When we think of elite players in the NHL, we tend to think of individuals who are especially good at obvious things; the types of things that get highlighted in an NHL Skills Competition, like fastest skater, hardest shot, and most accurate shooter. And when you ask what makes a skilled player elite, these are often the first attributes that come to mind.

This makes sense intuitively because the NHL’s elite players usually fall into one or multiple of these categories. McDavid is fast, Ovechkin shoots the puck hard, and Crosby is pinpoint accurate.

This line of thinking makes a player like Matthew Tkachuk a uniquely interesting case study. Tkachuk is one of the preeminent wingers in the NHL. His combination of physicality, verbal sparring, and high-end scoring skill is a rare combination. His NHL Edge stats, hilariously, paint a confounding picture.

These NHL Edge stats suggest that Tkachuk is slow, doesn’t cover much ice, and has below-average velocity on his shot. And yet, he’s elite at driving offensive zone time (92nd percentile) and goal scoring (81st percentile).

Tkachuk is known for his physicality, goal-scoring, and antagonism, but in my opinion, the skillset that works as his proverbial glue is his elite wall play. His smarts and top-notch ability to get the puck off the wall, combined with his other traits, make him a maddeningly effective player, which can extend possession sequences and create scoring chances like few can.

What does any of this have to do with the Seattle Kraken? The last article I wrote for Sound Of Hockey highlighted how simple habits with the mid-lane drive can produce high-quality scoring chances. This article has a similar theme – how the subtle skillset of strong wall play is the foundation of driving play effectively.

Jaden Schwartz and Jordan Eberle – a case study in fundamentals

The first time I watched either Jordan Eberle or Jaden Schwartz play was the IIHF World Junior Championship in 2009. For many players, the World Juniors are their first foray into the bright lights of national recognition.

Eberle seemed to rise to the occasion for big moments. He scored the game-tying goal and a critical shootout goal for Canada in a semifinal against Russia (more on that later). The next year, he scored twice in the final three minutes of the gold medal game to send Canada to overtime against USA (a game where the Americans eventually prevailed). 

Schwartz played for Canada in 2011 and 2012. Those Canadian teams were less successful, and I’ll confess that as a younger hockey fan, I felt a little underwhelmed. I think I expected Schwartz to be a flashy winger, but that type of performance didn’t materialize. Looking back, I think one of the reasons why I felt underwhelmed was that I personally didn’t understand what really good hockey fundamentals looked like.

With the benefit of hindsight, we can see how both Schwartz and Eberle have evolved from junior hockey stars to highly successful NHLers. In a lot of ways, Schwartz and Eberle share a lot of similarities. They’re both on the slightly smaller side, and they are skilled offensive wingers but high-end speed isn’t their calling card. Their games have also aged gracefully, and I believe one of the reasons why is that they’re both masters of wall play. Show me a player skilled on the wall, and I’ll show you a key play driver on your team.

An underappreciated skill

First, let’s set the stage for what makes wall play so challenging and important. Former NHL coach and player Dallas Eakins once observed that within NHL games, the puck is within three feet of the boards about 80 percent of the game. The boards serve as a natural outlet for many plays when direct tape-to-tape passes are not an option.

Handling pucks off the wall is difficult because rimmed pucks are often moving fast, and the boards can cause the puck to bounce unpredictably. You often need to be able to pull the puck off the wall with the toe of your stick, which is less than ideal for puck control. When you add the element of pressure and the fact that lingering too long on the wall with the puck leads to repeated hits, you can see why wall play is challenging.

At the same time, successful wall play leads to defensive-zone exits and transition play. Successful wall play keeps pucks in the offensive zone, allowing your team to wear down the opposition with extended offensive-zone sequences. Players that can consistently make plays off the wall help tilt the possession battle. You simply cannot be an effective play driver in the NHL without mastering the fundamentals of wall play.

In the offensive zone

Let’s look at some key moments from last season where skill on the wall led to a positive outcome for the Kraken.

Excellent wall play can force unexpected turnovers on the forecheck, leading to prime scoring chances. In this sequence, Schwartz is the first forward (or F1) on the forecheck. After the Kraken dump it in, Montreal defender Arber Xhekaj is first to the puck. Schwartz correctly reads that Xhekaj does not have an option to move it up the strongside boards and moves to cut off the rimmed puck behind the net.

In almost one smooth motion, Schwartz is able to pick up the rimmed puck and move it out front to a wide-open Oliver Bjorkstrand. It’s a great shot by Bjorkstrand, but that play is only there because Schwartz is able to pick up the rimmed puck and move it quickly.

The ability to pick the puck off the wall quickly also allows you to move the puck faster, opening up passing lanes. This next clip illustrates how Eberle is able to retrieve the puck off the wall and find a streaking Jani Nyman before the defense can react.

Eberle enters the zone on the power play and is forced down the wall to the corner before sending it back up high to the blue line. Montour is a right-handed shot, so moving the puck from east to west is risky. He opts to rim the puck back low to Eberle. Eberle is able catch the rim and immediately move it to a wide-open Nyman for his first career NHL goal. It looks like a routine play, but it’s not. If Eberle needs to take an extra second to pick up that puck, that passing lane gets shut down either by the defender Matheson (No. 8) or a well-timed poke check from the Montreal goaltender.

More recently, Eberle displayed his mastery by one-touching a back-hander between his own legs to Matty Beniers, who finished off a beautiful power-play goal against Vegas last week.

MATTY MAGIC! 🚨

Sick setup, sick finish, sick celly.

Power-play goal, and it's 1-0 #SeaKraken. pic.twitter.com/AfVFcsAmxz

— Sound Of Hockey (@sound_hockey) October 12, 2025

In transition

The Kraken had a lot of trouble transitioning the puck last year, likely contributing to their less-than-stellar results for offensive- and defensive-zone time. Making successful plays on the wall is a key ingredient to moving the puck out of your zone in an organized fashion. The following two plays show how making a wall play in transition leads to offensive-zone possession and a goal.

Eberle finds himself with the puck in tight against the wall attempting to break it out. His options are somewhat limited. He doesn’t have much speed, and he’s about to take a hit from a back checker. The lateral pass to teammate Chandler Stephenson is unavailable due to a well-positioned stick from Montreal’s Brendan Gallagher (No. 11). However, he remains poised and is able to make a skilled play and find Vince Dunn sprinting up the middle, which opens up more breakout options.

The Kraken ultimately dump the puck in, and the Montreal goaltender, unable to handle the rimmed puck, allows it to go to the other side where Eberle is ready to make a play. He one-touches the rimmed puck to Eeli Tolvanen, who makes no mistake scoring. That last play wasn’t a fortuitous deflection. That was the subtle art of wall play.

This next example features neither Eberle nor Schwartz but is simply too good not to share. Kaapo Kakko takes a breakout pass along the wall. Although he has to receive this pass with his back turned to the middle of the ice, limiting his vision, he pre-scans prior to getting the puck, knowing that Beniers is skating up the middle. He makes a skilled play, simultaneously protecting the puck and finding a clever outlet to Beniers.

Because Kakko is able to move the puck to an already-moving Beniers, the Kraken are able to get the zone entry and create an initial scoring chance. That chance doesn’t go in, but the Oilers fail to recover the puck, and Kakko is able to make yet another skilled wall play, catching a rimmed pass on his backhand and walking out in front of the net to set up Beniers for a backdoor tap-in goal.

Defending

Being great at wall play doesn’t just mean you’re on the ice for key offensive situations; it also means that coaches will put you out when your team is defending a lead. When the trailing team is pressing, making plays off the wall is crucial to clearing pucks and relieving pressure. If you can’t make those plays, the puck can end up in the back of your net very quickly.

In the above, a good play on the wall prevents a clean zone exit, and the Oilers are forced to rim the puck back behind their own net. Jake Walman has the next chance to pull the puck off the wall and clear it, but under pressure, he ends up putting it right on the stick of Schwartz, who scores his second goal of the evening.

In this next clip, the Oilers go from having clear possession to pulling the puck out of the back of their net within a matter of seconds. The culprit? A botched clearing attempt.

Oilers defender Ty Emberson has difficulty handling the puck behind his net and, under pressure, rims it hard to his partner Troy Stecher, who is positioned near the hash marks. Stecher is unable to handle the hard rim, leading to a turnover at the blue line. Ryker Evans sends it the other way, and Andre Burakovsky finishes the scoring chance from the top of the crease.

Strong wall play is critical in the NHL

Let’s revisit Eberle’s famous goal against Russia in the 2009 WJC semifinal. Russia defends pretty well here, keeping the puck on the wall and staying in shooting lanes. The entire sequence prior to the goal is a slog along the wall.

Ultimately, the Canadians win enough small wall battles to find a fortuitous opening, and that makes all the difference in the game that sent them to the final.

In hockey, all these little moments add up to one bigger one. This is winning hockey – the ability to win the hard pucks along the wall in critical moments.

Wall play is a subtle and underappreciated skill. It’s not really sexy, and it’s equal parts hard work and talent. It’s also hard to highlight on TV because the typical broadcast angle doesn’t give a full view of the nearside boards. But players who master it have staying power in the NHL.

One can never get too good at picking up rimmed pucks on the backhand… pic.twitter.com/BbGiigVUBG

— Jack Han (@JhanHky) September 11, 2025

The next time you go to a Kraken game or even an open practice, I would encourage you to keep an eye out for players working on their wall skills. They might partner off and work on it individually or you might see it baked into a puck retrieval drill. For some of you, it may be a whole other dimension to the skill game waiting to be discovered.