The Columbus Blue Jackets are scoring a lot of goals this season.
Second-year player Dmitri Voronkov (17 goals, 11 assists) has been a big part of the Jackets' goal-scoring tendencies and overall offensive output.
Voronkov made his season debut on Nov. 1 after missing the first nine games due to an upper-body injury suffered during preseason.
Then he got hot and really hasn't let up.
After going the first three games of his season without a point, and registering one point — a goal — in the first six games, Voronkov hasn't gone longer than three games without a point this season.
He has three stretches of going exactly three consecutive games without a point and he's putting up 0.88 points per game. Fourth on the club with 28 points and tied for the team lead with Kirill Marchenko with 17 goals, Voronkov, thriving in his sophomore season, is also part of the rejuvenated power play, as he leads the unit with seven goals.
He has four goals in the last two games after consecutive two-goal performances in wins over the St. Louis Blues and Pittsburgh Penguins, including a power-play goal in Pittsburgh.
Voronkov doubled his career-long point streak of three games last season — he had five three-game point streaks last season — with a six-game point streak (four goals, four assists) from Nov. 18 through Dec. 1 and a six-game point streak (five goals, five assists) from Dec. 15 through Dec. 27.
A lot of symmetry with his point totals and streaks.
After recording his one and only multi-goal game last season against the Vancouver Canucks, Voronkov has four such games and all since Dec. 23.
Since Dec. 1, Voronkov is tied with Leon Draisaitl for the most goals with 12.
From a physical standpoint, Voronkov doesn't back down too many — if any — as he's second on the team in penalty minutes with 37.
Head coach Dean Evason has to marvel at what Voronkov has brought to the table this season, especially lately.
Blue Jackets insider Jeff Svoboda wrote about Voronkov and below is a quote from Evason on how Voronkov can continue to elevate his game to the next gear.
I’ll be honest with you, he has to get into even better shape than he is now in order to arrive (to plays). He’s committed to doing that. He’s doing extra work in the gym, he’s doing extra work after practice. It’s not a desire thing. He’s just not in the position yet to do it, so we’ve asked him to do that, get going so that you can be that physical presence.
To put that whole package together, it should be very dominating. It’s not just him – when you get a big body like that, you have to have it tuned up more than that little guy that can scoot. You have to get yourself in a position to get there physically. It’s not a will thing, it’s a physical thing that he has to continually work.
On Thursday night against the Seattle Kraken, Voronkov will look to push his point-and- goal streak to three games.
