Armchair Hockey Scout Beta

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

41

Nicolas Hague

Vegas Golden Knights Defense

Six-six and 245 pounds, and 82 per cent of his attempts from beyond forty feet.

SeasonTeamGPGAPTS+/-PIMPPSHGWSS%TOI
2019-20VGK3811011032100541.816:05
2020-21VGK5251217+1431000786.416:00
2021-22VGK5241014+6380001163.518:40
2022-23VGK8131417+7510011032.918:05
2023-24VGK7321012-5430011051.918:33
2024-25 so far
Career296155671+221951024563.317:41

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

73 games, 2 goals and 10 assists for 12 points, 43 penalty minutes, 18:33 a night and minus-5, with 1 game-winner. He took 50.1 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 1,229 minutes, the 53rd percentile, and his ice went 46-51 against an expectation of 47.91-47.66.

Two goals of finishing below what the chances were worth and three more conceded than they called for. Forty-six point seven per cent of the attempts is the lowest share of any defenceman on the club, on an even chance share.

The Finesse Game

143 attempts at a median of 55 feet with 82 per cent of them from beyond forty and 6 per cent from inside twenty, 103 of those on goal, converted at 1.9 per cent against a career 3.29 across 456 shots.

Fifteen career goals and one power-play goal in 296 games. Eighty-two per cent of his attempts came from beyond forty feet, which is the most perimeter-bound chart on this club; the shot is heavy and it exists to be tipped rather than to beat anybody.

The Physical Game

He is 6-6 and 245 — the fifth-heaviest man in this edition — and took 43 penalty minutes.

195 career penalty minutes in 296 games. At 6-6 and 245 he owns the front of his own net simply by standing in it, and the reach takes the cross-ice pass away before the puck is on the stick.

The Intangibles

Thirty-fourth overall in 2017 by Vegas, five seasons, one organisation, and 71 points in 296 games.

A career plus-22 in 296 games. He is 25, he was a second-round pick by this club, and he has played more than 52 games in a season twice.

The numbers underneath

On the ice

Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 1,229 minutes

Expected goals
50.1%
54th pct

share of the chances while he was out there

Shot attempts
46.7%
26th pct

share of the attempts while he was out there

Goals while he was on the ice: 46 for, 51 against. Expected: 47.9 and 47.7.

The eye and the numbers

Hindsight
Report
76th
Numbers
54th

The report ranks him 22 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 652 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 75 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 · 1229 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
VGK took 51.2% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 50.1% — 1.1 below the club he did it on.
The role
Second pair, 1,229 minutes at five-on-five — 85th percentile in ice time.

With and without

TeammateTogetherHim apartMate apart
Zach Whitecloud48.4%51.6%54.9%
Ivan Barbashev48.9%50.7%50.3%
Michael Amadio49.8%50.2%54.6%

48.4% together, 51.6% for him apart and 54.9% for Whitecloud apart. Both were better apart than together — the pairing was doing neither of them any favours.

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

143 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 2 of them goals. His median goal came from 41 feet. 6% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 82% from beyond forty.