Oskar Bäck

Last Season

Five goals and seven assists in 72 games — 12 points, plus-10, at 12:22 a night with ten penalty minutes.

The Finesse Game

Thin in volume and remarkable in location. Sixty-one unblocked attempts, of which 67 per cent came from inside twenty feet, median 15 — the second-shortest average distance of any forward in this edition after Voronkov.

Five goals out of it, which is a poor conversion from excellent ice and says the hands are the limit rather than the positioning.

Seven assists in 72 games is the whole of the playmaking.

The Physical Game

Six foot four, 207, and he uses it in front of the net and on the forecheck. Ten penalty minutes in 72 games is unusually clean for a player in this role.

He wins defensive-zone faceoffs, which is most of why he dresses.

The Intangibles

Fifty-two point two per cent of the expected goals, 72nd percentile, with the goals 50-28 in his favour across 735 minutes — the best margin of any Dallas forward.

That is a fourth line doing its job on a club that finished fourth in expected goals against, and it is worth more than the twelve points suggest.

He is 26, a third-round pick, and 145 games in. No points in his last ten. If the finishing ever arrives he is a third-line centre; if it does not, he is exactly what he is now, and that has value on a team that expects to play in May.