Roope Hintz

Last Season

Fifteen goals and 29 assists in 53 games — 44 points, plus-16, at 17:20 a night. Twenty-nine games missed.

The Finesse Game

One of the faster large men in the league — six foot three and genuinely explosive, which is why he can play either wing or centre and be dangerous from both.

The shot chart is excellent: 55 per cent of his unblocked attempts from inside twenty feet, median 18, with only eleven per cent from beyond forty. Fifteen goals in 53 games from that ice is a thirty-goal pace.

Twenty-nine assists says the playmaking has become the larger half of him.

The Physical Game

Six foot three, 217, and he uses the speed rather than the weight. Eighteen penalty minutes. He is not physical by inclination and he does not need to be — he arrives before the check does.

The durability is the concern: 53 games, and this is the third time in five seasons he has missed twenty or more.

The Intangibles

Fifty-five point three per cent of the expected goals, 89th percentile — level with Robertson as the best forward mark on the club — in 678 minutes.

Eight points in his last ten. He is 29, 421 points into 521 games, and comfortably the best two-way centre here.

For a club whose whole design is to defend first and finish clinically, he is the forward who does both. The only question that has ever mattered about him is how many games he plays.