This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Nick Jensen
Ottawa Senators Defense
Plus-18 at 20:13 a night, and his ice conceded eleven fewer goals than the chances said it should have.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016-17 | DET | 49 | 4 | 9 | 13 | -7 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 59 | 6.8 | 17:45 |
| 2017-18 | DET | 81 | 0 | 15 | 15 | -8 | 27 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 107 | 0.0 | 16:15 |
| 2018-19 | DET/WSH | 80 | 2 | 18 | 20 | +4 | 21 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 94 | 2.1 | 19:51 |
| 2019-20 | WSH | 68 | 0 | 8 | 8 | +1 | 13 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 61 | 0.0 | 17:49 |
| 2020-21 | WSH | 53 | 2 | 12 | 14 | +5 | 14 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 60 | 3.3 | 17:18 |
| 2021-22 | WSH | 76 | 5 | 16 | 21 | +32 | 21 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 88 | 5.7 | 19:21 |
| 2022-23 | WSH | 77 | 5 | 24 | 29 | -1 | 18 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 109 | 4.6 | 20:37 |
| 2023-24 | WSH | 78 | 1 | 13 | 14 | -9 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 71 | 1.4 | 19:38 |
| 2024-25 | OTT | 71 | 3 | 18 | 21 | +18 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 77 | 3.9 | 20:13 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 633 | 22 | 133 | 155 | +35 | 142 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 726 | 3.0 | 18:51 |
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
3 goals and 18 assists in 71 games — 21 points at 20:13 a night, plus-18, on 6 penalty minutes, which is the lowest total of anybody in this chapter who played more than 50 games.
51.1 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five, the 63rd percentile. His ice went 49-35 against an expectation of 48.20-46.16 — eleven fewer goals against than the chances predicted, which is the largest defensive surplus on the roster.
The Finesse Game
77 attempts in 71 games at a median of 53 feet with 73 per cent from beyond 40. He does not shoot and he does not pretend to; 3 goals is a career-typical number.
The value is the first pass, which is quick, short and almost never wrong. 18 assists is what a defensive defenceman produces when the breakout works.
The Physical Game
6-0 and 202 and he defends by position rather than by force. He closes the gap early, takes the puck with his stick, and steers the play to the wall.
6 penalty minutes in 71 games at twenty minutes a night is close to unheard of. He is essentially never beaten badly enough to need to foul, and he is a first-unit penalty killer for exactly that reason.
The Intangibles
A fifth-round pick in 2009 who did not become a regular until he was 26, and is now 633 games and 155 points into it across three organisations.
He turned 35 in the autumn and played the best defensive season of his career. Ottawa acquired him from Washington in 2024 and paired him with Chabot, and the pair was a large part of why the club finished 6th in the league at suppressing chances.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 1,208 minutes
- Expected goals
- 51.1%
- 63rd pct
- Shot attempts
- 51.1%
- 65th 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: 49 for, 35 against. Expected: 48.2 and 46.2.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe numbers rank him 21 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 637 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 71 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 · 1208 minutes at five-on-five
- Tyler Kleven10%
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
- OTT took 50.2% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 51.1% — 0.9 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- First pair, 1,208 minutes at five-on-five — 85th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Thomas Chabot | 51.8% | 48.2% | 55.3% |
| Tim Stützle | 56.2% | 48.8% | 51.9% |
| Drake Batherson | 50.6% | 51.3% | 51.2% |
51.8% together, 48.2% for him apart and 55.3% for Chabot apart. He was the one being carried: the share went with Chabot and did not follow 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
121 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 3 of them goals. His median goal came from 27 feet. 7% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 73% from beyond forty.