Winnipeg Jets: Will Superstar Patrik Laine Score 60 Plus Goals?

The Winnipeg Jets have a superstar on their hands in Patrik Laine. Laine is on fire, but is it really possible for the sniper be able to score 60+ goals?

Quick little stat for you, Patrik Laine currently has a one point per game average, despite only having three assists. Yes, only three assists in 24 games. That means his other 21 points are coming from goals. 21 goals in 24 games in our current era of hockey is insane to think about.

So I did the math and he also has an average of 0.875 goals per game. If Laine manages to stay strong and go the whole season without an injury or minimal bumps and bruises and plays in all 82 games, he’s currently on pace to hit 71.75 goals. We round that up, so 72 goals. Patrik Laine is on pace to hit seventy or more goals for the first time since 1992-93.

Who was the last person to score 70 plus goals in a season? None other than Teemu Selanne, the original Finish Flash. Well, Teemu and Alex Mogilny. They both scored 76 goals in the 92/93 season. Nobody has been able to match that total since.

Okay, so maybe 70 is a stretch. Maybe he slows down a bit. I don’t really think he’s slowing down, just getting better, but 70 is a real push. As a Winnipeg Jets fan, I don’t want to give myself false hope, because it’s just such a hard thing to do nowadays. Not taking anything away from guys like Selanne, but scoring 70 goals was a lot easier in the nineties than it is in today’s era.

I’d like to settle with 60. 60 goals is still an unreal amount, and allows for the youngster to have some room in case he slows down a little bit. Wait, I just said settle with 60. That just seems unbelievable that I would just “settle” with 60. That really shows you how much of a goal scorer Laine is.

Basically to accomplish the 60 goal milestone, he would still need to score another 39 goals in the remaining 58 games. To be honest, I think that he can pull this off. I’m a huge Laine fan and I don’t think anything will stop him unless he went down with an injury. To hit 70 goals, he’d need 49 goals still, which doesn’t really sound possible, knowing it took him an entire year last year to tally 44.

I think Laine has what it takes to score 60 in a season. His next step will to light up the bottom feeding New Jersey Devils tomorrow night.