Shakir Mukhamadulin game breakdown

I took a closer look at his recent performance vs Sibir.

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The New Jersey Devils, controversially, drafted defenseman Shakir Mukhamadulin with the 20th overall pick in last week’s draft.

A lot of the defense made surrounding the selection has centered around improved play early on in this KHL season.

Rather than blindly taking everyone’s word for it, I wanted to see for myself. So, thanks to DevilsInsiders, I combed through once of his recent games – taking notes and tracking data along the wall.

Here are some of my takeaways from his performance on October 8th vs Sibir.

note: he is No. 85 if you’re looking for him in the GIFs.

The Good

• I was impressed by Mukhamadulin’s skating for such a big, rangy, kid. He’s not a burner, per se, but he has quick feet and a pretty fluid stride. This allowed him to rather effortlessly jump into the play and close on attackers in the neutral zone without worrying about them blowing by.

• Mukhamadulin’s one-on-one defense, for the most part, was good. He didn’t sit back and allow opposing players to gain his line. He did a good job of putting himself in the right spots and using his stick to steer them into low-danger areas; or simply poke the puck off altogether.

• Mukhamadulin’s transition play was better than I anticipated. Six of his nine exit attempts at 5v5 were completed with control (2 carry-outs, 4 pass-outs). He was also rather effective when he did decide to jump into the play and join the rush. He attacked the right areas of the ice and was capable of completing quick passes to help in the build-up.

• I did like Mukhamadulin’s passing. He didn’t take any crazy risks in the way of long-range stretch passes, or lobbing pucks into space, but he completed the simple outlets that were in front of him and put a couple D-to-D passes on his partner’s tape. I’m not sure what his ceiling is when it comes to passing ability – an 18-year-old kid probably isn’t going to take too many chances in a professional league against men – but it is something I’ll be watching as he continues to progress.

The Bad

• Mukhamadulin did some good but it was far from a perfect performance. One thing the 6’4’ rearguard struggled with, believe it or not, was board play. There were several instances where he would take a poor angle, give up leverage – or put himself in a position where he can’t use his strength – and then cleanly lose a battle you’d expect, at the very least, would turn into a bit of a scrum. Whatever the case may be, he didn’t come out with the puck as often as I’d like to see. While gaining muscle should help, he has some work to do.

  

• I did like Mukhamadulin’s defense in one-on-one situations and in the neutral zone. There were a couple weird instances, though, where he’d kind of get so zeroed in on his man that he would chase any movement and, at times, take himself right out of the play. There was one play where an attacker near the net backed away and Mukhamadulin followed him out a little bit, allowing the puck carrier to take the puck right to the net without *any* resistance at all. It was a free pass. I’d like to see that cleaned up.

• He did have some trouble breaking out of the defensive zone when pressured. If he had space to skate, or an outlet available, he consistently made the right play. When there was nothing really available he kind of looked lost. There were multiple occasions where an opponent would be closing on him and there was no easy exit. He would kind of just throw the puck away – on one occasion right into another player – and it would quickly turn into offense for the opponent.

• Mukhamadulin wasn’t really involved in the offensive zone; particularly at 5v5. He wasn’t the guy looking to breakdown the defense with his passing. He didn’t put himself in positions to put his heavy shot to use either. All told, he logged more than 13 minutes of ice (almost all of it coming at 5v5) and did not record a single shot contribution. No shot assists, no shot attempts.

Data Dump

5v5 Corsi

5v5 Zone Exits

5v5 Neutral Zone Defense