This series has worked through the cheapest and most expensive cost per point among forwards and defensemen. Now it turns to the crease, with an even bigger caveat attached. Cost per win leans on team quality more than any skater metric does; a cheap backup on a contender can pile up victories a better goaltender on a lottery team never will. So treat this as a look at the numbers, not a ranking of the league’s best goaltenders. With that in mind, here are the ten netminders who won games at the lowest price in 2025-26.
This list excludes goaltenders on entry-level contracts and requires at least 25 games played last season.
Brandon Bussi ($25K Per Win) — The cheapest win in hockey belonged to the best story in hockey. Undrafted out of Western Michigan and stuck in the Bruins’ minor league system for four years, he worked a pandemic job at Chipotle along the way, Bussi signed a league minimum deal with Florida last summer, was waived in training camp, and was claimed by Carolina on Oct. 5. All he did from there was go 31-6-2, reach 20 wins faster than any goaltender in NHL history, and do it behind one of the league’s most difficult defensive workloads, where his raw .895 save percentage undersold how well he actually played. He adopted a “house money” mantra and never let the moment shrink him, capping the run by starting the final three games of the Stanley Cup Final as the Hurricanes won their first title since 2006, all on a $775,000 cap hit. Carolina signed him to a three-year, $1.9MM AAV extension during the season, so the league’s best bargain is back in Raleigh for 2026-27.
Jet Greaves ($31K Per Win) — Greaves entered 2025-26 having never played more than 20 NHL games and left it as Columbus’s unquestioned starter. Undrafted and long an AHL workhorse in Cleveland, he appeared in 55 games, posted a .908 save percentage and 16.5 goals saved above expected on an $812,500 cap hit, and carried a heavy load for a Blue Jackets team that pushed for a playoff spot. That set up a genuine standoff in arbitration, where he filed at a $7.5MM valuation against the club’s $2.8MM. The two sides bridged the gap on the morning of the hearing, agreeing to a three year, $15MM extension ($5MM AAV) on July 23 that keeps him in Columbus through 2028-29 and takes him to unrestricted free agency at 28, right in his prime.
Jakub Dobes ($33K Per Win) — Montreal’s young Czech netminder took a major step in his second season, going 29-10 across 43 games with a .901 save percentage on a $965,000 cap hit, then backing it up with an eye opening playoff run this spring that
briefly made him the talk of the Canadiens’ crease. For a young goaltender still on a bargain deal, that combination of regular season workload and postseason poise was exactly the profile Montreal wanted to lock up. The Canadiens rewarded him with a three-year, $5.36MM AAV extension this summer, but he stays on his current number for 2026-27, giving Montreal one more cheap season before the new deal takes over.
Dustin Wolf ($37K Per Win) — Wolf’s rate stats slipped in 2025-26, a .899 save percentage and 3.01 GAA behind a Calgary team that took a step back, but his 23 wins came in one of the league’s heaviest workloads at 57 games on a final-year $850,000 cap hit. A seventh-round pick and two-time AHL goaltender of the year who has been overlooked at nearly every stage, Wolf had already answered the doubters the year before, finishing second in Calder Trophy voting and dragging the Flames to the brink of a playoff spot. The bill for that breakout was settled last September, when Calgary signed him to a seven-year, $52.5MM extension ($7.5MM AAV). That deal begins in 2026-27, cementing him as the franchise goaltender for the better part of a decade.
Arturs Silovs ($45K Per Win) — Acquired from Vancouver just before the season, Silovs took on a heavy share of Pittsburgh’s crease and went 19-12 on an $850,000 cap hit. The Latvian arrived with a big game pedigree; he was named MVP of the 2025 Calder Cup playoffs after nearly setting an AHL record for shutouts in a single postseason, and had stepped into Vancouver’s net during the 2024 NHL playoffs as a rookie, and he flashed it again with a .939 save percentage across three playoff starts after an up-and-down regular season. The Penguins brought the restricted free agent back on a one-year, $2.8MM deal in July, a show of faith that still puts the onus on him to seize the projected starter’s job in 2026-27.
Scott Wedgewood ($48K Per Win) — The only goaltender here with genuinely elite rate stats, Wedgewood was supposed to be Colorado’s backup. Instead, with Mackenzie Blackwood injured, the veteran journeyman seized the crease, opened the year without a regulation loss through seven starts, and finished with a .921 save percentage, a 2.02 GAA and 31 wins, pacing the NHL in victories for stretches, on a $1.5MM cap hit. Since arriving from Nashville in a November 2024 trade, he has been remarkable, and by his own admission he could have chased more money and term on the open market. He didn’t want to, signing a one-year, $2.5MM extension in November that keeps him in Denver for 2026-27.
Akira Schmid ($55K Per Win) — Schmid’s 16 wins came not in Florida, where he’s now headed, but in Vegas, where the towering Swiss netminder handled the heaviest workload of his career for the eventual Western Conference champions, going 16-10-6 on an $875,000 cap hit. His pedigree traces to New Jersey, where he authored two shutouts in the 2023 playoffs, including a Game 7 against the Rangers, as one of the sport’s more intriguing young goaltenders. The Panthers acquired him at the end of June for a third-round pick to help replace Sergei Bobrovsky, then signed him to a two-year, $2MM AAV deal in late July while avoiding arbitration. He’ll pair with the returning Jacob Markstrom in Florida’s rebuilt tandem in 2026-27.
Casey DeSmith ($67K Per Win) — The veteran gave Dallas exactly what it paid for, going 15-8 with a .907 save percentage and 2.43 GAA in 30 games behind Jake Oettinger on a $1MM cap hit. An undrafted journeyman who has carved out a decade-long NHL career largely in the backup role, DeSmith is the kind of cheap, steady insurance a Cup contender needs to survive the stretches when its starter needs rest. He’s signed for one more season and enters 2026-27 in the final year of his deal, once again slotted behind Oettinger in the Dallas crease.
Eric Comrie ($69K Per Win) — Comrie’s 12 wins came in Winnipeg, where an injury to Connor Hellebuyck handed the longtime Jets fan favorite a career-high 25 appearances. The team cratered without their Vezina winner, though, and Comrie’s .890 save percentage reflected the rough stretch as much as his own play. A career backup who has spent the bulk of his professional life in the AHL across three separate Jets stints, he signed a two-year, $1.15MM AAV deal with San Jose on July 1 as a free agent, where he projects as organizational depth behind Yaroslav Askarov and Alex Nedeljkovic in 2026-27.
David Rittich ($71K Per Win) — Rittich rounds out the list after a steady year backing up Ilya Sorokin on Long Island, going 14-10-3 with a .894 save percentage on a $1MM cap hit. That raw number looks modest, but it came in one of the league’s toughest defensive environments; his underlying numbers actually graded him as a clear positive, ranking among the better backups leaguewide in goals saved above expected. “Big Save Dave” stayed in the region as a free agent, signing a one-year, $1MM deal with New Jersey on July 3, where he joins Jake Allen and Nico Daws in a crowded three-goalie picture for 2026-27.
All contract information provided by Puckpedia.
Photo courtesy of Sergei Belski-Imagn Images