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For NHL standards, 32-year-old Carl Soderberg is a grizzled old veteran waiting to be replaced by a young up-and-coming star. It also doesn’t help his case that he plays for a team that has preached developing younger players at the NHL level. The Colorado Avalanche are the youngest team in the NHL with an average age of 25. Soderberg is one of just two regulars on the team in their 30’s.

Taking all of this into consideration, Soderberg should be on his last leg. This would especially make sense after his horrid season on a faltering Avs club last year, which led to him being a healthy scratch on opening night this past October.

But despite all of the odds being stacked against him, Carl Soderberg is actually having the most underrated offensive season of his six-year NHL career.

Soderberg played his first three seasons in the NHL with the Boston Bruins after coming over from Sweden. In 2012-13, he appeared in just six regular season games and two Stanley Cup playoff games in Boston’s run to the Cup Final. Basically, Soderberg is currently participating in his fifth full season in the NHL.

Soderberg’s rise through the Avs’ depth chart this season started after he was eventually paired up with Blake Comeau and Matt Nieto. The three of them together have become a full-fledged shutdown line for the Avs, albeit they’re doing it with second line minutes. Through game 69 on the Avs’ schedule, Soderberg ranks fourth in TOI/game among forwards behind the top unit of Gabriel Landeskog, Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen. Comeau and Nieto are currently in sixth and seventh place with J.T. Compher sandwiched in-between them and Soderberg. So while the Avs generally list Soderberg’s line as the third unit, they’ve ultimately been the second line since late October.

Carl Soderberg currently sits sixth on the Avs with 33 points (15 goals, 18 assists) in 66 GP. His 15 goals are one off his career high (2013-14 with the Bruins) and he’s still 18 points back of the 51 he amassed in 2015-16 with the Avs after signing a five-year contract.

What makes this season so incredible is the way coach Jared Bednar has utilized the Swedish centerman. According to Hockey Reference, Soderberg has started just 30.5% of his shifts in the offensive zone (oZS%). This is the lowest in his career by a country mile. In every other season he’s played, his offensive zone starts have been 41.7% or higher.

Soderberg has also constantly seen his line go up against tougher competition all season long. Let’s use the St. Louis Blues as an example – the team the Avs face off against tonight (March 15th). In their last contest against the Blues, Soderberg and his line saw 60% of their shifts against Alex Steen, Paul Stastny and Vladimir Tarasenko.

Despite the lack of offensive opportunity, Soderberg has been very efficient and has consistently helped the Avs offensively all season long. His goals/60 currently sits at 0.78 which is far and away the best of his career. His points/60 is currently 1.72 which ranks third behind his output in 2015-16 (2.07 p/60 with oZS% at 41.7%) and 2014-15 (1.92 p/60 with oZS% at 60.6%).

With the Bruins in 2014-15, Soderberg’s most common linemates were Loui Eriksson (79.3% of all 5-on-5 situations) and Chris Kelly (54.8% of all 5-on-5 situations). Soderberg also accumulated 162.5 minutes of powerplay time that year playing a majority of them on a unit with Riley Smith and Eriksson.

The following year, Soderberg’s most common linemates were Comeau (71.6% of all 5-on-5 situations) and Landeskog (42.7% of all 5-on-5 situations). Patrick Roy utilized Soderberg on the powerplay for a total of 179.6 minutes. He played most of those with Jarome Iginla and MacKinnon.

In both years, Soderberg saw more PP time than he has this year while also playing with at least one offensively gifted linemate. This year, Soderberg has seen just 131.5 minutes of PP time with a revolving door of players on the Avs’ second unit.

To summarize his 2017-18 season, Soderbergs linemate regulars have been Comeau and Nieto playing against tougher competition than he’s seen in years while starting just 30.5% of his shifts in the offensive zone and clicking at a 0.50 P/GP pace. His career average hovers at roughly 0.49 P/GP.

Would it be safe to say Soderberg is having his most productive season offensively? Perhaps. But when all is said and done, the offensive efficiency Soderberg has shown this season has flown under the radar for a team that is currently sitting in a wildcard position heading into the final weeks of the regular-season.

(All stats from hockey-reference.com, naturalstattrick.com, NHL.com, behindthenet.ca. All photos from avalanche.nhl.com)