\u201cBillionaire Strut\u201d celebration<\/a>.<\/p>\n\u201cI was just having fun out there. There\u2019s a lot of stuff going on in my life right now,\u201d McKenna said after Penn State\u2019s 11-4 win. \u201cSo being out on the rink, being with the guys, that\u2019s my happiness \u2026 I just thought I\u2019d show some personality.\u201d<\/p>\n
Four of the scouts The Athletic spoke with called the outstanding misdemeanor charge something they\u2019d want to talk to him about and seek clarifications around, but also felt it wasn\u2019t likely to \u201creally play a factor\u201d in decision-making on draft day. The scouts were granted anonymity to speak freely about an upcoming draft prospect.<\/p>\n
\u201cPut it this way,\u201d one scout said. \u201cIf McKenna was the clear-cut No. 1 and the gap\/conversation wasn\u2019t as tight as it\u2019s become, and with what we know now, he\u2019s still going No. 1 with what happened (near) that bar.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many of the scouts The Athletic spoke to seem to believe that McKenna was provoked. Two NHL scouting directors went as far as to say \u201cthe charges don\u2019t bother me at all\u201d or call them a \u201cnon-issue.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not nothing for everyone, though.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the information out there is true, it\u2019s really unfortunate that other people act that way,\u201d said one scout. \u201c(But it) would not have been my first choice to respond that way. I guess with that, the McGregor celebration, and zero detail in his game, I do have some whiff of immaturity or entitlement now.\u201d<\/p>\n
What remains, for now, is a situation that frequently is resolved without prison time, and, on a parallel track, an on-ice reputation that has regained some of the luster that had begun to fade. That progress has come under a considerable deal of scrutiny, including at the team level; before their win over Minnesota, even with McKenna in the midst of a scoring binge, the Nittany Lions had gone 2-6-2 in their previous 10 games, the latest leg in an uneven regular season that they began as the No. 4 team in the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we\u2019ve learned a lot, myself and our staff,\u201d Penn State coach Guy Gadowski said on Wednesday when asked how his team, writ large, handles pressure. \u201cI\u2019ve said this before, but I think a lot of what we\u2019ve learned has actually come from watching (McKenna). He\u2019s the only one that\u2019s dealt with a lot of distractions and eyeballs and what\u2019s written and said. \u2026 And he has a great way about him of just being very confident in his values, what he stands for, and what he can control.\u201d<\/p>\n
One scouting director argued that those who doubted whether strong point production would come were always going to end up on the wrong side of the McKenna debate.<\/p>\n
\u201cQuestioning McKenna\u2019s production is a bet you are always going to lose,\u201d he said. \u201cWas just a matter of time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Four of the scouts credited him for strong play at both the World Juniors and after returning, with one director going as far as to say he has been \u201cexcellent\u201d since the tournament and another saying he has \u201crelieved some concerns\u201d after a \u201cquestionable start to the season due to his physical engagement, toughness level, (and) puck pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked where he\u2019d seen growth in McKenna since the start of the season, on and off the ice, Gadowski mentioned his work in Penn State\u2019s weight room, where he has access to amenities not typically available in the Canadian Hockey League, where McKenna played parts of three seasons with the Medicine Hat Tigers and put up 244 points in 150 games.<\/p>\n
\u201cJunior hockey is completely different. You\u2019re on the bus a ton, you\u2019re playing a ton of games, you don\u2019t have the facilities, you don\u2019t have the strength and the conditioning coaches, you don\u2019t have the nutrition,\u201d Gadowski said. \u201c(He) knew that was something in him, as an athlete, he could improve.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though there\u2019s still no consensus No. 1 pick in this year\u2019s draft, and McKenna isn\u2019t going to lap the field like Connor Bedard and Macklin Celebrini did (even with a strong conference tournament and potentially national tournament), one scout joked, \u201cHe\u2019s going No. 1 to Vancouver,\u201d and another said he has again made the conversation at the top interesting.<\/p>\n
There are still questions, to be sure.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still do have concerns with his play and desire away from the puck,\u201d said one of the directors.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think his play\u2019s been fine. I wouldn\u2019t say he\u2019s grown his game or been lights out at Penn State,\u201d said the other director. \u201cIt seems to be a very loose league and environment. How special is he? I think he\u2019s really good, but I don\u2019t know if he\u2019s (Patrick) Kane, franchise level.\u201d<\/p>\n
Others expect that teams will again sour on him leading into the draft as the Stanley Cup playoffs get harder and heavier. That \u201cseems to happen yearly,\u201d one scout said.<\/p>\n
Gadowski, asked about how continued high-end production from McKenna could change his team\u2019s ceiling, immediately pivoted to praising his work without the puck.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen he changes, when he backchecks, his stick \u2014 he does so much more than I think what you\u2019re referring to. He is a difference-maker,\u201d Gadowski said. \u201cThis kid is world-class.\u201d<\/p>\n
On a recent phone call, Willie Desjardins, McKenna\u2019s former coach with the Medicine Hat Tigers \u2014 the team he left for college hockey after leading to a WHL championship \u2014 wished his old star \u201call the best.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou only get one side of things. You don\u2019t get the full story. There\u2019s always more to stories. So you just have to wait until everything comes out and you hear what happened,\u201d Desjardins, a former NHL coach, said. \u201cHe was great for us, he played hard, and that\u2019s all you can ever ask for from a player.\u201d<\/p>\n
What McKenna has earned is more time to win over his detractors, starting Saturday night, when Penn State travels to Yost Arena for a Big Ten semifinal game against top-ranked Michigan. A trip to the NCAA Tournament almost certainly awaits, as does the NHL Draft Scouting Combine in June.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"STATE COLLEGE, Pa. \u2014 In October, Gavin McKenna played his first game in \u201cHockey Valley.\u201d On Wednesday, he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539784,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-539783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539783","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=539783"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539783\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}