Gavin McKenna’s 6:36 night against the Buffalo Sabres became a Toronto talking point, but the Maple Leafs’ next move mattered more: the 18-year-old was back for a season-high 17:56 against the New York Islanders two days later. For a teenager breaking into the League, a short bench is not automatically a punishment. It can be part of the plan.
McKenna, New York Rangers defenseman Alberts Smits and San Jose Sharks forward Ivar Stenberg were all selected in the 2026 NHL Draft, and each is learning the daily tension between development minutes and the demand to win now. The balance is especially tight in Toronto and New York, where every shift is measured against the standings.
Jim Hiller said second-period penalties against Buffalo cost McKenna opportunities to get back into the rotation, and later acknowledged he likely should have used the winger again. Once a young player has been parked for a long stretch, though, a coach has another decision to make: send him back over the boards cold or keep the bench intact.
The key is what follows behind closed doors. Young players can spot a vague explanation quickly. Coaches need to be direct about what must change, why it matters and how the player can earn the next opportunity.
After the horn
Top prospects do not arrive fully finished simply because they dominated junior hockey or college hockey. They often bring habits that worked at lower levels but will be exposed in the NHL, where plays close faster and mistakes repeat on the video screen.
A healthy development program is more than a reduction in ice time. Video work can show a player exactly where a shift went wrong and help identify whether the issue was positioning, puck management or a late read. Practice then supplies the repetitions: protecting pucks, sharpening a release, improving retrievals and building the composure needed when the game speeds up.
Sitting a player is the clearest message a coach can deliver, but it is also the one most easily misread. Accountability remains non-negotiable. A club can tolerate some mistakes from a young player, but not a steady replay of the same ones. The goal is to make the lesson constructive rather than simply punitive.
That approach was used with Leo Carlsson when he entered the Anaheim Ducks lineup as an 18-year-old in 2023-24. Anaheim carefully managed his workload and held him out of selected games by design, even though he was among the club’s strongest rookies.
It was not an easy choice for a coaching staff trying to compete. Carlsson had come from Sweden, where the schedule was lighter, and needed time to build toward the physical requirements of an NHL season. The League schedule has since expanded from 82 games to 84. Rest also gave Carlsson room to heal minor injuries and work on his game. The absences were planned, not a knee-jerk response.
San Jose has more room for that kind of patience during its rebuild. Stenberg, now 19, has seen his minutes increase as he has earned more responsibility, which is the preferred progression for a young forward. Development reps are an investment a rebuilding team can more readily make.
Smits faces a different equation on a Rangers blue line built to chase results. The 18-year-old is not being used on either special-team unit, with Adam Fox and Sean Durzi handling power-play point duties and Marcus Pettersson and Vladislav Gavrikov among the penalty-kill examples available to study.
That does not mean special teams should be ignored in his development. Smits can learn the structures in practice and through video, watching how established Rangers defenders handle those assignments. When his chance arrives, those off-game repetitions should make the transition less abrupt.
| Young player | Club | Current development note |
|---|---|---|
| Gavin McKenna | Toronto Maple Leafs | Played 6:36 versus Buffalo before logging a season-high 17:56 against the Islanders. |
| Alberts Smits | New York Rangers | Averaging 15:04 through 11 games; has cleared 17 minutes twice in his past five outings. |
| Ivar Stenberg | San Jose Sharks | His workload has risen as he has earned more trust during the rebuild. |
Smits’ current minutes are not a prediction of his eventual role. The Rangers need to give him the practice work and teaching needed for larger assignments later, while protecting a team with little margin for recurring errors.
The common thread for McKenna, Stenberg and Smits is that NHL comfort does not arrive all at once. Processing speed, poise and trust are built shift by shift, meeting by meeting and practice by practice. Sometimes the most valuable development rep is the one a player receives. Sometimes it is the one a coach takes away, explains honestly and turns into the next lesson.
