Joel Hofer

Joel Hofer was still a teenager when the St. Louis Blues selected him in the fourth round, 107th overall, in the 2018 NHL Draft. Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba on July 30, 2000, he would go on to represent that city's hockey culture in a particular way — growing up watching Connor Hellebuyck, the Jets' franchise goaltender, as one of his primary on-ice references. Standing 6'5" and catching left, Hofer is now the Blues' primary goaltender through the 2025-26 season.

Before his professional career took hold, Hofer made his mark on the international stage. He was named the top goaltender at the 2020 World Junior Championship in the Czech Republic after going 5-0-0 with a .939 save percentage for Team Canada, helping the country to a gold medal. InGoal Magazine was covering him during that run, with two Pro Reads breaking down saves from that tournament — including a sharp-angle poke check against Finland in the semi-final and a play behind the net from the same game — both available to InGoal subscribers ^{[1] [2]}. Those breakdowns originated from an InGoal InPerson live webinar that Hofer did with his offseason goalie coach, Eli Wilson, a replay of which is also available ^[3].

Hofer's NHL career began quietly. He appeared in two games for St. Louis in the 2021-22 season, going 1-1 with a 3.07 GAA and .880 save percentage. The following year, 2022-23, he added six more appearances, posting a 3-1 record with a 3.22 GAA and .905 save percentage. Those eight games across two partial seasons gave him enough NHL save footage to begin the Pro Reads series that InGoal has continued with him since. His first NHL Pro Read, published in the summer of 2023, examined a power play sequence against the Washington Capitals, with Hofer walking through his post coverage and angle management ^[4].

The 2023-24 season was Hofer's first full NHL campaign, having won the backup job out of training camp. He went 15-12-1 across 30 games, posting a 2.65 GAA and a .914 save percentage, and recorded his first NHL shutout — a 27-save, 3-0 win against the Calgary Flames on October 26, 2023. That shutout prompted a second Pro Read, in which Hofer broke down a low-high sequence against the Winnipeg Jets, explaining his decision to push off his left skate rather than his right to protect the short side: "The biggest thing for this play was to push out with my left skate instead of my right skate because if I pushed out with my right skate I would have came out more to the middle and exposed the short side," he said. "Use the leg you are anchoring with and your momentum off the post will bring you right into the lane." ^[5] Later that season, Hofer set a new career-high with 39 saves in a 2-1 win over the Dallas Stars on December 27, 2023 — resetting a mark of 37 saves he had set just six days earlier against the Florida Panthers. A third Pro Read followed, examining a power play sequence against the Detroit Red Wings and Hofer's reads on one-timer options ^[6].

InGoal Radio featured Hofer in episode 218 following his gold medal at the 2023 World Championship ^[7], and in a 2020 episode recorded around the time of the World Juniors, Hutch spoke with him about his gold-medal run in a conversation that came together early in the morning when Hofer reached out and said he was awake and available ^[8]. An earlier podcast appearance in September 2022 also brought Hofer onto InGoal Radio ^[9].

In the 2024-25 season, Hofer appeared in 31 games, going 16-8 with a 2.64 GAA, a .904 save percentage, and one shutout. His workload and results continued into the current 2025-26 season, where through 46 games he holds a 24-13-5 record, a 2.61 GAA, a .910 save percentage, and six shutouts. Over his 115-game NHL career to date, he has accumulated 59 wins, 35 losses, 10 overtime losses, a 2.67 GAA, a .909 save percentage, and 8 shutouts across 6,366:28 of playing time.

A 2026 InGoal article by Colin Hodd focused on Hofer's approach to developing goaltending IQ through film study and cross-goalie dialogue, drawing on comments Hofer made on Episode 218 of the InGoal Radio podcast ^{[10] [7]}. In that piece, Hofer described his routine of watching hockey broadly and learning from goaltenders he shares the ice with — including conversations with Devon Levi about post-play decisions during the 2023 World Championship. "Me and Dev would go on and we'd talk about things," Hofer said of Levi. "It was mainly a lot of post-play stuff — whether we should overlap or go back into a reverse — but definitely some good conversations." ^[10]

InGoal Magazine has covered Joel Hofer in three podcast appearances, five Pro Reads, and two InGoal articles.