Nino Niederreiter isn't much of analytics guy.
"I try not to be," he said. "If you're not scoring and you don't get the points then it's obviously in your head."
The Carolina Hurricanes forward is getting plenty of offensive chances. He isn't scoring enough. His shooting percentage this season is uncharacteristically low. As he would put it, that's obviously in his head.
"At the end of the day, you want to get the shot off as much as you can," he said in an interview this week. "You want to be the best player you can be every night. You want to be on the board and you want to score and you want to help the team win. When they're not going in ... it's frustrating."
With that said, his frustration level is high. They're not going in.
Niederreiter, who did not have a goal in the first 10 games of the season, has 34 shots on net and scored twice _ a 5.88% shooting figure. According to Natural Stat Trick, a hockey analytics site, he ranks among the top 40 in the NHL with 26 "high-danger" scoring chances but 416th in shooting percentage.
Niederreiter, 27, didn't factor in any of the scoring Thursday as the Canes won a 5-4 overtime road game against the Buffalo Sabres. He did not have a shot and had a minus-2 rating. Unable to clear the puck in the final minute of regulation, he was on the ice when the Sabres tied the score with an extra attacker to force OT.
In the Canes' 8-2 rout of the Ottawa Senators on Monday at PNC Arena, Neiderreiter was one of the 14 players who had points, assisting on the Canes' eighth goal, by defenseman Joel Edmundson. He also hit the crossbar with an attempt, smiling later as he described the play and near-miss.
"You hit the crossbar and it doesn't count as a shot, either," he said. "You're probably a lot closer to scoring a goal when you hit the crossbar than when (the goalie) saves it with the glove."
Niederreiter also has had 17 attempts go wide of the net this season, according to NHL statistics, ranking among the top 30 in the league. That from a player who shot 13.6% last season and 11.9% for his career.
"I've gone through this before and every time it's frustrating," he said. "You just have to work hard and hopefully hard work pays off. I work on my shot before practice, after practice."
He also switches sticks, a lot. He did that before his first goal of the season, Oct. 26 against Chicago.
Niederreiter, traded to the Canes from Minnesota last season, had a combined 23 goals and 30 assists in 82 games. He was better with the Canes _ 14 goals, 16 assists in 36 games _ and his timely scoring, toughness around the net and defensive awareness factored into Carolina being a playoff team for the first time since 2009.
But the first 19 games of this season for the Canes (11-7-1) have been a slow go for the Swiss-born player, who has a $5.25 million salary. He has a minus-8 overall plus/minus rating after finishing plus-7 with the Canes last season.
"When you're eating minuses, that's obviously frustrating, too," he said.
Canes coach Rod Brind'Amour had Niederreiter on a line with center Sebastian Aho and Teuvo Teravainen in some early games and later moved him to Jordan Staal's line. Brind'Amour, after the Canes' road loss at Ottawa last week, tweaked some lines, shifting Niederreiter to Lucas Wallmark's line with rookie winger Martin Necas.
"He's had a tough year as far as a lot of really good looks that haven't gone in," Brind'Amour said this week. "It's tough when you're a goal-scorer and expected to score and you feel like you need to score to contribute (and) you're not."
Brind'Amour said Niederreiter had perhaps his best game of the season in the win over the Senators, adding, "A lot of the things he did away from the puck didn't even translate to points. He was on the puck. He's got a little grit to him and he needs to bring that every night."
Niederreiter was traded to the Canes on Jan. 17, 2019, after the Canes had made their one annual trip to Minnesota in the 2018-19 season. He did play against the Wild in Raleigh, the Canes winning 5-1 as Niederreiter first competed against his former teammates, many of them good friends.
But Saturday's game will be different. The Canes will be at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minn., where Niederreiter played parts of six seasons and was a part of five playoff teams with the Wild.
"It's a weird feeling going back, being on the other side for the first time," said Staal, who spent six seasons with the Pittsburgh Penguins and won a Stanley Cup before being traded to Carolina in 2012. "You have memories. You have memories of the building you played in, and that creeps in. It's fun and exciting to play against the old team and try to stick it to them."
The man who traded Niederreiter for forward Victor Rask, former general manager Paul Fenton, is gone but the coach, Bruce Boudreau, remains behind the Wild bench. Soon after the trade, Niederreiter said he had fallen out of favor with Boudreau, who had him playing on the fourth line.
"It's probably going to be emotional," Niederreiter said of the return. "I try not to think too much about it. I had a great time there and made some great memories and a lot of great friends in six years there. I have nothing but good to say about it."
