | 79 | 11 | 34 | 45 | +44 | 47 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 177 | 6.2 | 21:03 |
| 2024-25 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 819 | 77 | 250 | 327 | +176 | 398 | 11 | 4 | 17 | 1381 | 5.6 | 21:42 |
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
79 games, 11 goals and 34 assists for 45 points, 2 on the power play, 1 shorthanded, 47 penalty minutes, 21:03 a night and plus-44. He took 62.1 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 1,409 minutes, the 99th percentile, and his ice went 88-49 against an expectation of 87.25-53.28.
The plus-44 was third in this edition behind Gustav Forsling and Dylan DeMelo. Four goals fewer conceded than the chances called for and level at the other end: a pair that earned every bit of its record.
The Finesse Game
177 shots at a median of 47 feet with 61 per cent from beyond 40, converted at 6.2 per cent. The shot is a delivery rather than a threat and he has never pretended otherwise.
250 career assists in 819 games. The first pass is early and flat and it is the reason Evan Bouchard spends so much time with the puck moving forward.
The Physical Game
He defends with his reach at 6-5 and closes the gap before the winger has decided what to do.
He is hard to move in front of his own net and he clears it when he has to. 47 penalty minutes in 79 games at twenty-one minutes a night is a disciplined rate for a man who defends this much.
The Intangibles
A fourth-round pick in 2009 out of Borlange, thirteen seasons, 819 games and a career plus-176. He was the best defenceman in Nashville for most of a decade and arrived here at 32 without any fuss about it.
He kills penalties and has 4 career shorthanded goals. At 34 the legs will go before the head does, and the head is most of what this pairing runs on.
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
79 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
62.1% of the expected goals at five-on-five with him on, 53.8% for his club in the minutes he sat: +8.3, 99th percentile among defencemen
Season to season, this measure repeats moderately (0.39) · 29% keep it
- sheltered· is started in the attacking end
59% of his end-zone starts in the attacking end, 90th percentile among defencemen
Season to season, this measure repeats well (0.66) · 47% keep it
“He defends with his reach at 6-5 and closes the gap before the winger has decided what to do.”
“He is hard to move in front of his own net and he clears it when he has to.”
“He is hard to move in front of his own net and he clears it when he has to.”
“The first pass is early and flat and it is the reason Evan Bouchard spends so much time with the puck moving forward.”
“He kills penalties and has 4 career shorthanded goals.”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 1,409 minutes
- Expected goals
- 62.1%
- 99th pct
- Shot attempts
- 60.1%
- 99th 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: 88 for, 49 against. Expected: 87.3 and 53.3.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe numbers rank him 37 points above where the report does. 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 652 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, 2023-24 · 79 games
- Top speed
- 21.9 mph
- 58th pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 0.34 a game
- Distance
- 2.99 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 94.6 mph
- 69th pct
fastest he was clocked all season; the league's average best is 21.7
how often he reaches that speed, not how fast he goes
skated, all strengths
one shot; the league's average best is 90.2
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
2023-24 · 1409 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
- EDM took 56.9% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 62.1% — 5.2 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- First pair, 1,409 minutes at five-on-five — 94th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Evan Bouchard | 61.9% | 63.2% | 64.8% |
| Connor McDavid | 65.3% | 57.5% | 59.7% |
| Zach Hyman | 65.9% | 57.9% | 59.6% |
61.9% together, 63.2% for him apart and 64.8% for Bouchard 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
241 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 11 of them goals. His median goal came from 32 feet. 13% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 61% from beyond forty.