Matthew Schaefer gave some advice to Gavin McKenna ahead of his NHL debut and implored him to gain the experience first and worry about the expectations later.
The Toronto Maple Leafs are pretty lucky to have Gavin McKenna on their roster. The beneficiary of some seriously good luck at the draft lottery, the team now had the perfect piece to build around for the future while also giving Auston Matthews the type of player he thrives alongside.
But there are also a ton of expectations and pressure put on McKenna given his generational talent and ability to transform a franchise, but he's also a teenager and still going to need some time to get used to the NHL grind.
Fans are going to have to give him a bit of leeway when he makes mistakes because as good as he is - they are inevitable.
Matthew Schaefer believes confidence is Gavin McKenna's best weapon to battle the NHL's best
If McKenna was worried at all about the pressure he faces, all he has to do is turn to last year's first overall pick and Calder Trophy winner Matthew Schaefer. Himself a generational talent, the defender knows exactly what it takes to not only succeed right away, but deal with the constant spotlight.
Speaking at the Smilezone Golf Tournament, Schaefer gave some advice to the Maple Leafs rookie and implored him to just be himself and enjoy the ride:
Yeah, I mean, just enjoy it, obviously, he's in Toronto, and me growing up in Toronto, obviously Toronto's known for its hockey and stuff just growing up. Toronto's always the hot spot for tournaments and things like that.
At the end of the day, I think if your teammates and coaches and stuff like that, if they help develop you well and they bring you up...but I think if you can just get that confidence early and just run with it, then you'll do good.
Solid words of wisdom from a fellow teenager and no doubt the pressure and spotlight is going to be on both of them as the two will clash early on this year with a matchup in only the second game of the season on Sept. 30, then again on Oct. 17 so fans will get double the fun in a short span.
Schaefer's rookie campaign sets a pretty good benchmark for what to expect from McKenna
Though Schaefer's position is the polar opposite to McKenna, we can safely assume that if he hits close to or above the defender's production then he himself will be named a Calder winner as well.
We touched on how previous other first overall picks fared in their first season, and while there were some serious outliers like Sidney Crosby, the general range of points was from the 60-70 mark. So with Schaefer a point underneath it, it seems to just help reinforce that point.
If so, then McKenna being a forward with a lot of extra chances will be able to flirt with that and more. If he and Auston Matthews can find chemistry quickly and start to feed off one another, then we could easily see McKenna come close to the 75 point range instead.
Please don't come into the season and expect the rookie to score 100 points with 40 goals and a boatload of power-play points; it's not realistic. But do expect McKenna to be a focal point of the offence and given more than his fair share of chances to pile on the points.
McKenna and Schaefer face off in only the second game of the 2026-27 season
But here we go, the thing everyone wants to see. We had to wait until January 3 of 2026 for the two teams to face for the first time in the season.
It's almost as if the schedulers knew how much attention this would generate and made it a much sooner meeting.
Both teams are going to be out there with something to prove, and no doubt the spotlight will be on whether or not Schaefer can shut down McKenna or whether the Maple Leafs rookie is already going to have his number.
But again with it only being the second game of the year, don't expect a huge fireworks show considering that McKenna is going to need to get used to playing in the NHL, and we're going to still be working out the kinks in the rest of the Maple Leafs lineup, so temper expectations but enjoy the ride.
Much like Schaefer told McKenna to, because for the next two decades we're about to watch one of the greatest rivalries go down in the NHL with the potential to see two of the greatest of all-time duke it out.
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