{"id":666137,"date":"2026-05-26T14:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T14:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/666137\/"},"modified":"2026-05-26T14:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T14:22:09","slug":"2025-26-season-in-review-elmer-soderblom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/666137\/","title":{"rendered":"2025-26 Season in Review: Elmer Soderblom"},"content":{"rendered":"

Player: Elmer S\u00f6derblom
Born: July 5, 2001 (24 years old)
Height: 6\u20198\u201d
Weight: 252 pounds
Hometown: Gothenburg, Sweden
Catches: Left
Draft: 2019, Detroit Red Wings (Sixth round, No. 159 overall)
2025-26 Statistics: 5 goals, 5 assists for 10 points in 20 regular-season games with the Penguins (1 goal in five playoff games)
Contract Status: Signed through 2026-27 at a $1.125 million cap hit, hits restricted free agency in 2027<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

S\u00f6derblom was traded from the Detroit Red Wings to the Penguins on March 6 in exchange for a third-round 2026 draft pick.<\/p>\n

At the time of his deadline trade acquisition by the Penguins, S\u00f6derblom was averaging less than 11 minutes per night and shooting just 4.8 percent for the Red Wings. He had recorded two goals and one assists through 39 games that season prior to the trade.<\/p>\n

Dubas emphasized at the time of the trade that the Penguins picked up S\u00f6derblom in part because of his size and age, and in part because his contract status would allow the Pens to develop him. S\u00f6derblom becomes an RFA at the expiration of his contract in 2027.<\/p>\n

In the short term, Dubas said he wanted S\u00f6derblom to join the Penguins\u2019 fourth line in helping driving the team\u2019s forecheck.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the things that have stood out [about] him throughout this year have been just really the forecheck. Get in on the forecheck, disrupt pucks, win pucks back,\u201d Dubas said<\/a> about S\u00f6derblom in March. \u201cI think for us, that\u2019s one thing that we\u2019d identified as\u2014 we obviously have got the line of [Connor] Dewar, [Blake] Lizotte and [Noel Acciari] that do a really good job of that, but being able to add a little bit more of that throughout the lineup would be good.\u201d<\/p>\n

S\u00f6derblom made his Penguins debut on March 8. His best stretch of the season came when he started using his size to fill in what Dubas had been looking for on the Penguins\u2019 forecheck, a late push that resulted in him recording eight points (four goals, four assists) over his last four games of the season.<\/p>\n

He also scored the opening goal of the Penguins\u2019 Game 5 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers.<\/p>\n

Regular season 5v5 advanced stats<\/p>\n

Data via Natural Stat Trick<\/a>. Ranking is out of 18 forwards on the team who qualified by playing a minimum of 150 minutes.<\/p>\n

Corsi For%: 45.65 percent (17th)
Goals For%: 56 percent (7th)
xGF%: 1o.02 percent (16th)
Scoring Chance %: 48.24 percent (16th)
5v5 on-ice shooting%: 15.22 percent (1st)
On-ice save%: .886 (16th)
Goals\/60: 1.33 (4th)
Assist\/60: 1.33 (4th)
Points\/60: 2.66 (3rd)<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a relatively small sample size here for S\u00f6derblom, who skated just 20 games with the Pens. In that stretch the Penguins overall struggled to limit opponents\u2019 scoring chances, but were bolstered by S\u00f6derblom\u2019s (likely unsustainable) 18.5 percent shooting rate.<\/p>\n

S\u00f6derblom played his best hockey down the final stretch of his brief first stint with the Pens. Can he continue building on that in order to become a true bottom-six power forward in his first full season in Pittsburgh?<\/p>\n

Also, who will S\u00f6derblom be skating with next season? He got most of his playing time during the regular season on the fourth line aside Acciari when Lizotte was injured, but Acciari is currently un-signed. If he does ink a new contract, the Penguins could run things back with the old fourth line and would need to find a new spot for S\u00f6derblom.<\/p>\n

S\u00f6derblom continues developing as a skater and uses his size to help the Penguins on the forecheck and the second penalty kill unit.<\/p>\n

S\u00f6derblom adds size to the lineup the Penguins didn\u2019t have prior to his trade. That March deal could pay off for Dubas if the 24-year-old is able to keep contributing five goals every 20 games during his first full season with the Penguins.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s too small of a sample size to know for sure, but S\u00f6derblom is a young player with a contract team control for multiple more years who showed in his brief stint with Pittsburgh last season that he has the ability to be a positive addition to the Penguins\u2019 bottom six.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Player: Elmer S\u00f6derblomBorn: July 5, 2001 (24 years old)Height: 6\u20198\u201dWeight: 252 poundsHometown: Gothenburg, SwedenCatches: LeftDraft: 2019, Detroit Red…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":666138,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[257,385,99],"class_list":["post-666137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-general","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=666137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666137\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/666138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=666137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=666137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=666137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}