The key to Jonathan Huberdeau’s turnaround might be his stick tape

After being held to just one point in the entire month of Decemeber, 2024 has given us a new Jonathan Huberdeau where he has raked up eight points in his last seven games and is seemingly playing the best hockey he has since becoming a member of the Calgary Flames.

Now, there is plenty reasons as to why that could be, a new found confidence after finally breaking his streak, a new pair of line mates, but the reason I want to look into may be a little more unconventional, and that would be Huberdeau’s stick tape.

Changing stick tape colour is not all that common, for NHLers

I’ll preface this by saying that Huberdeau’s stick tape probably is not the reason he begun to play so much better, but it is quite funny that the minute he changed things up he began to produce again. A funny coincidence at it’s finest.

Hockey players are extremely superstitious, there is no denying that. If they have a certain routine they follow, certain equipment they use, or a special handshake with a teammate before every game, hockey players and athletes in general typically don’t love change. So, when you see a player that has used white tape for the entirety of his career all of a sudden change it to black tape in the middle of the worst slump of their career, then they are literally looking for anything to help them get going. That is what Huberdeau decided to do in their game against the Philadelphia Flyers on New Years Eve.

What has Huberdeau actually changed on his stick?

Huberdeau came out for the game against the Flyers sporting black tape on his stick, again something that he hasn’t done is a very long time (if at all). Something worked and he assisted on Dennis Gilberts late third period goal, a goal that bumped Huberdeau’s month long point drought. In their next game against the Minnesota Wild, Huberdeau was once again using the black tape on his blade, and what happened? Well, you guessed it, Huberdeau scored his first goal since November 20th. It’s weird how hockey can work sometimes.

This is where things begin to get even stranger, after a few good games where the points started coming for Huberdeau, he changed his tape again when the Flames played in Philadelphia on January 6th. On the surface, it looked like Huberdeau had just reverted back to his regular white tape on the blade, but it was actually a little different then that.

Huberdeau was using a form of white tape, but it was not your traditional white cloth hockey tape, he is using something called “Rezztek” or at least something very similar to it. It is essentially a sticker with grip on it, similar to sandpaper, where it only covers the face of the blade and not the bottom of it. The goal is to try and reduce friction on the ice and it doesn’t have to be re-tapped as often as your standard hockey tape.

It is not necessarily the “normal” when it comes to being used in the NHL, more and more guys have begun to use it, but it is still such a small percentage of players, Huberdeau for the time being is one of them, and it is paying off for him right now. Since changing over, Huberdeau has six points in his last four games, including a beautiful goal against the Flyers and some highlight reel assists against the Coyotes. Once again, it is funny how hockey can work.

Will Huberdeau change his tape again?

I understand how ridiculous this all sounds, but you cannot argue the timing in everything that has taken place for Huberdeau since all the tape developments. It has me wondering if he is going to be trying something new soon if things begin to go south. This is the player that changed all of his equipment (except for his stick) from one year to another due to bad performance.

This is not like we are talking about Sidney Crosby who cannot have anything change for him, and if these changes are going to keep Huberdeau playing the way he is, then bring on all of the different tape jobs he can think of!