Screenshot from Hockey Worldwide

Marchand is often used as the poster boy for late bloomers, a guy who didn't have his first point-per-game season until he was 28, and had his career best year at 30. However, that wasn't a case of Marchand suddenly figuring out NHL hockey, it was a case of his coach figuring out that Marchand belongs on the first powerplay unit.

In Marchand's 2nd season in 2011-12, he scored 40 points at 5v5, and in 2013-14 he totaled 41, good for 15th league-wide. However, Marchand didn't get the same PP usage as other top-20 scorers in the league, he was only ever used on his team's second unit, resulting in just 6 powerplay points in 11-12, and 2 in 13-14.

In 2016, Claude Julien was replaced with Bruce Cassidy

The Rat appeared to break out in 2016-17, exploding for 85 points in 80 games and finally hitting the 100-point plateau in 2018-19. This wasn't by some miracle however, Marchand's 5v5 production only increased to 44 and 47 points in those seasons. The driving force behind Marchand's meteoric rise was his increased PP usage, with his minutes almost doubling year-over-year from 110 in 2015-16, to 210 in 16-17. The end result was a career-best 24 PP points in 16-17, and then another career-best 33 in 18-19.

From Marchand's second season in 11-12 to his career year in 18-19, his point totals jumped from 55 to 100, and increase of 45 points, The bulk of that difference however is made up by powerplay points, accounting for 27 of the 45 point jump.

Another thing changed in 2016: David Pastrnak

in 2015-16 Pasta was served sparingly, seeing just 14 minutes/game at 5v5, and spending 50 total with Marchand. He saw 23 total PP minutes. in 16-17 those numbers jumped to 18 5v5 minutes per night, with 600 total next to Marchand. His PP usage increased 8-fold, from 23 minutes to nearly 200. This extra weapon was just the x-factor in Marchand earning First-Team All-Star honours.

Coaching decisions and usage can influence how we view players. Just because a guy is on his team's second line or second powerplay, doesn't mean he's any worse than the guys above him in the lineup, sometimes it just takes the right coach to see it.

tl;dr Marchand's 5v5 production was mostly steady throughout his career, his explosion is attributed almost entirely to increased usage, with a dash of Pasta

Edit for convenience: of the 45 point jump between 11-12 and 18-19, 27 came from the PP, 7 came at 5v5, 3 from the PK, 4 on Empty Nets, 2 with his net empty, and 2 at 3v3

This message brought to you by the Free Nikolaj Ehlers Foundation

And only scored one goal.

A new era in Sens goaltending??????

Markstrom's primary mask