Gavin McKenna Third Line Move Is Working. Jim Hiller Should Leave It Alone

The Gavin McKenna third line move worked

Jim Hiller moved Gavin McKenna to the third line for Thursday's game in Vegas, and the rookie responded with an assist on Nick Paul's goal in a 4-3 shootout loss. The Gavin McKenna third line experiment lasted one game and looked like the best version of the first overall pick Toronto has seen. LeafsLurker's take: Hiller should leave it alone, at least until McKenna's 10th game decides the first year of his entry-level contract.

This is not a demotion story, and it should not be treated like one. Toronto Sun reporting framed the move as giving the 18-year-old better defensive support while still showcasing his offence. That is exactly the right idea, and one game in, it has done what it was designed to do.

What changed before the Vegas game

For McKenna's first four NHL games, Hiller kept him on the left side of John Tavares and William Nylander. It was a big ask: a teenager on the second line, against good competition, with two veterans whose games are built around possession rather than defensive cover. The line struggled to control play. We argued on Oct. 3 that Hiller should swap McKenna and Easton Cowan, and on Oct. 6 that his patience with that second line needed a deadline.

The swap came before Vegas. Here is how the forwards lined up for Thursday's game, based on the projected lineup and TSN and Toronto Sun reporting:

LineLeft wingCentreRight wingFirstKirill MarchenkoAuston MatthewsJack RoslovicSecondEaston CowanJohn TavaresWilliam NylanderThirdGavin McKennaNick PaulColton SissonsFourthBrandon DuhaimeTeddy BluegerBo Groulx

Cowan scored on a breakaway 3:20 into the game. McKenna helped build the sequence that ended with Paul tipping a Darren Raddysh shot past Adin Hill at 8:37. Both young left wingers got on the scoresheet in their new spots inside the first nine minutes. The rest of the night went badly for Toronto, but not because of that change.

Why Nick Paul and Colton Sissons suit McKenna

Paul and Sissons are what McKenna did not have on the second line: two veterans who think about their own end first. Paul came over from Tampa Bay on July 1 and has been a reliable two-way centre; Sissons has built a career on killing penalties and taking hard defensive-zone draws. With them, McKenna does not have to be the forward who covers for everyone else. He can do what he does best, which is carry the puck through the neutral zone and make plays off the rush.

Hiller has also been careful with where McKenna starts. Sportsnet reported that the coach has deployed him in the 93rd percentile of offensive-zone start share at five-on-five, and that McKenna has hit at least one skating burst above 20 miles per hour in each of his first four games. That is a coach who is sheltering a rookie, which is smart, and a rookie whose legs are already NHL-ready.

Third-line minutes do something else that matters: they lower the quality of the opponents. On the second line McKenna was seeing other teams' top-six forwards and top-four defencemen. On the third, he gets more matchups against depth players. That is where a rookie builds confidence and stops forcing plays.

The numbers so far

Through five games, McKenna has a goal and two assists. His first two points both came in the 5-4 overtime win over Nashville on Oct. 6, where he set up a Tavares goal and then scored his first NHL goal, which we wrote about in our piece on what his first goal changed. The third point came in Vegas. Three points in five games is a perfectly normal start for an 18-year-old, and his debut, a minus-2 night with one shot against Montreal, already looks a long way back.

His one bad moment Thursday came in the shootout, where Hill stopped him along with Matthews, Nylander and Tavares. That is no reason to read anything into it; Hill stopped four of Toronto's five shooters.

Game 10 and the entry-level contract

The other reason to stop moving McKenna around is the calendar. Under his entry-level deal, McKenna can play nine NHL games before the first year of the three-year contract is used up. The 10th game burns that year. If he plays every game, Toronto's schedule runs like this:

GameDateOpponentLocation6Oct. 10Colorado AvalancheDenver7Oct. 13Utah MammothSalt Lake City8Oct. 15Buffalo SabresToronto9Oct. 17New York IslandersToronto10Oct. 19San Jose SharksToronto

We explained the mechanics in our breakdown of the nine-game window. The decision is not really in doubt; nobody in the organization has hinted that McKenna is going anywhere. But the next four games are still an evaluation, and the fairest evaluation is one where the rookie plays in a stable role. Bouncing him between lines, or between the second line and the third, makes his results harder to read. Leaving him with Paul and Sissons for four more games gives Hiller and John Chayka a clean answer.

What the move says about Hiller

There is a coaching point here too. Through the first week, Hiller's instinct was patience: he kept McKenna with Tavares and Nylander through three games of poor results and told reporters at practice on Oct. 5, two days after the Ottawa loss, that the team would stick with it "for now." Moving McKenna before Vegas was the first sign that "for now" had an end point, and that the coach was willing to change a plan built around his highest-profile player.

That is a good sign for a first-year NHL head coach. The worst outcome for McKenna's development would be a coach who felt he had to keep a first overall pick in the top six for appearances. Hiller showed on Thursday that he will put the rookie where he can succeed instead. The test now is whether he can show the same discipline in the other direction, and resist moving McKenna back up after one or two quiet nights from the top six.

The counter-argument, and why it's wrong

The case for moving McKenna back up is simple: he is the most skilled offensive player Toronto has drafted in years, and third-line minutes waste some of that skill. Hiller also needs offence from somewhere. Toronto did not score after the first period in Vegas, and the Matthews line was out-attempted 13-7 in its third-period look with Nylander, per The Hockey News.

But putting McKenna back with Tavares and Nylander does not fix that. The second line struggled when he was on it. The problem for Toronto in Vegas was a 43-24 shot deficit and a team that could not get out of its own end, not a lack of skill on the top two lines. A rookie with more difficult minutes would make that worse. McKenna will move up eventually; the point is to let him get there on merit, not because the top six is struggling.

What's next for McKenna

Saturday in Denver is a hard test, against a Colorado team with Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar that scored seven in Calgary on Thursday. If Hiller keeps the third line together, watch how McKenna handles the defensive side when the Avalanche get it deep. That, not his point total, is what decides how quickly he moves back up the lineup.

For the rest of the roster, and for every player's cap number, see our Maple Leafs players page. For now, the best thing Hiller can do for his best prospect is the least dramatic: nothing.