The Edmonton Oilers’ power play is among the most highly touted in the league. Connor McDavid headlines the bunch with his electric speed and playmaking abililies, Bouchard has a lethal shot from up top, and Draisaitl is an automatic goal on one-timers from the right-hand side of the ice. But the oft forgotten, yet critically important, piece tying everything together is Zach Hyman. Hyman is frequently maligned by casual fans as simply a product of the elite skill around him; comments like “I could score the goals he does on the power-play if I played with McDavid and Draisaitl” abound on social media. But the reality is that Hyman employs several intentional strategies that lead to his net-front success, strategies that require intelligence, strength, and the willingness to absorb contact to maintain beneficial body positioning.
Benefiting from the Oilers’ Movement
Before getting in-depth on Zach Hyman’s strategies, it is important to note that a large reason why these strategies are so effective is because of the constant movement, coupled with the immense skill level, of McDavid, Draisaitl, Bouchard, and Nugent-Hopkins. The Oilers power-play is constantly in motion. Sometimes McDavid circles the zone with the puck, sometimes he interchanges with Draisaitl on the half-wall or corner forward position, and regardless, there are always constant switches between the three players at the top of the umbrella.
This motion works because all four of those players are comfortable handling the puck in different positions, and because all four have the skill to make high-level plays in different areas of the ice. This means that (1) teams tend not to sit a player on Hyman net-front because they are more worried about the motion up top, and (2) opposing PKers frequently get stretched out of position, opening lanes for Hyman to find soft ice and receive pucks in prime scoring opportunities.
Strategy #1: The Backboard
I call this strategy the backboard because that is essentially what Zach Hyman turns himself into. Hyman is a righty, so he employs this strategy primarily when the puck is on the right half-wall. He positions himself on the weak-side post, puts his skates close together with the left one almost touching the post, and places his stick down on the ice. Hyman doesn’t just score on backdoor passes in this position. A lot of the time, the player on the half-wall will shoot it off Hyman’s skate, shin pads, or upper-body. What is important is that Hyman angles both his body and stick in such a way that any puck that hits him will go in, and the nature of the play is such that a goalie has no chance of getting there in time. Below are a few examples of Hyman employing the backboard strategy.
Most of the goals in this video are not clean backdoor tap-ins. But just by positioning himself on the edge of the post, Hyman puts himself in a prime position to score any time the puck gets through to the general vicinity of where he is positioned.
Strategy #2: Backdoor Fan-Out
In this strategy, Zach Hyman moves from his backboard position away from the net, fanning out to around the faceoff dot. His goal against Vancouver last season is a great example of him doing this.
The reason Hyman is so open on these types of plays is because of the constant motion by other players on the Oilers’ power play. At the start of the clip, Draisaitl enters the play as the clear flank player at the top of the umbrella. But rather than hold his space, he continues skating down to the front of the net. This catches the attention of Vancouver’s #23, causing him to drift lower than he should to try and prevent a quick-strike play to Draisaitl.
Pausing the video at ~5 seconds, you can see that Vancouver is in a pretty bad PK structure at this point, with too many players low and too many players on the right side of the ice. The Oilers then run a little interchange on the right half-wall, and Nugent-Hopkins fills in at the net-front position, causing additional confusion. When Nugent-Hopkins eventually filters to the goal-line and receives the puck, the Canucks are stretched out into an atrocious PK coverage. Nugent-Hopkins has the time to gather the puck, make a decision, and ultimately find Hyman, who in the midst of all the Oilers’ movement had very slowly fanned out to find a soft area backdoor.
Strategy #3: Gaining Positioning for Backdoor Forehand Tap-ins
Strategy #1 touched on the methodology Zach Hyman employs to score goals backdoor on his one-timer side. This section will talk about how Hyman is able to find space on his forehand side to create the occasional forehand backdoor tap-in. Hyman generally uses this method of attack when the puck is on the left flank.
One of the main things Hyman does to prevent the opposing defenseman from picking up his stick is to put his butt into the opposing player’s hip and face his toes towards the net, making it difficult for the opposition to square up to Hyman and engage with his stick. Hyman gets really low when he does this, entering a crouch-like position. Once Hyman establishes this stance, his lower-body strength makes it challenging for the opposing defender to maneuver around Hyman’s body in order to tie up his stick.
Hyman does not have to work off the defender’s hip much in this video given that the Blues defender is in a pretty bad position, but this video shows the body positioning that Hyman assumes when getting reading to receive a backdoor pass on the forehand. Hyman is super crouched, knees bent, and he has his right toe facing the net. When the pass arrives, all Hyman has to do is move his wrists to direct the puck in; the rest of his body is in perfect position well before the pass arrives.
Strategy #4: Being Strong at Net-Front
There are countless clips of Zach Hyman being really strong and relentless in front of the net which ultimately leads to him scoring goals. While it is less of an intellectual strategy per se, it is certainly a conscious choice that he makes. Hyman takes countless cross-checks, hooks, and slashes in front, but regardless of the violence he refuses to give up his net-front positioning. A lot of his goals come from him simply holding his ground in front and pouncing on a rebound, deflection, or loose puck.
Conclusion
A good chunk of Hyman’s power-play success relies on the impressive players heading the Oilers’ powerplay, especially Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl. Another good chunk of Hyman’s power-play success comes from sheer relentlessness and willingness to take hits and cross-checks to establish good body-positioning. But in addition to these factors, Hyman also employs several intentional strategies that consistently put him in prime scoring situations on the power-play. These are strategies that not a lot of other net-front players on the power-play use, and that greatly contribute to Hyman’s power-play success.
Videos taken from InStat. Photo by Tony Gutierrez, The Associated Press
A Note on the Player Reports
These player reports are designed to provide analysis on what makes the best players in the NHL so good. Please get in touch with me (information found in the Contact Me page) if you have any players/skills that you would like me to analyze and I’ll be sure to respond quickly. For examples of other analyses, see my work on Matthews’ goal-scoring or Kucherov’s collection of skills.
