Connor McDavid is among the best players in the NHL and well on his way to being an all-time great.
The Edmonton Oilers center has won the scoring title four times, most recently last season, when he had 123 points (44 goals, 79 assists). He has also won the Ted Lindsay Award (players’ MVP) three times and the Hart Trophy (League MVP) twice.
With his season-opening hat trick against the Vancouver Canucks on Oct. 12, McDavid became the sixth-fastest player in NHL history to reach 700 points.
In 489 NHL games, he has 702 points (243 goals, 459 assists). Since entering the League at the start of the 2015-16 season, no player has more points. Patrick Kane of the Chicago Blackhawks is next closest with 624 points (225 goals, 339 assists) in 534 games.
Despite his gaudy numbers, McDavid has yet to score 50 goals in a season. He is averaging 34 goals per season and had an NHL career-high 44 goals in 2021-22.
Can the 25-year old reach the 50-goal plateau this season and add that to his already substantial resume?
Video: McDavid first goal breakdown
That’s the question before NHL.com senior writer Dan Rosen and staff writer Amalie Benjamin in this installment of State Your Case.
Rosen: Since he arrived in the NHL seven years ago, it has never been a question of if McDavid will score 50, but when. The answer is this season. McDavid already has four goals in two games, which is, you know, a 164-goal pace. Pretty good. OK, he won’t score that many, but it’s not a stretch to think he can score 46 over the next 80 games. He had 44 in 80 games last season. McDavid has averaged 0.56 goals per game in the past three seasons (111 goals in 200 games). That’s 45 goals per 82 games. He needs to average 0.575 goals per game in the next 80 games to get to 50 after his strong start. The key for McDavid is his ability to drive to the net with speed. It makes him almost unstoppable, especially considering the skilled players around him that get him the puck, particularly on the power play. Leon Draisaitl is as good of a distributor as he is a scorer. I can see McDavid and Draisaitl becoming the first set of teammates to each score at least 50 goals in the same season since Mario Lemieux (69) and Jaromir Jagr (62) with the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1995-96. The question was always when. The answer is now.
Benjamin: Listen, I’m not saying it’s out of the realm of possibility, but 50 is a big number even for a player as talented as McDavid. But McDavid is a pass-first player — even as he’s scored at least 40 goals three times — and there’s no question that he wants to do exactly what it takes to bring the Oilers to the next level after they reached the Western Conference Final. last season. He wants to prove that he’s not just a point machine, that he’s the kind of captain and all-time player who can win the Stanley Cup. Which means that he may not focus on scoring 50 goals. He is likely focusing on distributing the puck to where it needs to go, when it needs to go there, which will inevitably dilute his goal-scoring totals. He’s focusing on making sure the Oilers can be the best team in the Western Conference and make it to the Cup Final, after being swept in the conference final by the Colorado Avalanche last season. It’s possible that McDavid scoring 50 goals will get them there, but it might just be more likely that scoring 40-45 will be the magic number. That’s where I think he’ll end up this season.
Rosen: McDavid is a distributor, but I hesitate to call him a pass-first player. He is a playmaker, which means if the play is to shoot, he will. He had 314 shots on goal last season. That was fifth in the NHL behind Austin Matthews of the Toronto Maple Leafs (348), Alex Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals (334), Timo Meier of the San Jose Sharks (326) and Kyle Connor (317) of the Winnipeg Jets. He has a total of 514 shots on goal over the past two seasons; only Matthews (570) and Ovechkin (516) have more. He is as much a shooter as he is a passer. In fact, McDavid shot 14.0 percent on his 314 shots last season, which was a shade under the 15.2 percent he shot in his first six seasons and even lower than his 16.5 percent in 2020-21 (33 goals on 200 shots). He already has nine shots in two games, which suggests he’s looking to shoot at least as much this season as he did the previous two. With his quickness and as decisively as he can get to the net, he’s going to be around the scoring areas. He’s not going to pass from there. He’s going to score. He can get his shooting percentage back up to 16.5 percent. He will have more than 300 shots on goal. Do the math and he’s right at 50 goals, not because he’s thinking of only himself and his numbers, but because that’s what the Oilers need from their captain.
Benjamin: You make a compelling case, Dan. But we also have to keep in mind how rare a 50-goal season is, despite the goal-scoring binge of last season, something that we don’t yet know will continue. Everything must come together right for any player — even one who will likely end up among the all-time NHL greats — to reach that level. Yes, four players did it last season — Matthews with 60, Draisaitl with 55, Chris Kreider of the New York Rangers with 52 and Ovechkin with 50 — but in the previous nine seasons, only five players hit 50. Ovechkin did it four times (2018-19, 2015-16, 2014-15 and 2013-14) and Draisaitl once (2018-19), and Ovechkin is perhaps the greatest pure goal-scorer in NHL history. I think Draisaitl could get there again, which would be his third 50-plus season, but I don’t think McDavid will, even with those four goals in two games to start this season — four goals on nine shots is a bit of an unsustainable pace for anyone. And that’s the other question: As part of those four 50-goal seasons in 2021-22, NHL scoring was up across the board. Will that continue? Maybe. But I’m not yet convinced of that, and I’m not yet convinced McDavid will find the magic and hit 50. Check back with me in March.
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