Jacob Markstrom

Jacob Markstrom was born on January 31, 1990, in Gävle, Sweden, and was selected by the Florida Panthers in the second round, 31st overall, of the 2008 NHL Entry Draft. At 6'6" and 207 pounds, the left-catching goaltender has built a career that now spans more than 578 NHL games across four organizations.

Markstrom's path to becoming a full-time NHL starter was a gradual one. He made his NHL debut with the Florida Panthers, appearing in just one game in 2010-11, then expanded to seven games the following season and 23 in the shortened 2012-13 campaign. After that stretch with Florida, he was traded to the Vancouver Canucks, where he arrived as a backup and worked his way into the starting role over several seasons. In 2013-14 and 2014-15, he saw only brief action with Vancouver — four and three games respectively — before taking on a larger share of starts in 2015-16, when he appeared in 33 games.

By 2017-18, Markstrom was firmly the Canucks' number one, starting 60 games and posting a .912 save percentage. He matched that games-played total and that same .912 mark in 2018-19 with 28 wins. In the pandemic-shortened 2019-20 season, he played 43 games, won 23, and recorded a .918 save percentage, the highest of his Canucks tenure.

Following his time in Vancouver, Markstrom signed with the Calgary Flames for the 2020-21 season, appearing in 43 games with a .904 save percentage. His 2021-22 campaign in Calgary stands as the single most productive statistical season of his career: 63 games played, 37 wins, a 2.22 goals-against average, a .922 save percentage, and 9 shutouts. The 37 wins and 9 shutouts both represent career highs by the numbers in this record. Calgary's goaltending coach Ian Clark had worked with Markstrom previously in Vancouver, and in January 2020 — when Markstrom was named an NHL All-Star — the two collaborated on a net-front scramble drill that InGoal documented ^[1]. The drill, designed to simulate the unpredictable scrambles that develop around the crease, was filmed during a post-practice session and captured Clark's explanation of the goaltender's challenge: "What we're trying to do is create that unpredictable dynamic event that allows a goaltender to work on those net-front moments where there are a lot of bodies and a lot of traffic and we have to manage these pucks that are potentially visually lost, positionally lost, and our ability to recover them all." InGoal Magazine has covered Jacob Markstrom in one drill breakdown ^[1].

Markstrom's final two seasons in Calgary showed a shift in numbers: 59 games in 2022-23 with 23 wins and a .892 save percentage, followed by 48 games in 2023-24 with 23 wins and a .905 save percentage. He then joined the New Jersey Devils, posting 26 wins, a 2.50 goals-against average, and four shutouts across 49 games in 2024-25. Through the 2025-26 season — his current campaign with New Jersey — he has appeared in 44 games with 23 wins and 1 shutout.

Across his NHL career, Markstrom has accumulated 264 wins, 25 shutouts, a 2.73 goals-against average, and a .907 save percentage in 578 games.