{"id":470359,"date":"2026-02-10T10:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T10:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/470359\/"},"modified":"2026-02-10T10:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T10:03:08","slug":"top-nhl-prospect-gavin-mckenna-has-hearing-in-assault-case-pushed-to-march","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/470359\/","title":{"rendered":"Top NHL prospect Gavin McKenna has hearing in assault case pushed to March"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Gavin McKenna, of Penn State, during a game against Arizona State, earlier this season.Rick Scuteri\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n

The preliminary hearing for top NHL prospect Gavin McKenna in an alleged assault case in Pennsylvania has been postponed by a month.<\/p>\n

The court in Centre County, Pa., where Penn State University is located and where McKenna plays for the school\u2019s men\u2019s hockey team, said in an e-mail that the hearing scheduled for Wednesday has been stayed until March 11.<\/p>\n

McKenna faces a misdemeanour simple assault charge after Pennsylvania\u2019s district attorney\u2019s office said last week it had withdrawn a previous felony aggravated assault charge against the 18-year-old from Whitehorse, Yukon.<\/p>\n

The alleged assault is reported to have occurred Jan. 31 in State College, Pa., with the victim allegedly being punched and suffering two jaw fractures that required his jaw to be wired shut.<\/p>\n

The felony aggravated assault charge was dropped after the district attorney\u2019s office said Friday there was insufficient evidence, noting investigators determined there was no intent to cause serious bodily injury after reviewing video of the alleged incident.<\/p>\n

McKenna, who is also facing harassment and disorderly conduct charges, is widely regarded as one of the top two prospects for the upcoming NHL entry draft, along with Swedish forward Ivar Stenberg.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Gavin McKenna, of Penn State, during a game against Arizona State, earlier this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":470360,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[3793,3782,64,63,3794,1348,3774,3795,2065,3773,3787,3788,3784,3775,3772,164,2555,75,69,3781,3805,3776,3777,3786,3783,1625,2289,3796,3779,3800,3801,575,3803,3798,3802,3797,3799,3778,3790,3791,84,3789,2111,85,635,105,3792,3785,3780,1346,3804],"class_list":["post-470359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-nhl","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=470359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/470360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=470359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=470359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=470359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}