Who are Flames’ fastest skaters and hardest shooters according to NHL Edge skating and shot data?

Earlier this season, the NHL announced the launch of NHL EDGE – an advanced statistics section of the league’s website developed in collaboration with Sportradar that delivers “Player performance metrics from the League’s Puck and Player Tracking system.” Focusing on skating speed and shot speed, I visited NHL.com/edge and dug into the data on Calgary Flames skaters so far through the 2023-24 season. Here’s what I found:

Top skating speed (forward)

The Flames do not have a forward with tremendously impressive top speed and only a handful of Flames forwards, including Blake Coleman, Dillon Dubé, and Adam Ruzicka, eclipsed the league average (34.94 kilometres per hour) top speed among forwards. The forward to hit the fastest top speed for the Calgary Flames so far this season is Martin Pospisil, who has clocked 36.04 KPH (22.39 MPH).

Top skating speed (defenceman)

The fastest top speed on the entire Flames roster so far this season was recorded by Nikita Zadorov with an impressive 37.62 KPH (23.15 MPH) top speed, while the remainder of the Flames defencemen hover around league average top speed for the position (33.98 KPH).

Top skating distance (forward)

Unsurprisingly, no skater on the Calgary Flames roster has logged more mileage than top-line centre, go-to penalty killer, and top power play mainstay, Elias Lindholm, who’s skated 82.19 kilometres so far this season. Lindholm has also recorded the furthest skating distance in a single game, with 6.19 kilometres.

Per 60 minutes, however, the leader is Walker Duehr, with 16.90 kilometres. This stat likely speaks to his limited ice time and the resulting ability to hammer distance on his shifts.

Top skating distance (defenceman)

Among defencemen, likely due to the four-game suspension to Rasmus Andersson, Noah Hanifin leads the group in total skating distance with 80.41 kilometres, while Jordan Oesterle, with 15.15 kilometres, is the per 60 leader. Rasmus Andersson holds the top skating distance in a game (among all Flames skaters) with 6.72 kilometres.

Hardest shot (forward)

The Flames’ hardest-shooting forward is Walker Duehr. Not only has he recorded the fastest shot speed among all skaters on the team with a shot clocking 156.26 KPH (97.10 MPH), his average is also the highest among forwards (105.74 KPH/65.70 MPH).

Hardest shot (defenceman)

Like with Calgary’s forwards, the same player has recorded both the hardest shot (151.85 KPH/94.36 MPH) and the highest average shot speed (120.38 KPH/74.80 MPH): Noah Hanifin.

Note: Ilya Solovyov recorded two shots (only one shot on goal) that were tracked, so his 125.18 KPH average shot speed was excluded.