This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Ryan Pulock
New York Islanders Defense
A career plus-55 in 486 games, and fifty-eight of eighty-two.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015-16 | NYI | 15 | 2 | 2 | 4 | +1 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 15 | 13.3 | 15:44 |
| 2016-17 | NYI | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | +1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | — | 3:57 |
| 2017-18 | NYI | 68 | 10 | 22 | 32 | -4 | 14 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 184 | 5.4 | 18:24 |
| 2018-19 | NYI | 82 | 9 | 28 | 37 | +21 | 22 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 180 | 5.0 | 22:22 |
| 2019-20 | NYI | 68 | 10 | 25 | 35 | +8 | 14 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 163 | 6.1 | 22:24 |
| 2020-21 | NYI | 56 | 2 | 15 | 17 | +15 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 121 | 1.7 | 22:26 |
| 2021-22 | NYI | 56 | 5 | 16 | 21 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 122 | 4.1 | 21:08 |
| 2022-23 | NYI | 82 | 5 | 21 | 26 | +10 | 14 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 126 | 4.0 | 20:54 |
| 2023-24 | NYI | 58 | 5 | 14 | 19 | +3 | 12 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 90 | 5.6 | 22:33 |
| 2024-25 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 486 | 48 | 143 | 191 | +55 | 91 | 16 | 0 | 9 | 1001 | 4.8 | 21:13 |
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
58 games, 5 goals and 14 assists for 19 points, 2 on the power play, 12 penalty minutes, 22:33 a night and plus-3. He took 49.0 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 1,093 minutes, the 46th percentile, and his ice went 46-45 against an expectation of 42.89-44.64.
Three goals of finishing above what the chances were worth and level at the other end. Fifty-eight games is the second time in three full seasons he has missed twenty or more, and the club’s penalty kill finished twenty-sixth in the year he and Adam Pelech each missed twenty-four.
The Finesse Game
129 attempts at a median of 53 feet, with 2 per cent from inside twenty and 78 per cent from beyond forty, 90 on goal, converted at 5.6 per cent against a career 4.80.
143 career assists in 486 games. The shot from the point is genuinely heavy — 16 career power-play goals from it — and there is no carrying at all. He moves it first-time and gets back.
The Physical Game
He is 6-1 and 219 and defends by position and body, holding the front of his own net.
91 career penalty minutes in 486 games at twenty-one minutes a night is one of the lowest rates in the league. He blocks shots, clears the crease, and kills penalties without ever taking one.
The Intangibles
Fifteenth overall in 2013 out of Dauphin, Manitoba, nine seasons, 486 games and 191 points, all of it for one organisation, at a career plus-55.
He is 30 and is a genuinely good defensive defenceman who cannot stay in a lineup. The club’s record with and without him is most of what the penalty-kill ranking is describing.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 1,093 minutes
- Expected goals
- 49%
- 46th pct
- Shot attempts
- 45.5%
- 20th 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: 46 for, 45 against. Expected: 42.9 and 44.6.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe report ranks him 40 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 415 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 74 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 · 1093 minutes at five-on-five
- Adam Pelech27%
- Mike Reilly11%
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
- NYI took 49.1% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 49.0% — 0.1 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- Second pair, 1,093 minutes at five-on-five — 71st percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alexander Romanov | 48.6% | 49.4% | 48.6% |
| Bo Horvat | 52.0% | 47.4% | 53.6% |
| Mathew Barzal | 50.2% | 48.4% | 53.6% |
48.6% together, 49.4% for him apart and 48.6% for Romanov 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
129 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 5 of them goals. His median goal came from 40 feet. 2% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 78% from beyond forty.