Penn State hockey coach discusses the responsibility, attention that goes with guiding Gavin McKenna
Men’s hockey coach Guy Gadowsky and his staff got NHL uber-prospect Gavin McKenna to commit to Penn State.
Now, Gadowsky has to coach him up.
Or does he?
17-year-old hockey phenom Gavin McKenna is heading to Penn State to continue his career ⤵️ pic.twitter.com/qrxxfILu9P
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) July 8, 2025
The way Gadowsky is talking, the best thing that he can do for McKenna during what will likely be his lone year in NCAA competition is to stay out of the way.
“I have a bit of a philosophy,” Gadowsky said during an online media session Tuesday. “I was fortunate enough to grow up and watch Wayne Gretzky play in Edmonton. I think one of the things that makes (McKenna) so special is that he is so creative. His mind is just very different. And there’s no way that I — or anybody else on our staff — thinks like Gavin does. He is a very, very special athlete who thinks very differently, and I’m going to enjoy watching him. By no means am I ever going to talk to him about how his mind creates. That’s him.”
To an extent, though, Gadowsky insists that’s not an entirely dissimilar approach to how he handles all of his players.
“That goes for all of our athletes as well. That’s partly what I think makes Penn State hockey fun. We certainly encourage creativity,” Gadowsky continued. “Just watching (McKenna’s) game, he’s so fun to watch because of his physical skill level. But it’s also how his mind is able to slow things down and create — it’s just really fun to watch.”
Unless McKenna shows — or asks — otherwise, Gadowsky seems to feel that the biggest role he and the rest of the staff can provide the 17-year-old from Whitehorse, Yukon, is that of a support system as he jumps onto a campus of 89,000 students.
“There’s not only a transition to college hockey, there’s a transition to college. There’s a transition, albeit a very exciting, fun one, to State College,” Gadowsky said. “I think that we have really good players on this team, really good people. I think they’re looking forward to helping him navigate and enjoy all of those things.”
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Gadowsky says McKenna’s personality will allow his coaches to take a hands-off approach while he is in State College.
“He’s very humble and extremely polite. He has excellent manners,” Gadowsky raved. “His mind always goes first to ‘the whole’ — to the team. Always. It’s, ‘What the team does, how the atmosphere is for the team, the success of the team.’ That’s how he is.”
In fact, Gadowsky said the biggest hurdle for himself and his staff when it comes to managing McKenna may be managing their own expectations of him.
“What can we do? I think we can be a little patient. You can’t just expect anybody to come in and just pick things up from a college hockey perspective, a college perspective, or a State College/Penn State perspective. It takes some time,” Gadowsky added. “What we can do is to remember that no one gets it all right away.”
Tangentially, another challenge may be how to massage the playing time and expectations of some of the returning players from last year’s team that went to the Frozen Four. Not just because of McKenna’s presence. But other NHL draft picks such as Jackson Smith (Columbus) and Mac Gadowsky, Guy’s son, are enrolling at PSU. Gadowsky is transferring in from Army after a season that saw him named a Hobey Baker top 10 finalist.
“The lessons that were learned, specifically last year, were to do everything for the team and be positive for the team. We have to enhance that. You don’t just go through it one year and then say, ‘We’re done, check that box,’” Gadowsky cautioned. “We don’t have conversations in July and say, ‘That’s how we handle it. We’re done.’ I think it’s something that you tackle every day. It’s not just the coaching staff. It’s specifically the leadership group that is going to have a lot of work to do.”
That’s something Penn State’s entire team will realize quickly. They are the clear betting favorites to win the NCAA title this year. So the ability to live up to those expectations will fall on the shoulders of the entire team, not just McKenna.
Despite how many people are saying he can handle it all by himself.
Tim Benz is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Tim at tbenz@triblive.com or via X. All tweets could be reposted. All emails are subject to publication unless specified otherwise.
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