Lightning star Brandon Hagel has made a career of proving people wrong

TAMPA — Brandon Hagel has a fairly thick pores and skin. He’s acquired the sort of scar tissue which may have been made by some gamers fairly way back. But not this man.

“I didn’t get taken in the WHL draft, it’s a kick in the head as a Canadian kid, you always want that opportunity,” the Tampa Bay Lightning star stated Monday. “I’ve been kicked in the head a lot.”

No, actually.

“I go to Buffalo (which drafted him), they don’t even sign you, they don’t give you an opportunity,” Hagel stated, rhyming off his career hurdles like he is studying his bio on the again of a hockey card. “When you spend a summer there like they asked, you do everything you take, and you still get kicked in the head.

“And then, you get an opportunity and someone that believes in you — and Chicago was the first team to believe in me.”

But even the Blackhawks then traded him, as we’ll get to in a second.

The level is that Hagel has lived it and it has hardened him.

“I’m very fortunate that I’ve had those downs in my life because as I got older, it’s pretty easy to block them out now… All you have to do is prove them wrong. Which I think I’ve done a pretty good job with.”

Tim Murray drafted Hagel whereas GM of the Sabers 10 years in the past. It was within the sixth spherical, 159th, the crew’s eighth participant taken in that draft.

Not overly shocking he went that low. Hagel was a scrawny child and had simply come off a 13-goal season with WHL Red Deer.

But Murray noticed sufficient.

“Hockey sense, offensive skills and awareness, compete level was what we liked,” Murray stated. “Exposure, size and strength and skating were reasons he dropped (in the draft).”

Exposure, as not many scouts appeared to present him a lot of a second take care of their first viewing, Murray stated. But once more, the Sabers noticed sufficient. Unfortunately, with Murray fired a 12 months later in 2017 and not on the helm in Buffalo, the Sabers determined to not signal Hagel, making him a free agent in 2018.

“A (Sabres) player development guy, I can’t remember who it was, called me that day and said, ‘Hey, listen, all the best, I hope you prove us wrong and good luck,’” Hagel stated.

“They felt combo of size and type of player was not going to work,” Hagel’s agent, Allain Roy, recalled.

Funnily sufficient, earlier than signing with Chicago on Oct. 30, 2018, Hagel went to a Montreal Canadiens rookie camp in September.

Jake Evans certain remembers. He was on the identical camp.

“I’ve said it many times to the guys here, we missed out on a really good player, which is crazy,” the Canadiens ahead stated. “I do remember him being there. Obviously, he took huge steps after that. He got big in Chicago and really took off there. Pretty crazy.

“I’ve really introduced that up a few instances. Every time we play them, I really feel like I carry that up.”

Instead, Hagel signed with Chicago and found his place. It seemed like a heck of a place to have a career. Until another curveball: getting traded to Tampa Bay at the trade deadline in 2022. And not just traded — the Lightning spent two first-round picks as part of the package. That got everyone’s attention. Part of it was Hagel’s low cost certainty at a $1.5 million AAV for two more years in a flat cap environment, but certainly it was also that Tampa GM Julien BriseBois saw a star in the making.

But the price tag on that deal brought some spotlight and early pressure once Hagel arrived.

“I used to be discovering my groove in Chicago, working my method up the lineup, getting some extra alternatives and actually appreciative of that. I cherished Chicago, their group, everybody was nice,” Hagel said. “Was it a shock to me? Yeah it was.

“At the same time, I was getting traded to a team at a pretty young age that just won back-to-back Stanley Cups. For my career, that’s only going to benefit me, you get to walk into a dressing room with a bunch of champions. You get one of the best coaches in the league. Not many guys get that opportunity.”

Hagel, now within the second season of an eight-year contract carrying a discount $6.5 million cap hit, blossomed into a two-way star right here in Tampa, a lot in order that he acquired on Team Canada’s radar.

Bruce Cassidy acquired a first-hand take a look at Hagel as half of Team Canada’s teaching employees for the 4 Nations Face-Off and the Olympics. Cassidy, in cost of the forwards, acquired a higher understanding of what makes the participant particular.

“Dynamic, competitive player with a skill set that impacts the game in many ways, a real gamer,” Cassidy stated. “But not a guy that will necessarily wow the average fan.”

His inclusion on the 4 Nations roster final season might need caught some people off-guard, nevertheless it should not have.

“Brandon Hagel went to the World Championships the summer before the 4 Nations, and the reason he got on the radar is that he went to the World Championships and he excelled while he was over there,” Team Canada and Lightning head coach Jon Cooper stated. “After the first game against the US at 4 Nations, I think everyone in Canada knows who Brandon Hagel is. From that day moving forward, I think it’s kind of defined what he is. It’s not that he’s a fighter, but that he is willing to do anything to win, regardless of the task.”

Few will ever neglect the three fights in nine seconds to open the US-Canada round-robin recreation in Montreal, which included Hagel’s throwdown with Matthew Tkachuk. It was post-game, after that Team USA victory, that the Tkachuk brothers revealed they’d mentioned initiating the opening faceoff fights in a group chat that afternoon.

To which Hagel delivered the quote of the match a few days afterward the eve of the championship recreation and a rematch with Team USA.

“We’re out there playing for the flag, not the cameras,” Hagel stated that day. “That’s a part of Canada that we have in there. We don’t need to initiate anything, we don’t have any group chats going on, we’re going out there playing our game and giving it everything and doing it for our country.”

Hagel regarded a bit sheepish when that quote was introduced up on Monday. What motivated him that day to make that remark?

“I don’t know, it was just a little bit of my personality,” Hagel smiled. “I saw some things, heard some things, I just kind of felt it out there. That was kind of it, to be honest. There wasn’t too much to it, it’s just the first thought that came to my head.”

But that is Hagel. He cares deeply concerning the Lightning, he cares deeply about Team Canada, he cares deeply about his teammates.

“Playing for the flag and getting that opportunity is the best feeling in the world,” Hagel stated. “I’ll always be doing it for the flag. That’s the mentality I put into it. Did I expect to fight (Tkachuk)? No. Do I fight? No. I will for the flag, I will for my teammates, I will throw my head through the wall for the flag, my teammates and the Tampa Bay Lightning. Whatever team I’m on, I will do that every single night.”

They cherished him on the Bell Center that evening. Now they will be booing him for Games 3 and 4.

Teammate Nick Paul will get why some followers in different markets nonetheless might not have appreciated the complete measure of the participant Hagel is.

“I think he’s one of the best wingers in the league,” Paul stated. “You watch him day in and day out, what he brings to this team, what he does offensively, what he does defensively, PK, you talk about short-handed goals, he does it all. And he brings that emotion to the team, he leads, I mean, if you’re building a team you want a guy like that on it… He’s unreal. And he’s going to be a big part of this series.”

He already is, with two targets in a Game 1 time beyond regulation loss. He was Tampa’s finest participant and a handful for Montreal to deal with. He’s not accomplished placing his mark on this sequence.

At 27, it is already been fairly a life lived for Hagel. From undesirable at each cease to indispensable in Tampa.

“Every team would love to have Brandon Hagel,” Cooper stated.

That actually wasn’t true seven years in the past. But that was earlier than Hagel proved all of them wrong.