This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Nikolaj Ehlers
Carolina Hurricanes Left Wing
63 points in 69 games, and the first significant free agent this organisation has ever signed.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015-16 | WPG | 72 | 15 | 23 | 38 | +3 | 21 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 167 | 9.0 | 16:06 |
| 2016-17 | WPG | 82 | 25 | 39 | 64 | +1 | 38 | 5 | 0 | 4 | 204 | 12.3 | 17:29 |
| 2017-18 | WPG | 82 | 29 | 31 | 60 | +14 | 26 | 7 | 0 | 7 | 231 | 12.6 | 16:05 |
| 2018-19 | WPG | 62 | 21 | 16 | 37 | +2 | 15 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 158 | 13.3 | 15:46 |
| 2019-20 | WPG | 71 | 25 | 33 | 58 | +14 | 30 | 3 | 1 | 5 | 203 | 12.3 | 16:31 |
| 2020-21 | WPG | 47 | 21 | 25 | 46 | +15 | 15 | 6 | 0 | 5 | 148 | 14.2 | 16:55 |
| 2021-22 | WPG | 62 | 28 | 27 | 55 | +18 | 20 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 245 | 11.4 | 18:04 |
| 2022-23 | WPG | 45 | 12 | 26 | 38 | -2 | 11 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 132 | 9.1 | 15:39 |
| 2023-24 | WPG | 82 | 25 | 36 | 61 | +27 | 29 | 0 | 0 | 7 | 233 | 10.7 | 15:52 |
| 2024-25 | WPG | 69 | 24 | 39 | 63 | +14 | 17 | 6 | 0 | 5 | 174 | 13.8 | 15:48 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 674 | 225 | 295 | 520 | +106 | 222 | 40 | 1 | 39 | 1895 | 11.9 | 16:26 |
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
24 goals and 39 assists in 69 games for 63 points, plus-14, on 15:48 a night with Winnipeg and 174 shots.
63 points in under 16 minutes a night is a rate almost nobody in the league matches — he has now produced at a point-per-game clip in three of the last four seasons while never once being given a first-line workload.
The Finesse Game
The fastest man on this roster and one of the fastest in the league. He accelerates through the neutral zone with the puck under control, which forces a defenceman to turn, and everything he does offensively comes out of that half-second.
13.8 per cent shooting is a fair rate and the release is quick off the rush. The playmaking has grown — 39 assists in 69 games — and he is now as likely to slow up and find the trailer as to shoot. What he does not do is create anything from a standing start; if the puck has to be won first, he is not the man who wins it.
The Physical Game
6 feet and 168, and he is one of the lightest forwards in the league. He does not forecheck with weight, does not win pucks on the wall, and is separated from possession by any NHL defenceman who gets a body on him.
17 penalty minutes over 69 games. He is not in the traffic. The durability has been mixed — he has cleared 75 games twice in ten seasons.
The Intangibles
Ten seasons in Winnipeg spent being underused by three different coaches, and a free-agent departure that surprised nobody.
Carolina is the ideal environment for him: a club that already wins the puck and needs somebody to do something with it. The reservation is April. He has 20 points in 55 career playoff games, on clubs that were repeatedly eliminated by heavier opposition, and this organisation’s specific failure has been the same one.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 850 minutes
- Expected goals
- 53%
- 79th pct
- Shot attempts
- 51.7%
- 71st 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: 23 for, 35 against. Expected: 35.4 and 31.4.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 12 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 315 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 76 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 with WPG · 850 minutes at five-on-five
- Cole Perfetti71%
- Vladislav Namestnikov70%
- Adam Lowry16%
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
- WPG took 51.8% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 53.0% — 1.2 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- Third line, 850 minutes at five-on-five — 40th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cole Perfetti | 52.5% | 54.2% | 52.3% |
| Vladislav Namestnikov | 50.8% | 58.9% | 54.3% |
| Josh Morrissey | 55.2% | 51.6% | 53.5% |
52.5% together, 54.2% for him apart and 52.3% for Perfetti 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
266 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 24 of them goals. His median goal came from 31 feet. 29% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 24% from beyond forty.