How confidence has driven Mitch Marner’s eight-game goal scoring streak

The last time an NHL player scored in nine straight games was during the 1997-98 season, when Teemu Selanne did it en route to scoring in 11 straight. That’s 24 years since anyone’s got to nine in a row.

Mitch Marner now has the longest streak in the NHL this season with goals in eight straight games, scoring 10 times in that stretch, which is pretty staggering coming from a guy many had labelled as one-dimensional. It’s been an unbelievable dimension, of course — his vision and passing is up there with some of the great distributors in league history — so it’s at least been fair to say scoring hasn’t been his main dimension.

Marner’s always been a decent NHL scorer though, as evidenced by his league rank in goals for over the past five seasons respectively: 39th, 142nd, 71st, 98th, 106th. With 32 teams in the league, that’s 96 first line players (and 192 top-sixers), which puts Marner’s scoring somewhere in the standard mix of goal output you’d expect from players in the top-six.

Still, we don’t compare Marner to average Joes. He’s a top-five NHL draft pick who’s played top-six minutes from the second he stepped into the league (who also isn’t paid to be just “good” at offensive stuff) so you can see why his scoring ability is often hand-waved away.

Still, this is a guy who last season slid inside the top-40 in goals scored, and who also showed he could score in junior, so maybe we shouldn’t be stunned he’s had a run where he’s finding the back of the net at an incredible clip.

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Marner’s eight-game goal streak has come on the back of three things: An increased frequency of shooting, getting to the better areas of the rink, and of course, good ol’ fashioned luck. (He fanned on a breakaway shot that went in, grabbed an empty netter, and had a few pucks bounce his way, as should happen for every player at times.)

Let me add a fourth thing to that as well: he’s not just getting to better spots and shooting more, but having the confidence to just shoot the puck before the goalie has time to take stock of things. (Since he has only an average shot, this is something he can take and keep from this streak — you don’t have to overpower anyone if the shots are coming before a goalie is set.)

So first, the numbers.

Over the first 26 games of Marner’s season, he was shooting the puck at a rate of 2.31 shots per game. Over this eight-game scoring streak that number has skyrocketed to an even 4.00 per, which helps explain more pucks going in, and also some of the “luck” I mentioned that’s tied to his success.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen Alex Ovechkin score goals and gone “Man how does that shot go in — just because Ovi is shooting it?” Well, the simple answer is that it isn’t going in just because Ovi is shooting it, it’s going in because he SHOOTS AND SHOOTS AND SHOOTS and has over his whole career and if you challenge goalies to make saves frequently enough, sometimes they fail to do so.

But further to that, Marner’s not just getting shots, he’s getting considerably better ones. His looks in the inner slot prior to the streak came at a rate of 0.5 per game. During this streak, that’s up to 1.38 per. Being there has driven up his total scoring chances, and of course, his expected goals, which has jumped up a significant amount as well.

If you care to see all that laid out:

What I want to focus on most, though, is the bottom stat there: his one-timers. What’s really stood out to me is how quickly the puck is getting to him and off his stick. As you can see his rate of one-timers has ticked up from 1.12 per to 1.50, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. It’s been on my mind watching him ever since he just absolutely buried this one-timer which made me think, “Boy, that was refreshing to see him just get it and unload it, wasn’t it?” This was game two of his streak:

It looks like the obvious play to hit the one-timer there — because it is — but he hasn’t always taken that obvious option in the past. That’s the type of goal I’d deem a “streak starter,” which is a weird thing maybe only I believe in. When you hit one just right, just perfectly, and it tucks under the bar and feels so cathartic, there’s something freeing about that for your mind and the way you approach the game afterwards, like you’re playing with house money. (I believe in slump starters too, which are those freebies you somehow choke away, before you start squeezing your stick into a fine powder like the universe now owes you a goal.)

Once you start feeling it, I think guys remember how they’re capable of putting goalies in uncomfortable situations simply by getting pucks at them and making it their problem.

I always think of this goal when it comes to the concept of a hot, confident player just saying “Y’know what the second I get it I’m firing it, the onus is on you now, goalie.” It was the start of the season and James Neal had scored in the team’s previous two games, and he had already scored three in this particular game. It must’ve felt like anything he’d touch would go in. So he figured, let’s find out.

Sure, fadeaway, goal-line, on-ice, quick-release wrister into the tendy’s feet, why not make it four on the night? It’s a bad goal on the goalie, sure. But this is the thing about making the puck the goalie’s problem — it often works, and right now that’s what I see from Marner’s mojo. When the puck is coming to him anywhere near those scoring areas, he’s in absolute “let’s find out, this puck is your problem now goalie” mode.

On his stick and off. And again.

No hesitation.

Mike Kelly of NHL Network and SportLogiq noticed this trend too, and tweeted about it Tuesday:

Mitch Marner: 10 goals during 8-game goal streak. Seven of ten goals via quick-release shots (less than 1 second with the puck before shot). League average shooting % is nearly double on quick-release shots vs non-quick-release. Grip it and rip it. pic.twitter.com/gJDywd6kl2

— Mike Kelly (@MikeKellyNHL) February 8, 2022

So this is what NHL players mean when they talk about confidence in their post-game press conference. It’s tough to describe exactly how it changes the way you attack goalies, but a universal truth seems to be that hesitating leads to problems, and just playing quickly and forcing others to react to you helps guys “get lucky.”

For weeks now Marner has been shooting first and asking questions later, and the answers have been nothing but positive.

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