February 4, 2025 by Ryan Lotsberg

Evan Bouchard has 40 points in 52 games this season. While it’s a dropoff from last season, it’s stellar offensive production. He’s tied for fifth among NHL defencemen with 27 even strength points entering play on Tuesday.

If you were to judge him by his underlying metrics alone, then you’d be crazy to suggest that he’s struggling. He consistently hits the high 50s and even the low 60s in all of the metrics on Natural Stat Trick.

Bouchard has taken a lot of heat this season though. The heat intensified after Saturday’s loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs. He gave Matthew Knies a bit too much space at the Edmonton Oilers blue line and played the situation far too passively moments before Mitch Marner restored the Leafs’ three-goal lead during the first shift of the third period. The fact that Bouchard got a goal and an assist didn’t do anything to douse the flames.

There are a couple of big reasons that fans are frustrated with Bouchard’s play this season. The first one is the fact that he hasn’t scored a powerplay goal yet. The Oilers sit eighth in the league with a 24% powerplay percentage. That’s a significant dropoff for a unit that has been the best in the league over the course of the last five seasons. 

Bouchard having not scored isn’t the only leak in the boat that is the struggling Oilers powerplay, but it’s a significant one since he has the puck on his stick a lot and he’s the shooting threat from the point. Even if his shots don’t go in, they can create chaos. Either result is a positive thing, so Bouchard definitely needs to start shooting more on the powerplay.

The biggest issue plaguing Bouchard is the frequency at which he’s giving the puck away this season. The timing of said giveaways has been inopportune in many instances. They aren’t ending up in the back of the Oilers’ net as often as they have in other stretches where Bouchard has fought the puck in his career, but there have been a lot of high danger chances surrendered by the stick of Bouchard this season.

The numbers support that observation. Bouchard is averaging 4.18 giveaways per 60 minutes of five-on-five play this seaso according to Natural Stat Trick. That is up from 2.76 giveaways/60 last season. His previous career-high giveaway rate was 3.21 giveaways/60 in 2022-23.

Bouchard has been on the ice for an average of 9.89 high danger scoring chances against per 60 minutes of five-on-five play this season. That’s higher than last season’s number (9.43), but not by a drastic amount. 

The detail about that stat that makes it look bad is that it’s the highest rate among Oilers defencemen that have played more than two games (I need more of a sample size from John Klingberg before I start including him) this season:

Player	HDCA/60	% 5v5 TOI vs Elites
Evan Bouchard	9.89	34.5
Mattias Ekholm	9.38	34.6
Brett Kulak	9.25	30.5
Darnell Nurse	8.77	29.4
Troy Stecher	8.82	26.4
Ty Emberson	8.74	25.4
Travis Dermott	6.21	21.1
Josh Brown	5.87	27.2

You might have noticed that I also included each player’s percentage of five-on-five ice time spent playing against elite competition as found on PuckIQ in the table. That’s because there’s a nearly direct relationship between the rate at which a defenceman gives up high danger scoring chances and the percentage of their ice time played against elite competition. It’s almost like elite opponents are good at hockey or something!

Bouchard has long been criticized for his lack of urgency in a lot of situations, specifically when alarm bells should be going off when a giveaway is about to happen in a dangerous situation. I’ve always argued that the “lack of urgency” is a lack of panic. I see it as poise and calmness. I would MUCH rather have a defenceman with that level of poise and calmness than a defenceman that panics at the first sign of danger. That asset is a huge part of what allows him to make the plays with the puck that he makes.

There are times where he looks lost in the chaos of a broken play in his own zone, or when he doesn’t keep his feet moving on the backcheck when odd man rushes happen. There are also times where he leaves fans wishing he would be more physical. I don’t love those attributes either.

Here’s the thing though. Even with all of Bouchard’s deficiencies, the Oilers are still one of the best defensive teams in the league. Bouchard is a big part of that success.

Even with all the giveaways and even with allowing the highest rate of high danger scoring chances of any Oilers defenceman this season, Bouchard ranks second among all Oilers defencemen in scoring chances against per 60 minutes of five-on-five play. Don’t believe me? Here’s the list as derived from Natural Stat Trick:

Bouchard averages the most five-on-five ice time among all Oilers defencemen (20:06). He gets the toughest assignments on the top pairing. He gives the puck away as often as he does, and he STILL allows scoring chances at a lower rate than any other defenceman aside from his defence partner on one of the best defensive teams in the league.

I know where a lot of you will go after noticing that I said that Bouchard’s defence partner is the only one allowing scoring chances at a lower rate than Bouchard. To say that Bouchard is a product of Ekholm is to say that Bouchard is only good because of Ekholm. That’s just not true. It’s fair to say that Bouchard gives up more high danger scoring chances when he isn’t paired with Ekholm, but Bouchard’s underlying numbers away from Ekholm are still tremendous.

Related: Put Some Respect on Bouchard’s Name

Say what you want about Bouchard. I’ll acknowledge that he likely won’t ever win a Norris Trophy. He’s not perfect; but the Oilers get the better of the play when Bouchard is on the ice FAR more often than not. There aren’t many defencemen that can provide what Bouchard can. I’ll happily deal with Bouchard’s flaws in exchange for all of the tremendous things he does for the team. The good far outweighs the bad with this player.

It’s entirely fair to want and expect more powerplay goals and fewer giveaways from Bouchard because we’ve seen him do it before. What isn’t fair is saying that the guy that is ninth in league scoring by defencemen in the last three seasons and that just had the third highest single season point total by a defenceman in a single playoff run in league history needs to “figure it out”.

Look at the league leaders in giveaways this season. It’s a star-studded list. Someone should probably tell Nathan MacKinnon and Nikita Kucherov that they need to “figure it out” as well because they have more giveaways than Bouchard does this season. They are also giving the puck away at a higher rate than Bouchard is.

Bouchard is in a tie for 50th in giveaways/60 among all NHL skaters that have played over 500 minutes this season. He’s 30th among NHL defencemen that fit the above time on ice criteria in giveaways/60.

Someone should tell John Carlson and Victor Hedman that they need to “figure it out” too. Throw Erik Karlsson in there too. Add Mackenzie Weegar, Dougie Hamilton, Shea Theodore, Josh Manson, Vince Dunn, Noah Hanifin, Ryan McDonagh, and Brent Burns as well while we’re at it because they are all giving the puck away at a higher rate than Bouchard is this season. Alex Pietrangelo, Roman Josi, Rasmus Dahlin, Thomas Harley, Charlie MacAvoy, and Thomas Chabot better figure it out too because they’re all nipping at Bouchard’s heels with over four giveaways/60 this season. Remember that this is with Bouchard having his career-worst giveaways/60 season by 0.97.

Elite players touch the puck more often than average players do, and they make riskier plays with the puck. They give the puck away more often than average players because riskier plays don’t always work out well. Elite players succeed on more of those plays than average players do. That’s what makes them elite. It’s one of those things that you just have to accept when you have an elite player like Bouchard on your team. Whether you have Bouchard as a top five, ten, or twenty defenceman in the NHL, he’s still an elite player!

Players have good years and bad years. If this is what a bad year looks like for Bouchard, then I’ll live with it.