Zach Benson’s game : In-depth breakdown

A dynamic and fiery 5’10 winger, Benson ended his season with 98 pts in 60 games. He finished first in scoring for his team, the Winnipeg ICE, even ahead of Matthew Savoie and Conor Geekie who were two high selections in the 2022 draft. Winnipeg was one of the best teams in the WHL and this was in large part thanks to Benson.

He has this ability to make everyone around him better and this is mostly expressed through his skills as a playmaker. His range of ways in which he shines as a passer is very wide.

What impresses me the most is how fast his brain thinks and how consistently he manages to identify the best passing option even when heavily guarded and how his execution never falters in such circumstances. Even coming in full speed and having to deal with a bouncing puck, he has the hand dexterity to handle the puck without having to lower his sight and he can spot the best option in a fraction of a second. He manages to make very difficult passes as if they were routine plays for him.

He’s not afraid to draw pressure on himself and that’s why he’s such a good passer from behind the net. He has the poise, the dynamism and the ability to escape to allow him to gain time for his teammates, while managing the opposing pressure.

His ability to make decisions quickly is matched by an execution that is just as fast. On the power play, he has a great ability to pass the puck through the defensive box and he often does it with one-time passes, creating a lot of confusion for the opposing team.

In addition to executing plays quickly, Benson demonstrates great refinement in his vision of the game and he manages to identify the open-ice areas where a teammate can jump into play to grab the puck (Area-Passes). There is not only ‘flash’ with his passes, but also a lot of substance as he will often make good short passes under the opponent’s stick coverage which demonstrates good intelligence and also a strong level of talent.

To complete, his hands allow him to be very comfortable to pass the puck on his backhand, and he is possibly the best player in the draft to perform saucer passes, allowing him to reach teammates who would not otherwise be accessible.

In 2nd position of the things I like the most about him, there is simply the way he approaches each shift on the ice. Benson leaves absolutely nothing in his tank every time he hits the ice. He competes extremely hard, definitely having one of the best work ethics in the entire draft. In other words, he is a ‘Gamer’!

There are some nuances between ‘working hard’ and ‘competing’. Not all hard-working players compete. In Benson’s case, it leaves no doubt. He will never back down from physical contact, heck, he even seems to enjoy it, he will never hesitate to fight back during skirmishes. His dedication to his team is immense, he’s not afraid to sacrifice himself and he’ll even go the extra mile you just don’t see other players doing, for example, diving and stretching his stick all the way in the offensive zone to prevent an opposing player from clearing the puck. His love for the game transpires in this kind of play. He is ready to give the little 10% extra that the others do not.

His tenacity in forechecking (or simply chasing the puck) is remarkable! He wants the puck more than anyone on the ice and he works very well with his stick to steal it from his opponents.

With or without the puck, Benson is not afraid to attack the net, even at full speed.

And what I like the most about his approach to the game is the way he thinks proactively on the ice. Benson is always a step ahead of his opponents and that’s because you can watch his brain working at full throttle on the ice. He is always readjusting his position on the ice according to the movements around him. At the slightest blunder by the opponent, he will be in the best possible place to make them pay. His offensive positioning is simply one of the highest I have had the chance to observe in a prospect.

Personally, if I have any reservations about a small player, I will have them about Matvei Michkov long before Benson.

When a player combines superior intelligence with Benson-like intensity, it usually leads to accomplish defensive players. It’s very rare to see a 17-year-old show such maturity without the puck, even more so when talking about a player who has accumulated the statistics that Benson has accumulated with the Winnipeg ICE.

His hard work in pursuit of the puck or on the puck carrier is obviously one of the reasons that propel his defensive game to a high level.

But what is possibly the reason why I say so much about him is his level of vigilance on the ice. Somewhat in the same line of thought as his way of getting open offensively, Benson is very mindful of every little variable that is influenced on the ice and he reacts accordingly. That’s one of the reasons I’m able to see him as a guy who can play on the PK in the NHL. His dedication means that he puts a lot of pressure on the puck carrier, but the quality of his defensive reads and his engine ensure that he immediately regains a suitable position on the ice following a puck movement by the opposing team. With these qualities, no player stays uncovered for too long.

He excels so much because he understands very fine subtleties that are only mastered by very high defensive IQ. For example, in the neutral zone, when the other team is counter-attacking, he knows how to influence the puck carrier towards the boards, but without compromising the center of the ice. It closes the play extremely well.

Speaking of play along the boards, Benson is doing very well despite his diminutive size. He shows ingenuity thanks to the quality of his hands and his agility on his skates. He also knows when to deliver the puck at the right time to a teammate, never holding it for too long.

His size will always be a limitation for him, but he shows a lot of combativeness. He puts his body in a favorable position by lowering his center of gravity and proactively seeking to push his opponent back. In addition, he keeps his feet moving to create distance with his coverer and he manages to attack the net as well.

Even in puck recovery, not the biggest or the fastest, but he will manage to put his body in front of the other player to make sure he gets to the puck first.

Other than his size, if there was one place where people seemed to have reservations about Benson it is about his skating. As far as I’m concerned, I’m not too worried.

From the outset, I do not consider his speed to be below average. And if people think it’s not enough for a player of his size, I think he makes up for it more than enough with his level of vigilance on the ice and his engine. His feet are also always in movement, so that mitigates some of the risks that could be attached to it.

He is playing at a pace that is only matched by a handful of players in this draft. Thanks to his intensity and his play readings, he is very often first on the loose pucks. These situations are often races for the puck, which means the pressure is imminent. Luckily for him, Benson is a player who moves the puck quickly, so he doesn’t get neutralized along the boards.

As I was saying, for me, Benson is all in all a pretty good skater, and that shows in his game in transition. He can arrive at full speed with the puck, hand it to a teammate and continue his route in acceleration to get the puck back while having eliminated one or two opposing players at the same time. These are plays that require a high level of execution and these are plays that for me are characterized as ‘fast’ even though some may argue about his skating. A faster player who does not have the same processing speed and hand dexterity will not be able to ‘play’ at that speed.

We also observe in his game in transition his great intelligence and his way of using his teammates in his plays. He is very good at influencing the position of his opponents and he can use this quality by slowing down and deflecting his trajectory to one side to open up the ice, and then join a teammate with a magnificent saucer pass in open space.

While he definitely has more of a pass-first mentality, Benson demonstrates some scoring instincts as well.

He understands the open spaces on the ice extremely well and he’s scored quite a few of his goals close to the net. He knows where to go to score. He also knows how to exploit the movements of goalkeepers to his advantage, waiting for them to move in one way just to open up the other side of the net. It’s a fairly underrated facet of his game. He has a good shot, and more importantly, a good shooting range. His one-timer is surprising and he is able to take shots quickly as he skates at full speed.

For my part, I have no worries towards Benson, and I am someone who will never hide to admit that I have a certain bias against small players. He does a lot of things very well on the ice, and the way he does them leaves me in no doubt as to whether it’s going to translate in the NHL or not. He is probably the most projectable player of all the small players in the past few drafts.

He is a player who makes everyone around him better, and not just through his level of talent, but also through his work ethic. He is the kind of player who makes the tempo of practices faster and all the other players around him feel the need to do more. His impact transcends what he does on the ice. A lot of people laugh at the comments of NHL GMs who talks about the importance of building a good ‘culture‘, and well to me, Benson is a ‘culture‘ player.