MacKinnon Growing Into Leadership Role

Nathan MacKinnon has always been one of the young guys on the Colorado Avalanche.
He made his NHL debut on Oct. 2, 2013, when he was just 18 years and 31 days old. He became the youngest player in franchise history to do so and then made an immediate impact for the Avs, registering 63 points (24 goals, 39 assists) in 82 regular-season games on his way to winning the Calder Memorial Trophy as the league's rookie of the year.
MacKinnon has become one of Colorado's top talents and is counted on for production on a nightly basis. He is such a pivotal member of the club that he was named an alternate captain on Oct. 13.

The honor brought MacKinnon into the fold as a leader, someone who could be dependable in good times and in bad, and it also spoke to the way the 21-year-old forward has grown during his three and one quarter years with the Avs.
"He's grown on the ice and gotten better and stronger and faster, but I also think he's matured off the ice as well," said team captain Gabriel Landeskog, reflecting on the developmental shift from teenager to young adult. "It doesn't matter what you're going to be doing in your late teens and early 20's. I went through it myself. You feel a lot of growth within those first years in the league, whether it's on or off the ice. You're not living with your family. You have to figure things out on your own, and I think that can be good."
Landeskog is one of many in the dressing room that has witnessed MacKinnon's growth, from fresh face to NHL pro. Always an explosive, dynamic player capable of making an impact on any game, MacKinnon has begun to take the leadership role more seriously.
He leads by example, letting his performance on the ice speak volumes. This is evidenced by his current four-game point streak, where he's put up three goals and two assists. MacKinnon can take over a game--you saw it when he took a stick to the face in Toronto and proceeded to skate through everyone in his way until he scored a huge goal--and that is something that energizes the rest of the team.

"That feeds the team. He has that attitude where he can go out and change the momentum of a game," Landeskog said. "He has that skill and that determination to change the outcome of a game. When he's going and when he's going good, the team can feel it. We can tell right off the drop of the puck when he's going."
"He's a competitor. He's obviously an elite player in this league. When you see him score a goal like that, that was huge for us," forward Blake Comeau recalled of the play in Toronto. "It gave us a little bit of a cushion. He's such a good, powerful skater. To see him skate the neutral zone like that--we see it in practice all the time--it was a huge goal for us. We need him to be our best player on a nightly basis, and everyone has got to follow his lead."
While some would assume that an expanded role on the team comes with increased pressure, the Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia, native says nothing has changed for him.
"I think we hold ourselves accountable to be the best we can be. We're the top players on the team, and we have to play like that," he admitted. "Whether I have an 'A' or I don't, I need to lead by example--that's always been kind of my thing. We need to get back to that and start playing well here."

While he may not have the wisdom and experience of a veteran like Jarome Iginla or the commanding leadership qualities of guys like Cody McLeod and Francois Beauchemin, MacKinnon is quietly developing into a figurehead for the Avalanche. He's become a keystone, both on the ice and away from it.
He leads the team in points (20) and assists (12) and is tied for second in goals (eight). MacKinnon also led the NHL with 61 shots in November, setting a new Avalanche record for shots in the month. He topped the previous mark of 57 set by Claude Lemieux in 1995 and equaled by Rob Blake in 2003. In fact, MacKinnon's shots were the most by a Colorado player in any month since Joe Sakic (67) in March 2001.
MacKinnon is a driver of team puck possession as well. He ranks third on the roster in shot-attempt differential, as the Avs account for 50.3 percent of the shots by both teams with him on the ice at even strength. He also sits first in this metric relative to his teammates, who are 5.4 percentage points better with him on the ice than off.
The best part of this is that he still has room to grow.
"I think he's working on it. He's done a good job here. I think the consistency part of it for him and just making sure he's channeling his energy in the right direction is something that doesn't come real natural to him," head coach Jared Bednar said when asked about MacKinnon's growth as a leader. "He's still a real young player, obviously at his age. It's important for him. He leads us on the ice. We need him to be part of our leadership group off the ice as well, and he's handling it well. He's asking the right questions. He's talking to the right guys in the locker room, and he's a real competitive guy. That's what our team needs a little bit too. So he leads in that department."

Now MacKinnon will be one of many skaters tasked with helping Colorado climb back up the standings after the team went 0-4-1 on its last homestand. That starts tonight with a game against a Philadelphia Flyers club has won nine in a row.
Needless to say, the nationally-broadcast matchup offers plenty of motivation.
"We want to make a statement to the league that we can get back in the mix. There's a lot of teams, with [our] games in hand, that aren't very far ahead of us," MacKinnon said. "Obviously, to be better we have to be better here at the Pepsi Center. Against Philly, they're going to come out strong. They've been playing great hockey. You see some of the players they have, they're pretty special. So we got to be good tonight."
The Avs want to take what they've done on the road, where they're 7-7, and bring it home. That means letting go of whatever mental restraints and misgivings they have and playing the way they do while on enemy ice.
"We're not trying to please anybody. I think that's a big thing, especially with tough starts," MacKinnon said of finding success at home. "The crowd gets out of it and it gets quiet, and that's definitely hurting us. Our first periods have been tough at home, for sure. We got better on the road a little bit. Excluding the Montreal game, we won two of our last three. So we're trying to build off that and stay as positive as we can.
"We've been a better road team. We need to be better at home. Same with the last road trip, we won two of three and everybody was scoring, and then we come back home and have a tough one. So just looking to have a good couple games at home here."