Will the NHL's 100-Point Players List Grow in 2023-24?

With the explosion of goal-scoring in the post-pandemic NHL, it's easy to forget that we're only eight years removed from a year without a single 100-point player. In the 2014-15 season, Jamie Benn of the Dallas Stars won the Art Ross Trophy with 87 points. 

Over the last seven years, players have reached the century mark a total of 32 times, with a heavy emphasis on the past two seasons.

Here's the distribution:

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Of the 11 NHL players who hit 100 points last season, eight did it for the first time.

It's old hat for Connor McDavid. The five-time Art Ross champ has hit triple digits six times in his eight seasons to date. He was at 97 points in 64 games when the 2019-20 campaign was paused due to the pandemic.

McDavid's teammate, Leon Draisaitl, has cracked 100 points in four of the past five years. In the pandemic-shortened season, he was the only player to hit triple digits, with 110 points. That earned him the Hart and Art Ross Trophies and the Ted Lindsay Award.

McDavid and Draisaitl hit new career highs last season — McDavid by 30 points in his first Rocket Richard win (64 goals) and Draisaitl by 18 points.

Nikita Kucherov tied for third in 2022-23 with 113 points. It was his third time hitting triple digits but not his personal best. In the Lightning's historic 2018-19 season, Kucherov matched his club's 128 standings points with 128 points of his own. That was good for the 2019 Art Ross and Hart Trophies and the Ted Lindsay Award.

Now, the newbies:

This past season was the first past 100 points for Boston's David Pastrnak, who finished second to McDavid with 61 goals and tied with Kucherov with 113 points. 

Pastrnak's previous best also came in the 2019-20 season, when he shared the Rocket Richard Trophy with Alex Ovechkin thanks to 48 goals and was up to 95 points before the season shut down.

In fifth place last season, we find Nathan MacKinnon with 111 points. One year after winning the Stanley Cup with the Colorado Avalanche for the first time, he cracked the century mark after three previous seasons in the 90s — including an oh-so-close 99 points in 2018-19. The following year, his quest was thwarted when he got to 93 points in 69 games before the season was shut down.

Sixth and seventh place last season were held by 109-point efforts from a pair of up-and-coming talents. In his third full NHL season, 23-year-old Jason Robertson added 30 additional points to his strong 79-point sophomore campaign.

And while Matthew Tkachuk cemented his superstar status during the playoffs, he also delivered during the regular season when he bettered his 104-point effort in Calgary in 2021-22 with 109 points in his Florida Panthers debut. Even more impressive: 30 of those points came in the last 20 games of the season, as the Panthers made their successful push for the post-season.

With seven NHL seasons already under his belt, Tkachuk only turned 25 last December. He still has plenty of runway ahead.

Mikko Rantanen turns 27 on Oct. 29. He has just put together the two best offensive seasons of his career and could have more in the tank. In 2021-22, Rantanen set new personal bests with 36 goals and 92 points. Last season, he left those numbers in the dust with 55 goals — third-most in the league — and 105 points, good for eighth place overall.

In ninth place at 104 points, we have the first overall pick from 2011. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins had never before even hit 70 points in a season — his previous career high was 69 in 2018-19. But the 29-year-old found a perfect spot on Edmonton's historically good 32.4 percent power play and collected 53 points on the man advantage, putting him third in that category behind only his teammates McDavid (71) and Draisaitl (62). 

Rounding out the top 10: Elias Pettersson of the Vancouver Canucks. Pettersson won the Calder Trophy in 2019 with 66 points in 71 games but subsequently struggled to eclipse his debut campaign. In 2021-22, he finally hit career highs with 32 goals and 68 points. Then, he jumped to 39 goals and 102 points during a tumultuous 2022-23 campaign in Vancouver. 

Finally — there isn't much to say about the final member of last season's Century Club that hasn't been said already. Erik Karlsson's 101-point effort made him the first defenseman to hit triple digits since Brian Leetch posted 102 points in 1991-92. And Karlsson is just the sixth blueliner of all-time to get there, following in the footsteps of Bobby Orr (six times), Paul Coffey (five times) and Al MacInnis, Leetch and Denis Potvin (once each).

Karlsson's previous career high was 82 points with the Ottawa Senators in 2015-16 — a year where he finished as the Norris Trophy runner-up to Drew Doughty. But his historic campaign really came out of nowhere: limited to 50 games in 2021-22, Karlsson catapulted up from a 35-point season all the way to his third career Norris and, now, a chance to contend in the playoffs with the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Can They Sustain? 

It seems safe to assume that Karlsson's achievement will be one-and-done — both because it was so extraordinary and because he's going to have to share offensive ice time with Kris Letang in Pittsburgh.

For McDavid and Draisaitl, they're now so far above the 100-point bar that it would be insulting to suggest they'd dip to double digits. With them, the question is whether they can continue their steady, impressive year-over-year improvement.

Nugent-Hopkins's status seems a bit more questionable. And while having a healthy Evander Kane for a full season could offer some additional options on the power play, Jay Woodcroft stuck pretty religiously with his Big Five during the playoffs: McDavid, Draisaitl, Nugent-Hopkins, Zach Hyman and Evan Bouchard. If it ain't broke...

Nugent-Hopkins and Kucherov are the only forwards who hit triple digits last season and are no longer in their 20s. Both turned 30 shortly after the end of the regular season, so they should still have some gas in the tank. 

As for Pastrnak, Robertson, Tkachuk, MacKinnon, Rantanen and Pettersson — they're in that age 24-to-27 sweet spot where they should be playing some of their best hockey. Another 100-point year could easily be in the cards for all of them.

Who's Next?

Can we get to 15 or more 100-point players in 2023-24? Don't rule it out.

Two stars fell just shy of hitting triple digits last season. Jack Hughes of the New Jersey Devils and Mitch Marner of the Toronto Maple Leafs finished with 99 points each. For Marner, that followed up a 97-point campaign, suggesting the 26-year-old is on the precipice of breaking through.

Hughes, just 22, was limited to 49 games in 2021-22 but produced at better than a point-per-game rate. So while his jump from 56 to 99 points looks massive on paper, there were hints that he was already on his way. 

The New Jersey Devils' new status as a top team in the Metropolitan Division should set the stage for his first 100-point campaign.

A couple of other players also hit the 90-point threshold for the first time last season and are tough to bet against. 

Tage Thompson went from 68 points to 94 while logging two six-point games — the only player in the entire NHL to hit that mark in 2022-23. And Tim Stutzle has already made the Ottawa Senators feel very good about signing him to that eight-year contract extension that kicks in this fall. The 21-year-old went from 58 points in the 2021-22 campaign all the way up to 90 last season.

Also, keep an eye out for 25-year-old Clayton Keller on an improved Arizona Coyotes team. He'd been flirting with a point a game before suffering a broken leg late in 2021-22, then came back to shatter his previous records with 86 points last season. 

The Coyotes should have more firepower this year than we've seen in a long time. Keller will be the sparkplug that ignites the offense.

After an injury sidelined him in the 2022 playoffs, Brayden Point joined the 50-goal club for the first time last season. His 95 points were the best of his career after he hit 92 with the Lightning in 2018-19. 

And are there some former centurions who could get back in the mix next season? Look for a strong campaign from Auston Matthews, who hit 60 goals and 106 points in 2021-22. Johnny Gaudreau, Jonathan Huberdeau and Kirill Kaprizov are three more players from the 2021-22 Century Club who also have bounce-back potential.

From the Department of Legends: Sidney Crosby has six 100-point seasons in his career, most recently in 2018-19. He played all 82 games last year, finishing with 93 points, and should be coming back hungry after a too-long summer vacation. And Steven Stamkos followed up 106 points in 2021-22 with 84 points last year. Remarkably, he's now heading into the final season of his current eight-year contract. At 33, he has plenty of incentive to demonstrate this season he's aiming for a Pavelski-esque career arc where age is just a number.