Yegor Sharangovich can succeed in many roles

The 24-year-old winger doesn't have to play with Jack Hughes to be effective.

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By CJ Turtoro (@CJTDevil)

There’s been a rather persistent memetic perception that Yegor Sharangovich is almost exclusively a product of Jack Hughes’s wizardry. 

This may be partially because in 2020-21, Jack Hughes somehow dragged a line with rookie mid-rounders (Yegor and Janne Kuokkanen) to top line competence.

When this past season started and Hughes was injured, Yegor struggled mightily and Janne Kuokkanen played himself out of the country.

So, is it true Yegor was just a beneficiary of the Jack Hughes passes that needed to go to somebody? 

Well, Yegor spent roughly half of his 5v5 time last season with Jack Hughes. In 506 minutes with Jack Hughes, he scored 9 goals (on 7.09 xG) and 20 points. In 518 minutes away from Jack Hughes, he scored 7 goals (on 6.83 xG) and 12 points.

So, contrary to what fans may think, it was actually his assists that suffered away from Jack – his scoring and his chances were pretty much unchanged.

If you think Yegor is a 30-goal type of player, it seems reasonable to expect him to be able to get there with or without Jack. But he would get there in a different way.

In roughly 500 minutes with and without Jack; Yegor drew 4 more penalties (7 vs 3), had 8 more takeaways (22 vs 14), and threw 17 more hits (23 vs 6) away from Jack.

He was still effective, but he simply played a different kind of game. He was more physical, more aggressive, and more persistent; but perhaps less dynamic and less focused on driving the offense.