Ranking the Biggest NHL Player Leaps This Season
The NHL has an incredible collection of young talent starting to make its presence felt across the league, and that's not just limited to the highly touted rookie class led by Connor Bedard, Adam Fantilli, Brock Faber, Leo Carlsson and Marco Rossi.
There are also quite a few young players outside of that class who are taking significant steps forward as we approach the halfway point of the 2023-24 season.
We are going to take a look at seven of those players who have taken the biggest leaps and rank them based on who has enjoyed the biggest jump.
We are limiting this to players aged 26 or younger and who have played in the NHL prior to this season. So not first-year players, and not names that have already established themselves as finished products. We are simply looking for youngsters who have taken a step forward.
Let's get to the list.
7. Connor Ingram, Arizona Coyotes
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Nothing changes a team or a season quite like a goaltender.
Great goaltending elevates mediocre teams while bad netminding can ruin good sides. Arizona is getting a taste of the former this season thanks to the stunning development of Connor Ingram.
The Coyotes added him on waivers from Nashville early in the 2022-23 season, and he has been one of the biggest surprises in the NHL this season.
Arizona is 13-8-0 in the 21 games where he has been the goalie of record, and he has posted a well-above average save percentage of .916. He also leads the league with four shutouts.
Coyotes fans finally have reasons to be optimistic over the direction of the franchise with some of the young talent it has assembled, and the 26-year-old is helping to speed that process up this season.
Ingram helped make the team part of the Western Conference playoff race far quicker than anybody should have reasonably expected.
6. Alexis Lafrenière, New York Rangers
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It's starting to become clear that Alex Lafrenière might not ever be the type of superstar you hope for with a No. 1 overall draft pick, but that doesn't mean he's a bust. Not by a long shot.
The 22-year-old is still a very good player who has found a role in New York, and he is quietly putting together his most complete season in the NHL for a Rangers team that has climbed to the top of the Eastern Conference.
In terms of his traditional box-score numbers, Lafrenière is on pace for the best season of his career.
His current production (10 goals and 23 total points in 38 games) puts him on pace for more than 20 goals and 50 points over 82 games. Those numbers would be new career highs.
The most encouraging sign, though, is that he has seen an improvement in the process behind those results.
His possession numbers in terms of shot attempt share, as well as his ability to generate shots on goal, have also reached new career highs. Over the first three years of his career, almost all of his value came from the fact that he was a high percentage shooter. There was nothing sustainable about his numbers and little to indicate he was playing like a top-line player.
All of that has changed this season. His shooting percentage has dropped to a career-low number, but his production is increasing because he is putting himself in positions to get more chances and more shots. That is big.
5. Cole Perfetti, Winnipeg Jets
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There is no bigger surprise in the NHL this season than the Winnipeg Jets.
They approach the halfway point of the season as one of the league's top teams thanks in large part to another stellar season from starting goaltender Connor Hellebuyck and some big seasons from their top players.
The development of Cole Perfetti is also playing a big role.
The Jets always take a methodical approach to their roster construction. General manager Kevin Cheveldayoff never makes a significant trade unless he is absolutely forced to do so.
And they are not typically active in free agency.
Almost all of their change comes from within and the development of their own players through their farm system. The good news for them is they have been pretty successful in that area, having produced Hellebuyck, Mark Scheifele, Nikolaj Ehlers, Joshua Morrissey and Kyle Connor from their drafts.
Perfetti is the latest addition to that core.
The 22-year-old showed a lot of promise a year ago but has taken a step forward this season, scoring 11 goals with 25 total points in 38 games. He looks like he has top-line potential and could be a 30-goal scorer in the near future, perhaps even this year if he gets hot in the second half.
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4. Seth Jarvis, Carolina Hurricanes
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The Carolina Hurricanes have been a Stanley Cup contender for five years now and still have a fairly young roster full of players either in the middle of their prime or just starting to enter it.
They have done a great job developing talent in recent years and have another young star emerging in Seth Jarvis.
After two promising seasons to get his career started, the 21-year-old is starting to emerge as a top-line producer this season. He has already matched his goal total from the 2022-23 season (14) in only 40 games and is on track to double that total at his current pace.
The one big thing that has always held the Hurricanes back in the playoffs in recent years has been the lack of big-time finishers who can turn territorial domination into goals.
They need players such as Jarvis, Andrei Svechnikov and Martin Necas to develop that aspect of their game.
It has not consistently happened for Svechnikov and Necas this season. But it is happening for Jarvis, and he has a legitimate shot to reach the 30-goal mark. That's not something many Hurricanes players have done in recent years.
3. Thomas Harley, Dallas Stars
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The Dallas Stars are one of the NHL's best teams and have a roster loaded with top-tier veterans. But part of what makes them such a threat in the league is that they have some exciting young players just starting to make their presence felt.
Forward Wyatt Johnston made a name for himself last season. This year, it's defenseman Thomas Harley, the team's first-round pick from the 2019 class.
The 22-year-old appeared in just 40 games over the previous two seasons and made a limited impact as the Stars slowly brought him along.
But Harley has had an opportunity to play a bigger role this season, especially lately in the absence of veteran Miro Heiskanen.
Not only is he playing close to 20 minutes per night, but he is also making a major impact offensively with nine goals and 19 total points in 35 games. That puts him on pace for 20 goals as a defenseman, while also posting excellent underlying numbers from a possession and scoring chance perspective.
When Harley is on the ice during 5-on-5 play, the Stars are controlling more than 54 percent of the total shot attempts, expected goals, scoring chances, high-danger scoring chances and are outscoring teams by a 30-23 margin.
He is rapidly becoming a key long-term piece in Dallas.
2. Mason McTavish, Anaheim Ducks
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This season is rapidly unraveling for the Anaheim Ducks as they continue to sink toward the bottom of the standings. It's not exactly a great sign on a team level for the progress of their rebuild.
The encouraging thing, though, is that they do still have some talented young players who should be long-term building blocks.
Mason McTavish is top of that list, and he has been the most promising young player on the roster in terms of both his production and the eye test.
Following a promising rookie campaign that saw him score 17 goals with 43 total points in 80 games, he enters this week with 11 goals and 26 total points in his first 32 games. Those numbers come out to a 26-goal, 66-point pace over 82 games, making him one of the most productive players on the Anaheim roster.
Injuries have limited what the Ducks have been able to get from some of other young core players, such as Trevor Zegras, Jamie Drysdale and Leo Carlsson, but McTavish has been one of the few bright spots in an otherwise miserable season.
1. Quinton Byfield, Los Angeles Kings
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The Los Angeles Kings had high hopes for Quinton Byfield when they chose him with the No. 2 overall pick in the 2020 NHL draft. HIs combination of size, speed, strength and skill gave him all the ingredients to be a franchise player at the NHL level.
However, the first three years of his career were a little rocky. He battled through a significant ankle injury that hurt his development, did not always have a set role at the NHL level and struggled to make much of an impact.
That has all changed this season after finding a place in the Kings' top six, and the 21-year-old has already set new career highs in every offensive category.
Prior to this season, Byfield had scored just eight goals with 33 total points in 99 career games. But in the Kings' first 35 games this season entering play Monday, he has already scored 10 goals with 27 total points and nearly matched his previous career totals in just half a season.
Getting a chance to play next to Anze Kopitar on the L.A. top line has helped bring that production along, but he is making the most of his ice time and starting to play like the star he was expected to be. That is a huge development for the Kings in their quest to become a bona fide Cup contender.
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