Cole Caufield’s Playoffs: A Volume Shooter Heating Up
There’s something pretty simple happening right now for the Montreal Canadiens in these playoffs: when Cole Caufield gets looks, things tend to follow. And lately, he’s getting a lot more looks.
Caufield is beginning to score in the playoffs. That's trouble for the Sabres.
In Game 3, Caufield scored his 53rd goal of the season when you combine regular season and playoffs. That’s not a small number at all. In fact, it puts him in some pretty elite company. Among U.S.-born players over the past 30 seasons, only a couple of players have put up more in a single year stretch: Auston Matthews scored 64 in 2021–22 and Keith Tkachuk with 58 back in 1996–97. That’s the neighbourhood Caufield is living in right now, at least in terms of pure scoring output.
And it kind of makes sense when you watch him. Caufield has always been a volume shooter. That’s his game. He’s not the guy coasting around waiting for one perfect chance. Instead, he’s the guy who keeps pulling the trigger until something breaks. During the regular season, he piled up 462 shot attempts, which ranked him 20th among NHL forwards. That’s a heavy workload, no matter how you slice it.
Caufield has played differently in the postseason.
What’s interesting is how that’s shifted in the playoffs. At the start of the postseason, he had just 13 shot attempts in his first five games. That’s quiet and almost like the rhythm wasn’t quite there yet. But over his last five games? That number jumped to 27 shot attempts. That’s more like the Caufield everyone recognizes. He brings constant pressure, constant releases, and constant testing of goaltenders.
And when he shoots like that, he tends to score. He’s also got a bit of a pattern developing in big spots. Caufield has scored goals in each of his last two Game 4 appearances, going back to last postseason. That’s the kind of small sample trend that fans love to grab onto during playoff runs, even if hockey usually laughs at trends like that.
Still, the underlying numbers are what really stand out. According to NHL EDGE tracking data, both of his playoff goals have come from high-danger areas. He’s not just firing from the outside; he’s getting inside ice and finishing chances where goalies actually feel pressure.
Caufield skates tons when he’s on the ice.
And then there’s the skating and time-on-ice stuff. Caufield ranks in the 95th percentile or higher among forwards in total skating distance and offensive zone time percentage. The translation is that he’s not floating. He’s involved. He’s constantly around the puck, constantly in motion, constantly looking to create.
So when you zoom out, this feels less like a hot streak and more like a player slowly finding his playoff identity. The shots are up, the chances are better, and the results are starting to follow. For Montreal, that’s a pretty good place to be.