Connor Brown June 15

EDMONTON -- Connor Brown can only shake his head when reminded that he was once a minus-72 player.

"Hard to believe, isn't it?" the Edmonton Oilers forward said. "It's pretty crazy.

"I mean, that's pretty hard to do."

And not in a good way.

"Hey, you’ve got to believe in yourself in those hard times," he said. "You've got to persevere."

Brown has done exactly that in a rags-to-riches story that saw him reach those plus-minus depths with the 2011-12 Erie Otters to playing for the Stanley Cup against the Florida Panthers for a second consecutive year.

That he's come this far is a testimony to his relationship with Kris Knoblauch, who helped him realize his potential in Erie and is now attempting to do it again with the Oilers.

Indeed, it's a special coach-player link that goes back almost 13 years.

Knoblauch took over as coach of Erie of the Ontario Hockey League midway through the 2012-13 season. The Otters were coming off a league-worst 10-52-3-3 record the previous season, one which saw Brown go minus-72 while scoring 53 points (25 goals, 28 assists) in 68 games as a rookie in junior hockey.

In 2013-14, Knoblauch's first full season as coach, Brown won the OHL scoring title with 128 points (45 goals, 83 assists) in 68 games. Just as important: He finished at plus-44, some 116 better than he had two seasons earlier.

Knoblauch's influence on Erie was evident that season as the team had one of the best records in the League at 52-14-2-0, a 42-win improvement from two years earlier. Yes, the arrival of teen phenom Connor McDavid had a huge impact, but so did Knoblauch, especially when it came to Brown's development as a player.

"I'd say the biggest impact that Kris had on my young career -- well, you know, for me, I'm [a] really emotional, competitive guy, and I think his demeanor rubbed off on me in a really good way," Brown recalled. "He's so level-headed and taught me to be able to kind of channel that emotion, channel it as well as I could.

"It's good. I mean, you know, he's a really cerebral coach. He's really smart coach, and, you know, he's had a real positive impact on a lot of guys."

It showed in the standings.

"They had been the worst team in the league," Knoblauch said. "So I think as the team improved, so did Connor (Brown). He individually became a better player.

"I can't say that it was necessarily working on one aspect of his game. But when you get a better cast of characters and talent around you, and you get experience, the door opens for you to get better. He took advantage of it."

All the while, he proved to be a great mentor for McDavid, who joined Erie after it made him the No. 1 pick in the 2012 OHL Draft.

"He's just so smart," McDavid told NHL.com. "He's a really, really smart player. And competitive. I think that was the main thing I remember.

"I was just a 15-year-old kid, and he was trying to develop his game. He'd just been drafted by the (Toronto Maple) Leafs (sixth round, No. 156 in the 2012 NHL Draft) and was just so competitive every single night. We weren't a very good team, so there were a lot of long bus rides, but the next few years were great."

Brown has carried his newfound success in junior hockey into a respectable NHL career in which he has 258 points (107 goals, 151 assists) in 601 regular-season games with the Maple Leafs, Ottawa Senators, Washington Capitals and, now, the Oilers. In the process, he's been reunited with Knoblauch, who was hired as Edmonton's coach on Nov. 12, 2023, and has contributed with eight points (five goals, three assists) in 19 games during these playoffs.

Now they have another chance to win the Stanley Cup together, two wins away with Game 6 taking place at Amerant Bank Arena in Florida on Tuesday (8 p.m. ET; MAX, truTV, TNT, SN, TVAS, CBC).

"Connor Brown is a really good two-way player, whether we put him out there as a shutdown (defenseman) or part of a shutdown line," Knoblauch said. "But I think his penalty-kill skills are second to none. I think he's very good at that.

"He's a guy who can move up and down in the lineup and is so valuable in so many different situations."

Much like Knoblauch was in Brown's development.

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