This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Tyson Kozak
Buffalo Sabres Center
21 games, 5 points, and a fourth-line centre getting his first look at 22.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024-25 | BUF | 21 | 3 | 2 | 5 | -2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 11 | 27.3 | 10:29 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 21 | 3 | 2 | 5 | -2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 11 | 27.3 | 10:29 |
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
3 goals and 2 assists in 21 games for 5 points, minus-2, on 10:29 a night.
3 goals on 11 shots is 27 per cent, in twenty-one games, and means precisely nothing. 63 per cent of his attempts came from inside 20 feet, which is the more interesting line: in a very small sample he only shot from the paint.
The Finesse Game
Limited at this level and honestly presented. 11 shots in 21 games is almost no volume, and there is no playmaking on show.
He plays a simple, direct game — win the draw, get it deep, retrieve it — and does not attempt anything the shift does not offer, which is the correct way for a fourth-line centre to arrive.
The Physical Game
5-11 and 185, and willing rather than heavy. He finishes checks and supports the puck, and he is not going to win a battle against a defenceman by force.
2 penalty minutes in 21 games. Too small a sample to read.
The Intangibles
A seventh-round pick, four years of junior, three of the American League, and a first NHL look at 22 — a career built entirely out of persistence.
The realistic ceiling is a fourth-line centre who kills penalties. On this roster that job is genuinely available, which is more than most seventh-round picks get.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 211 minutes
- Expected goals
- 46.2%
- 20th pct
- Shot attempts
- 43.2%
- 6th 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: 10 for, 9 against. Expected: 6.4 and 7.5.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 16 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 — 70 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 · 211 minutes at five-on-five
- Alex Tuch15%
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
- BUF took 47.9% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 46.2% — 1.7 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- 211 minutes at five-on-five — 1st percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sam Lafferty | 44.4% | 47.0% | 44.2% |
| Bowen Byram | 46.7% | 45.9% | 48.6% |
| Connor Clifton | 41.2% | 48.0% | 45.1% |
44.4% together, 47.0% for him apart and 44.2% for Lafferty 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
27 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 3 of them goals. His median goal came from 12 feet. 63% of his shots came from inside twenty feet.