It’s been a few years since I’ve pulled this data together, and it’s fair to say things have shifted a bit in the NHL.
The league is slightly older, taller and thicker than three years back. There are also now more American players than ever, as they approach 30 percent of the NHL for the first time.
I’ve broken this all down team by team, as we’ve done here at The Athletic in the past. Included here is any player who played a game as of Monday night, as well as any backup goaltender that had sat on the bench by that point in time. Not included are any players out due to injury in this period.
All told, this analysis includes nearly 700 players, 66 of which are goalies, and information pulled from NHL.com.
NHL average age this season: 28.3
Analysis: Last year’s runners-up, and a team many have pegged to go deep this season, the Oilers are the NHL’s oldest club.
As of later this week, Edmonton will have only two players under 25 (Vasily Podkolzin and Ty Emberson) and 13 players who are 30 or older, including Corey Perry and Derek Ryan, who are both among the 10 oldest players in the NHL this season.
Nashville also became surprisingly old by bringing in a veteran free-agent crew including Steven Stamkos, Jonathan Marchessault, Luke Schenn, Ryan O’Reilly and Gustav Nyquist the past two summers.
On the other side of things, the struggling Sabres are incredibly young, with nine players who are 23 or younger and only one player in his 30s (Jason Zucker).
Most of the league’s youngest teams are rebuilding right now, although it’s very interesting to see Boston and Colorado down there. Part of that is they don’t have a lot of older players pulling up the average: Brad Marchand is the only Bruin older than 32 and the Avs have only three players older than 30.
Surprisingly, there isn’t a single player in the NHL over 40 years old right now, although three big-name players will get there by season’s end. And there are only nine teenagers in the league this season, led by baby-faced Flyers rookie Jett Luchanko, who was born in August of 2006, meaning there are quite a few players (e.g. Sidney Crosby) who have been playing longer than he’s been alive.
10 oldest players in the NHL this season
1. Marc-Andre Fleury, MIN, 39.9 years old
2. Ryan Suter, STL, 39.7
3. Brent Burns, CAR, 39.6
4. Corey Perry, EDM, 39.4
5. Alex Ovechkin, WSH, 39.1
6. Jonathan Quick, NYR, 38.7
7. Evgeni Malkin, PIT, 38.2
8. Derek Ryan, EDM, 37.8
9. Trevor Lewis, LAK, 37.8
10. Jack Johnson, CBJ, 37.8
10 youngest players in the NHL this season
1. Jett Luchanko, PHI, 18.2 years old
2. Macklin Celebrini, SJS, 18.3
3. Connor Bedard, CHI, 19.3
4. Zach Benson, BUF, 19.4
5. Will Smith, SJS, 19.6
6. Calum Ritchie, COL, 19.7
7. Leo Carlsson, ANA, 19.8
8. Matvei Michkov, PHI, 19.9
9. Samuel Honzek, CGY, 19.9
10. Adam Fantilli, CBJ, 20.0
NHL average height this season: 73.6 inches
Analysis: The league is creeping up on an average height of 6-foot-2, as teams continue to value length — especially in goal. The average netminder this season tops 6-3, the continuation of a trend where taller and taller athletes are getting the crease. (Exhibit A: Maple Leafs rookie Dennis Hildeby, all 6-foot-7 of him.)
I had to double-check the Bruins number to make sure it was right, as Boston really towers over everyone here, with a full half inch in height above the second-place team. No, I didn’t accidentally include Zdeno Chara; bringing in 6-6 Nikita Zadorov and Riley Tufte means the Bruins now have a remarkable 16 players listed at 6-3 or above. Even with Marchand bringing down the average, that’s a tall team.
Vegas and Washington have long been near the top of this list; the Leafs, meanwhile, have been climbing this list under new management (and having two giants in goal doesn’t hurt).
On the other side of things, Colorado has 12 players listed between 5-10 and 6 feet tall, surpassed only by the Kraken with 13. Jamie Oleksiak must be getting things off the top shelf in that dressing room.
10 tallest players in the NHL this season
1. Matt Rempe, NYR, 81 inches (6-foot-9)
2. Adam Klapka, CGY, 80
3. Tyler Myers, VAN, 80
4. Dennis Hildeby, TOR, 79
5. Mads Søgaard, OTT, 79
6. Ivan Fedotov, PHI, 79
7. Vincent Desharnais, VAN, 79
8. Jamie Oleksiak, SEA, 79
9. Victor Hedman, TBL, 79
10. Twenty players tied at 6-foot-6, including Jake Oettinger and Owen Power
10 shortest players in the NHL this season
1. Logan Stankoven, DAL, 68 inches (5-foot-8)
2. Daniil Gushchin, SJS, 68
3. Bobby Brink, PHI, 68
4. Cole Caufield, MTL, 68
5. Alex DeBrincat, DET, 68
6. Colin Blackwell, DAL, 68
7. Cameron Atkinson, TBL, 68
8. Mats Zuccarello, MIN, 68
9. Thirteen players tied at 5-foot-9, including Lane Hutson and Seamus Casey
NHL average weight this season: 201.1 lbs
Analysis: There’s the Leafs again, this time at the top of the list. New netminder Anthony Stolarz being the heaviest goalie in the league is part of it, but the other factor is Matthew Knies just, well, eating his way into the power forward role (he’s up to 227 pounds as a sophomore, with more room to grow).
Toronto has only four players listed under 199 pounds right now. And they’ll get even heavier and taller once Jani Hakanpää is ready to return from a knee injury.
On the lighter side, the Canucks make a surprise appearance here despite having a lot of big boys on the back end in Tyler Myers, Vincent Desharnais, Derek Forbort and Carson Soucy. Led by 165-pounder Conor Garland, Vancouver has 12 players listed at under 195 pounds, including lanky goalie Kevin Lankinen (yes, pun intended), Elias Pettersson and Quinn Hughes.
10 heaviest players in the NHL this season
1. Jamie Oleksiak, SEA, 257 pounds
2. Matt Rempe, NYR, 255
3. Nikita Zadorov, BOS, 248
4. Nicolas Hague, VGK, 245
5. Victor Hedman, TBL, 245
6. Anthony Stolarz, TOR, 243
7. Adam Edström, NYR, 241
8. Arber Xhekaj, MTL, 240
9. Alex Ovechkin, WSH, 238
10. Austin Watson, DET, 238
10 lightest players in the NHL this season
1. Lane Hutson, MTL, 162
2. Seamus Casey, NJD, 162
3. Logan Stankoven, DAL, 165
4. Danil Gushchin, SJS, 165
5. Conor Garland, VAN, 165
6. Jared Spurgeon, MIN, 166
7. Dustin Wolf, CGY, 166
8. Albert Johansson, DET, 168
9. Bobby Brink, PHI, 169
10. Zach Benson, BUF, 170
NHL averages this season: Canadian 41.2%, American 28.6%, European 30.2%
Analysis: The rise of USA Hockey keeps showing up in this number, year after year.
Twenty years ago, only around 15 percent of NHL players were American. A decade ago, that had jumped to 23 percent. Now it’s up again, this time approaching the level of all of the European nations combined.
That growth is obviously coming at the expense of Canadian players, which is happening for a couple of reasons.
No. 1 is simply population size, as the U.S. has nine times the people power. But the other big thing impacting this is simply participation in hockey. U.S. markets like Pittsburgh, Chicago, California, St. Louis, Washington D.C. and others have exploded over the last decade or two, offering more competition for spots in the pro game.
Minor hockey enrollment in Canada, meanwhile, has been stagnant for some time, in part due to cost reasons.
These trends are probably worth deeper analysis at some point later this season, especially as we ramp up for the return of international play with the NHL 4 Nations Face-Off in February and the Olympics in 2026. If you have suggestions on future stories that would look at how the demographics of the league have changed, let us know in the comments.
NHL averages this season: First-rounders 42.6%, Rounds 2+ 46.1%, Undrafted 11.3%
Analysis: I haven’t done this type of analysis before, so I don’t have historical comparables to look at, but I did find it interesting just to pull out the overall numbers.
The fact that nearly 43 percent of players are picked in the first round of the NHL Draft is telling, as is the realization more than 10 percent of the league wasn’t drafted at all.
There are a lot of different ways to build a team in this league.
One thing that stood out with this part of the data is just how different goaltenders are. Only 9 percent of those in the league were drafted in the first round, as teams are often reluctant to use high picks on them. More than 15 percent of goalies weren’t drafted at all, a group that includes recent Stanley Cup winners Sergei Bobrovsky and Alexandar Georgiev.
There were also a lot more mid- and late-round hits with netminders, with an incredible 20 percent of them picked in the fifth, sixth or seventh round. Only 10 percent of defensemen, by comparison, were found in those later rounds.
There’s probably a fuller analysis that could be done on this data as part of one of our upcoming draft packages, as there’s a lot to unpack here.
(Photo of Matt Rempe, 6-9, pushing over Ryan Lomberg, 5-9: Bruce Bennett / Getty Images)
