New York Rangers: Will Pavel Buchnevich have a break out season?

Pavel Buchnevich had an up and down rookie season for the New York Rangers. Although only playing for half the regular season and postseason, Buchnevich flashed his talents. What will he be able to do with a full season?

As Pavel Buchnevich moves into his sophomore season with the New York Rangers, he and the organization will look for him to step up. He possesses all the tools to produce well in the NHL; vision, shot, hands, hockey IQ. Will he avoid the dreaded sophomore slump and break out in his second season?

Assuming that Buchnevich plays nearly the entire season and is utilized properly, he has a very good shot at hitting the 50 point mark. Let’s delve into the reasoning behind this.

2016-17 season in review

Pavel Buchnevich finally came over from Russia during the 2016 offseason and made the team out of training camp.

He posted a four game goal scoring streak from November 5th to 12th, along with two assists. Then his back would cause him to lose the next two months.

He picked up right where he left off in mid-January by tallying two goals and four assists in his first four games back from injury. Then, soon after, he saw his ice-time drastically cut the rest of the season.

Buchnevich was also scratched multiple times down the stretch and had a few stints in Hartford to stay in game shape.

Despite the roller coaster of a season that he had, Buchnevich still managed to score eight goals and 12 assists in 41 games. The straightforward extrapolation would result in a nice, even 40 points over a full 82 game campaign.

KHL Production

Buchnevich had a shooting percentage of 14.5% last season. For established players, a ballpark estimate for their production can be made with their career average shooting percentage and shooting rates. Unfortunately, Buchnevich only has a half a season of NHL experience, so there isn’t much data to work with.

Buchnevich very well may be able to sustain a shooting percentage of 14.5%. But, looking at the career average shooting percentages of active players, this would put him roughly in the top-20.

However, Buchnevich did play 158 regular season games in the KHL, one of, if not the best hockey league other than the NHL. There are plenty of variables that don’t make this an easy translation such as ice dimensions, style of play, talent distribution and league parity, among others.

For our ballpark estimate, however, we will take his KHL career average shooting percentage of 9.9% and bump that to an even 10% for ease of calculation.

The other part of the equation is shot rate. For his KHL career, Buchnevich averaged 2.4 shots per game. His shot rate was much higher when playing for his hometown Severstal Cherepovets because he factored more into the offense. This was despite him being a young player and having to earn his ice time too. For the powerhouse SKA Saint Petersburg, his ice-time and shot rate dropped as he was behind their much more potent offense.

Conservative Production Estimation

Using the numbers we have from Buchnevich’s time in top-tier professional hockey leagues, we will make a conservative estimate. This is what we should expect at a minimum from Buchnevich next season.

Starting with his shot rate from the KHL, 2.4 shots per game over 82 games results in about 197 shots. With a 10% shooting average, this would mean around 20 goals.

So far, Buchnevich’s NHL shot rate is very low compared to his numbers in the KHL. His 55 shots in 41 games is a mere 1.3 shots per game. For comparison, fellow rookie Jimmy Vesey had 116 shots in 80 games (1.45 shots per game) and that was with him playing top-six/nine minutes.

However, among the Rangers, only Rick Nash, Derek Stepan, Chris Kreider and Mats Zuccarello had shooting rates of 2.4 shots per game or higher. I think a more realistic expectation would be somewhere between Buchnevich’s KHL and NHL numbers so far. For argument’s sake and again, ease of math, we will pencil in an even 2 shots per game.

This results in 164 shots over 82 games and at a 10% shooting percentage would mean 16 or 17 goals. Ironically, this is double his total from last season as well.

The assist total is a little more difficult to predict. We could look at his assist rate: 0.29 assists per game in the NHL, 0.32 assists per game in the KHL. This is fairly consistent even despite the differences in teams, linemates, ice-time, and competition.

0.3 assists per game would equal 24-25 assists in a full season. For those of you keeping score at home, you might notice that 16-17 goals and 24-25 assists is 40-42 points. That was a lot of words to come to the same result of just doubling his last season’s total. However, there is some justification and now we know that estimate has merit.

Will he break out?

One thing that hasn’t been addressed is that Buchnevich is a young player that has yet to reach his peak. Both Buchnevich and the team are expecting him to improve and not be content on replicating last season.

Mika Zibanejad is the team’s new top-line center, and he has had chemistry with Buchnevich in the past. Being on Zibanejad’s wing would give him that increased ice-time he needs to succeed.

Buchnevich only had one powerplay goal (his fist NHL goal) and three powerplay assists last season. Given more powerplay ice-time and the addition of Kevin Shattenkirk, his production in that department should rise significantly.

Operating under the assumption that Buchnevich will also see at least top-nine and hopefully top-six minutes next season, 20 goals in 82 games seems reasonable. Factoring in his wrist and slap shot and the time he will spend on the powerplay bolsters this.

In the assist department, he would need to have 30 to get to 50 points. How would he get there?Zibanejad is also expected to see an increase in production with his increased role. Hopefully, either Kreider or Zuccarello rounds out the line and they were the teams leading goal and point scorers respectively last season.

Playing with those players for a consistent amount of time will net Buchnevich a good amount of points. Buchnevich prefers to set the table and with those three players, all with shot rates north of 2 shots per game, he can expect the assists to follow.

Next: Comparing Rangers under 25 to other NHL pros

Scoring 50 points would make Buchnevich one of the top-100 producing skaters in the NHL when looking at last season’s numbers. With a little hope and luck, Buchnevich looks like he has a good shot at hitting that amount. If he does, the Rangers are much more of a legitimate Stanley Cup Contender.

(Stats courtesy of NHL.com and en.KHL.ru)

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