As Cayden Lindstrom spent much of last season not playing hockey but rehabbing from injury, he learned a valuable lesson about the importance of patience.
It's come in handy during his year back on the ice at Michigan State.
The Blue Jackets’ first-round pick (fourth overall) in the 2024 draft is still using what he learned, even if he hoped he’d be past that point. As it turns out, missing much of a season and a half of action means there’s an adjustment period when you get back on the ice, a reality Lindstrom is living at the moment.
After notching an assist in this weekend’s two-game series against Ohio State in Columbus, Lindstrom has a goal and three helpers in 15 games with the Spartans, as well as a tally in last Sunday's exhibition win over the U.S. National Team Development Program.
They’re not the numbers many had hoped for in his debut season in college hockey, and you can count Lindstrom in that group. But at the same time, he’s gone through enough to understand just how important the big picture is in this situation.
“Things take time, right?” Lindstrom said. “I had a frustrating first half, I think. I definitely wasn’t happy with the way I was playing, but then I realized things aren’t going to come as fast as I want them to. I’m just taking things day by day, just working hard in the gym and getting my legs back and my hands back.”
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Indeed, for Lindstrom, some hockey skills have come back as easily as riding a proverbial bicycle, while others simply take time and more repetitions. At the end of the day, the goal is to get Lindstrom back to being the player he was during the 2023-24 season, when he racked up 27 goals and 46 points in just 32 games with Medicine Hat of the WHL.
At that point, Lindstrom’s unique combination of size (6-3, 213), skating, scoring ability and snarl made him a consensus top prospect, and the Blue Jackets made him their top pick in that summer’s draft. And Lindstrom believes those abilities are still there in spades, it’s just a matter of when they all come back together from a production standpoint.
“I don’t think I lost it at all,” Lindstrom said. “It’s still there, obviously. I think, like I said, I’m taking it game by game, practice by practice, and things will come. I’m not worried about it, and I'm not worried what other people are saying. I know what type of player I am and I know a lot of people know what type of player I am too, so I’m not worried about it. I’m just focused on myself and my team and focused on winning.”
The last two years have been largely filled with frustration, though, as injuries kept him off the ice for all but a handful of games during playoff runs the past two seasons with Medicine Hat. The biggest was a microdiscectomy procedure on his back last November, and rehab from that cost him most of the season until he returned to play seven games for the Tigers during their WHL championship and Memorial Cup run.
This year at Michigan State, Lindstrom – aided by the new rule that allows Canadian Hockey League products to skate in NCAA hockey – believes he has the best of all worlds given the situation. He gets plenty of practice time and weight room experience considering college teams play just twice in an average week, and he’s getting the chance to round back into form on one of the best teams in the country.
Speaking after the Spartans’ 6-2 win over Ohio State on Friday night that featured Lindstrom's primary assist on the team's opening goal, Michigan State head coach Adam Nightingale said he’s seen steady improvement in the center's game as the season has gone on.
“When you miss that much time, especially at the age he was, so much of our game is habits,” Nightingale said. “The nice thing with our schedule, we get to practice a lot, so he’s done a great job. I think he’s improved a lot, and he can’t focus on points and production. That part will come. I thought he played a really good game today. He’s gotten better and he’s more consistent, and we just have to stay on that path.”
The No. 4-ranked Spartans are legitimate NCAA title contenders, and Lindstrom is one of 15 NHL draft picks on the roster, including three other first-rounders (Porter Martone, Ryker Lee and Charlie Stramel). He’s said there’s nowhere he’d rather right now than playing in East Lansing, and the biggest reason is he’s able to battle against the best each week during practice.
“It’s just huge, especially being out there with guys that want to compete,” Lindstrom said. “I love competing in practice. I think that’s what makes me a good player and makes the rest of us good players, too, is having that compete and that drive in practice, really pushing each other. Iron sharpens iron. That’s exactly how it is. We push each other every day, and it’s a blast. We love it. It’s just the funnest thing ever, I think. It’s really helped a lot.”
Nightingale pointed to Stramel as a potential inspiration for Lindstrom, as the first-round pick of the Wild in 2023 battled injuries with the USNTDP and at the start of his college career before becoming a dominant force (12-14-26 in 20 games) this year with the Spartans. Nightingale coached Stramel with the U.S. program and noted that he went through a similar process as Lindstrom before taking off the more hockey he played.
“I think it takes some time, right?” Nightingale said. “I think everyone has, I don’t want to say visions of grandeur, (but it’s) like, ‘OK, I’m coming off this injury and everything is going to be (fine).’ The reality is the last time (Lindstrom) really played hockey, he was 16 years old, turning 17. Those are critical years for forming habits, so I told him, ‘We’re not worried about points or whatever. We’re worried about playing the right way and playing winning hockey,’ and I think you saw a lot of that tonight.”
Lindstrom said he’s focused fully on helping Michigan State have a successful season, but he also acknowledged he enjoyed his return to Columbus, where he spent most of last season during his rehab. Down the road, his hope is to make Central Ohio his home and be a big part of what the Blue Jackets are trying to build.
“That’s a big goal of mine,” Lindstrom said. “That’s what I want. I want to be here in Columbus. I want to play for Columbus as long as I possibly can, especially with what they did for me after the draft, keeping me here and rehabbing and whatnot. This is where I want to be.”
