Sophomore Slump? Not Exactly — But Connor Bedard Also Isn't Having A Breakout Season

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It was back in February when Connor Bedard passed Steven Stamkos and Jeff Skinner for third place on a list of active players who have scored the most points before celebrating their 20th birthday. Only Sidney Crosby (222) and Patrik Laine (134) have scored more points as a teenager than Bedard (121), who has another three months to go before he turns 20.

It was yet another reminder of just how young the Chicago Blackhawks centerman is.

It was also evidence that contrary to what you may have been led to believe, the 19-year-old is not having as awful a season as the panel on TNT has repeatedly suggested. Then again, with a league-worst minus-40 rating, he also isn’t setting the league on fire as many — including himself — had hoped following his Calder Trophy win last season as rookie of the year.

“Maybe I have a slump. Maybe I do really well,” Bedard told The Hockey News prior to this season. “You don’t know the future.”

With 20 goals and 60 points in 78 games, it’s clear that Bedard didn’t experience the dreaded sophomore slump that befell previous Calder Trophy winners like Nathan MacKinnon and Matty Beniers. But considering he had 22 goals and 61 points in 68 games as a rookie, he also didn’t have the breakout season that Sidney Crosby and Connor McDavid did in Year 2 when they both won the Art Ross Trophy.

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Instead, that honour goes to Vegas’ Pavel Dorofeyev, who has somewhat unexpectedly broken out as a sophomore with 33 goals and 50 points in 78 games. For Dorofeyev, had just 13 goals and 24 points as a rookie last season, it amounts to a 108% increase in production.

“He's put the work, he put in a lot of work in this summer, and he's progressively gotten better through our organization," Golden Knights coach Bruce Cassidy has said about Dorofeyev, who has scored more goals than any other Vegas player. "He's earned it. He's done a lot of the right things... he's doing things that will lend itself to success in any environment. That's what I like about his game."

Unlike Bedard, who is playing on one of the worst teams in the NHL, Dorofeyev is on a Vegas team that is in first place in the Pacific Division. It's also worth noting that Dorofeyev, who is 24, is five years older than Bedard and had played parts of two other seasons in the NHL before qualifying as a rookie last year.

In fact, Dorofeyev was selected in the third round of the 2019 NHL Draft. That was a year before Bedard was even drafted in the WHL.

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Still, Bedard has more combined points (121) than not only Dorofeyev (83), but also Logan Cooley (102), Marco Rossi (98) and Matthew Knies (87) in the past two years. And he's younger than all of them.

Just think what he'll be able to do once he's no longer a teenager.