Armchair Hockey Scout Beta

This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →

79

Samuel Helenius

Los Angeles Kings Center

6-6 and 225 pounds at 22, 7 points, and a fourth-line centre learning the job.

SeasonTeamGPGAPTS+/-PIMPPSHGWSS%TOI
2024-25LAK50437+1250012913.88:39
2025-26 so far
Career50437+1250012913.88:39

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

4 goals and 3 assists in 50 games for 7 points, plus-1, on 8:39 a night — the smallest role on the roster.

48.9 per cent at five-on-five, the 39th percentile, over 405 minutes, which on this club is the worst share among the regulars. His on-ice goals were 24-17 against an expected 13-13.

The Finesse Game

Limited. 29 shots in 50 games and 4 goals, and 3 assists — there is no offensive game to project at present.

He plays simply and does not turn the puck over, which for a 22-year-old fourth-line centre is the requirement.

The Physical Game

6-6 and 225, and this is the case for him. He wins pucks below the goal line by weight, is difficult to move at the net front, and forechecks with real size.

25 penalty minutes over 50 games. The skating is the limitation and it is significant — he cannot keep pace with a fast transition, which is why the ice time is where it is.

The Intangibles

A second-round pick, a father who played, and a first NHL season at 22 on a club that plays a slow, heavy game that suits him.

The projection is a fourth-line centre who takes draws and kills penalties. Los Angeles is one of the few clubs whose style makes that a genuine role.

The numbers underneath

On the ice

Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 405 minutes

Expected goals
48.9%
40th pct

share of the chances while he was out there

Shot attempts
47.8%
31st pct

share of the attempts while he was out there

Goals while he was on the ice: 24 for, 17 against. Expected: 12.9 and 13.5.

The eye and the numbers

Hindsight
Report
31st
Numbers
40th

The two rank him within 9 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 357 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 69 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 · 405 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, 2024-25

The club
LAK took 54.0% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 48.9% — 5.1 below the club he did it on.
The role
Fourth line, 405 minutes at five-on-five — 12th percentile in ice time.

With and without

TeammateTogetherHim apartMate apart
Trevor Lewis44.9%51.3%48.1%
Tanner Jeannot48.7%49.0%52.3%
Joel Edmundson52.7%47.0%50.4%

44.9% together, 51.3% for him apart and 48.1% for Lewis 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

48 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 4 of them goals. His median goal came from 15 feet. 27% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 29% from beyond forty.