For all the NHL hockey fans out there and especially those managers finetuning their fantasy lineups, we have an exciting player point projection for you today. That player? Well, none other than Connor Bedard of the Chicago Blackhawks, and this is his estimated point projection for the upcoming 2025-26 campaign.
Connor Bedard‘s ’25-26 Point Total Projection
Connor Bedard has many impressive scoring records to his name already. In his 19-year-old season, among active NHLers, he just had the ninth-best season with 67 points. For brevity, Sidney Crosby‘s 120-point 2006-07 campaign leads the active snipers. His 84-assist total that year is still a legendary mark. Wayne Gretzky had 164 points in 1980-81 is the top overall, Crosby is second all-time. Now, we aren’t trying to quite put Bedard at the level of the best-of-the-best, but he has proven to every bit the first-overall pick we expected. There’s absolutely no denying that fact.
Another way to look at Bedard’s brilliance is the cumulative stats of a 19-year-old. There, his 128 points slot him 16th all time and fifth among active skaters. Thus, if we turn this idea into a prediction, what if Bedard ends up ranked around seventh after his 20-year-old campaign? The slot currently is occupied by Matt Duchene and his 150 points. The fact that he is already at 128, really puts into perspective how ahead of the curve he really might be throughout his recent era of NHL peers.
Even if Bedard maintains his two-year average, he would end up with 192 points. That would put him 19th on the all-time list, sandwiched right between The Savardian Spin-a-rama Denis Savard and a current Montreal Canadien, Patrik Laine. In contrast, based on his NHL sample thus far, we anticipate an increase in his offensive output. Call it a hunch. But how can we use the empirical evidence to help support our claim?
What About the Impact of his Teammates
Connor Bedard comes into his third NHL season, and really, the sky’s the limit. Bedard is going to get the top power play time. Moreover, he gets the best offensive talent Chicago has to offer. That talent includes young players like Artyom Levshunov and Frank Nazar. Furthermore, they have some veterans there, that can set up net front and make space for Bedard out there on the ice. Guys like Tyler Bertuzzi and Ryan Donato fit the bill for those type of NHLers. Therefore, even if Bedard isn’t surrounded by the most talented of players, he has role players, and able to grow his game with fellow young NHLers. He’s the centre of the team’s offence and hopefully for Hawk fans, able to power the team to success over the next number of years.
In any case, this is still somewhat a development year for Bedard. Not so much from an individual perspective, but from a organization standpoint. Because the challenging part for Bedard, with the lack of depth around him, is that it can be difficult to avoid tough defensive matchups. So, yes, Bedard may be on the verge of a huge offensive breakout, but the team dynamic does make it difficult to predict accurately.
Bedard is not long turned 20-years-old. One stat that is impressive for a forward of his age, is his average ice time is over 20 minutes. Even if he hasn’t exploded offensively to this point, he has been developing beyond his years. So, it really a matter of if, but when he is going to pop off offensively.
How Will He Get It Done Statistically
One of Bedard’s strengths is his shot. His release is very explosive, his wrist-shot is very powerful, and it’s extremely effective in tight. The one downside, is that he doesn’t use it enough. In his first two NHL seasons, he’s played 150 games and taken 401 shots on goal. His shots-per-60-minutes were 7.0 last year. Compared to someone like Auston Matthews, he was at 11.4 S/60 last year, and has been as high as nearly 14 throughout his career. The point is, we won’t know how good Bedsy’s shot can be, if he doesn’t use it.
We do think Bedard will shoot more in 2025-26. Also, the quality of his linemates should increase, as well as the chemistry. Whether that is the emergence of Nazar, or building off last year’s success with Bertuzzi, or perhaps one of the other skilled, offensive forwards. A couple guys that come to mind are Donato or Teuvo Teravainen. In any case, this will increase Bedard’s point totals, but also he playmaking and assist opportunities.
He has already established himself as someone with great patience. He is able to free up space for teammates, and is a very smooth passer to boot. Thus far, he has had NHL season assist totals of 39 and 44. We like to think that he keeps on improving on those numbers.
Now, it is time for our final point projection for the Hawks Connor Bedard in 2025-26. First of all, we do think with added chemistry, he is able to increase his assists, if only slightly. Therefore, we will land his projection around 45-50 assists.
The big thing for Bedsy is how often he is shooting. We think he finds a way to start scoring more, especially on the power play. He already took a big jump from four to 11 power play goals over his first two campaigns. With a higher rate of shots, as well as an improved shooting percentage. The more you shoot, the better rhythm you develop naturally, and the higher your shooting percentage should end up being. As a note, his current career shooting percentage is only 11.2%. Look for him to improve that to around abouts 13%, if not higher. That is as he learns he way around the league and how to use his space for his advantage, and not just setting up linemates.
For these reasons, we have him scoring between 30 and 35 goals this year. Maybe a tad conservative, but a big jump from 23 last year. Thus, putting it all together, we like him to be slightly more than a point-per-game player. He should be able to hit 80-85 points, even if he ends up missing a few games throughout the campaign.
Main Photo Credit: Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports
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