Thursday night's win over the Pittsburgh Penguins marked the Blue Jackets' first win over their division rivals since November 29, 2019. However, and perhaps more importantly for the future, it was rookie forward Hunter McKown's best game as a professional.
In his 11th NHL game, McKown, whom the Blue Jackets signed as a college free agent on March 20, recorded his second assist of the season by winning a face-off cleanly back to Andrew Peeke who scored.
Great job by CBJ's McKown (#41) to win the draw cleanly back to Peeke (#2) who blasts one past Jarry (#35). #LetsGoPens 1-1 #CBJ https://t.co/bRMtngiJeW
— Coby Maeir (@CobyMaeir) April 14, 2023
McKown was assertive, performing several solo defensive-zone exits, and weaved around several defenders in order to create three five-on-five individual scoring chances, per naturalstattrick.com.
Blue Jackets head coach Brad Larsen was impressed with his performance.
"[It was] the best game he's played," Larsen said postgame. "It's not even close."
Larsen added that his time on ice Thursday (17:20) was a career-high.
"There's a reason why he was dominant with the puck," Larsen said. "You could see he had some confidence. He was using his legs and his speed that we had heard about and that was a tremendous game by him."
McKown said that everything came together for him Thursday.
"I think it's just been a culmination," McKown said postgame. "It's gonna click at some point and that goes for the rest of my game as well. But, I think I'm definitely confident in my ability to skate pucks and keep pace with these guys in this league. So I think it's just a matter of putting everything together and it'll come."
If Thursday's game was a glimpse of the kind of player McKown can be, the Jackets made a great signing.
