I looked at Corey Sznajder’s microstat data this morning on All Three Zones to see how things have looked for some Sabres players. I intended to focus one one player, but another caught my eye.

Owen Power has been a lightning rod this season among fans. You mention his name on social media and the sides immediately start to form. It’s easy to forget that he’s only 22 years old and halfway through his third full pro season.

It has been a down season from an on-ice perspective for the former first-overall pick. In the last month, we’ve seen him struggle and play perhaps some of the worst hockey of his career. That has to start to turn around in the second half of the season. Especially if they want to make a wild run to the playoffs.

Early Career Struggles

Sabres fans should understand the pains of grinding through the struggles of a young talented defenseman. We went through this with Rasmus Dahlin in his first few years. If you can’t recall, below is a look at the underlying numbers in Evolving Hockey’s RAPM model that he was putting up from 2018-22.

The good news is that Power is putting better numbers at even strength early in his career even though it’s not perfect.

This is common for young defensemen particularly early on. Quinn Hughes went through a down season early, Victor Hedman went through some struggles, and there’s more. It doesn’t mean that our expectations shouldn’t be higher for Power, but it’s also an understanding that this is part of the development process. We can see the tools in his game.

Exits

Let’s get back to the microstats. They give us a good view of where Power is excellent and where there is room for growth in his game.

In All Three Zone’s data, Power is still one of the top exit defensemen in this league. He’s near the top in carried exits, which is when he skates the puck out of the zone himself. The Canadian-born defender is also one of the best in exits with possession.

Getting the puck out of your end of the ice is critical. The Sabres offense is still at its best when they’re transitioning up the ice cleanly and Power is an important piece of starting that from the defense zone.

One area that jumped out to me was how Power graded out as one of the top defensemen in the league in defensive zone retrievals per 60 minutes leading to an exit.

We know about his ability to exit the zone cleanly, but this tells us a bit of a different story. His physicality is one of the things that is talked about a lot as a downside to his game. It’s an area he still needs to grow, but it’s not in all aspects.

This data shows he can retrieve pucks dumped into the zone and defend off a forechecking forward to get the puck out of the zone efficiently. I’ve felt from watching that his ability to shield the puck along the walls with his body has improved since he entered the league and this backs that up. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a necessary improvement on net front body position.

Struggle Areas

The microstat numbers were not all roses for Power. His entry defense is among the worst in the league. He’s at the bottom of the league in entries against that lead to scoring chances. The entry denials per percentage are also at the bottom of the league.

Teams have scouts and do their homework. You can see by the high carry-against rate in the chart above that coaching staffs are telling their players to target Power on entries. Pairing him with Connor Clifton recently could be a sign the Sabres have noticed this as well and are trying to give him some help.

There could be a few reasons for this. Power is leaving too big of a gap and giving rushing attackers space to enter the zone. He’s not using his body to push players to the outside or remove them from the puck along the wall. He could also be failing to use his reach at 6’6″ to impact the puck carrier.

The positive spin we can put on this is that he can improve in this area with good coaching. It’s not an area where either you have it or you don’t. He may never be elite at it, but he can improve it enough to the point that it’s not hindering his ability to be an effective defender.

I feel that the overall narrative and conversation around Power has gone off the road. Objectively this is a player with elite traits in his game and potential. There are obvious areas of his game, particularly defensively, that need to grow. It’s holding him back from reaching that ceiling that he has.

Nobody is in the mood to hear anything about patience with this team, but that’s what’s required with a player still this young. The organization has not done a lot to help him along the way, similar to Dahlin. That’s on them and fans have to hope he works through it in the same way.

This article isn’t about trade him or not. It’s not about is he soft or not. The point of this is to show us the clear areas where he succeeds and struggles. To give the proper perspective on what needs to improve. It’s not just be more physical. It’s get better in net-front coverage and on entry defense.

It’s not he’s just an offense merchant. He has elite tools that make this team better defensively and in transition.

Data via: Evolving Hockey and All Three Zones

Photo Credit: Kevin Hoffman/Getty Images