Sabres Report Cards: William Carrier

The season is over, and we’re going to rate every player who played more than 20 games this season on their performance the same way we were all graded back in the day – on a report card scale of A to F. We’re taking a look at everyone from Bailey to Rodrigues in our 2016-17Buffalo Sabres Report Cards.

Age: 22

Contract: Cap hit of $690,000, under contract through 2017-18 season.

Introduction: As one of the pieces brought to Buffalo in the Ryan Miller deal, it was hoped that William Carrier would be one of the young prospects that would contribute to the Sabres down the line as they went from rebuilding to challenging for the playoffs. This season, Carrier got to experience his first year in the NHL after spending two seasons with Rochester, and put up eight points in 41 games this season.

Key Stat: 51.39 – This was Carrier’s Corsi number this season, which ranks him #1 among Sabres forwards with more than 20 games. Part of that stat comes from his very limited and slightly protected minutes, but Carrier spent a bit of time on the second or third line this season, and came out with at least one team-leading stat. Not bad.

Thumbs Up: Carrier’s speed and size added a much-needed element to Buffalo’s forward group, and he added a bit of talent to fourth line that was severely lacking in that department. He finished second on the team behind Marcus Foligno in hits per game, and finished third in +/-, ending the year with a -1 rating. Despite his low numbers, you can see that Carrier has the physical tools to play in the NHL – now we just to see growth next year.

Thumbs Down: Despite being a young, possibly-talented part of the hopefully-future team, young William received almost no ice time to prove himself – his 9:00 per game was second only to Nic Deslauriers, and he never got a chance on either side of the special teams coin. Was that because Bylsma and company didn’t trust him with more ice time, or because they didn’t think he had the talent to take advantage of it? Carrier’s NHL scoring is right in line with his first year in Rochester, now can he make the jump of almost doubling his goal total in year two like he did in the AHL?

Memorable Moment: Carrier scored his first career NHL goal on November 19th against the Penguins.

Voting: Using the good old grade school system of A, B, C, D, F, with a grade of A representing a great season, a grade of C being the performance you expected, and F a very poor season, rate Will Carrier on his performance this year.

Grade Will Carrier on his 2016-17 season