TORONTO — The morning earlier than Sam Bennett despatched the Toronto Maple Leafs’ beginning goalie to the hospital with a sneaky elbow to the top, a customer swung by former teammate Steven Lorentz’s stall with a query.
What’s the very first thing that pops to thoughts once you hear the identify Sam Bennett?
“Killer,” Lorentz replied.
Lorentz stated the phrase not with disdain, not with worry, however with admiration, unknowing, after all, what precisely would transpire in Sport 1 together with his previous Florida Panthers pal however absolutely understanding what may occur anytime his frenemy’s skates slapped the ice in a high-stakes contest.
“I’m an enormous Bennett fan,” Lorentz started, excitedly.
“He’s the proper playoff participant, a man you need in your workforce, as a result of he doesn’t have buddies on the market. Like, he’ll end his checks, and he simply performs the sport the fitting means. Performs onerous. So, we all know what to anticipate with that. He’s obtained a man lined up? He’s going to attempt to run him. And he does it clear. He’s participant. He is efficient. He performs the sport the fitting means. So, he’s very sincere. And, yeah, I obtained a variety of reward for him, so we’re gonna should preserve our head on swivel when he’s on the market.”
Or else, Bennett will swivel it for you is the half Lorentz left unsaid.
Swing by Scott Laughton’s stall that very same morning — earlier than the media wanted the fireplace division to place its hair out, as Bennett’s coach, Paul Maurice, would say in wealthy theatre — and also you’d discover that very same sly smile when Bennett’s identify is talked about.
Laughton, a fellow Toronto-area professional of comparable classic, skates with Bennett in summer time coaching classes however has all the time been a competitor, by no means a teammate.
Their historical past stretches again 12 years, to Kingston-Oshawa tussles within the OHL, when a rookie Bennett agitated Laughton a lot one night time, he picked a struggle.
“Nice competitor,” Laughton stated. “He tried to run me behind the web. I chased him up the ice, after which we fought.”
“I see him lots in the summertime. I imply, he’s an amazing competitor and a man that places it on the market, so that you gotta match it and convey much more. Deliver that depth degree,” Laughton stated.
“Fairly quiet man. Reserved. Retains to himself. A few his buddies I might know higher, however, yeah. So, we’ll see what occurs all through the sequence.”
What most outsiders don’t fairly perceive about Bennett the Menace — a human nailgun whose manufacturing and ache infliction concurrently skyrocket come playoff time — is how a participant able to such disrespectful actions could be so extensively respected by pal and foe alike.
Bruin-turned-Panther Brad Marchand was actually punched out of a playoff recreation final spring by Bennett’s sneaky fist and has rapidly circled and embraced him as a teammate.
“He obtained away with a shot, however I’m not going to complain,” Marchand stated of an incident that impacted his last sequence for Boston. “S— occurs. That’s a part of playoff hockey. I’ve been on the opposite aspect of a variety of performs. I believe that he obtained away with one, however that’s a part of the sport and undoubtedly a part of playoff hockey.”
Toronto’s Matthew Knies, who calls Bennett “intimidating,” discovered that the onerous means.
Bennett eradicated the facility ahead, then a rookie, from the primary Panthers-Leafs sequence two Mays in the past, when he concussed Knies with a WWE-style takedown 100 toes away from the puck.
Bennett dodged suspension for all these actions. He has a Stanley Cup ring, has been integral to Florida’s most profitable and savage period of NHL hockey and, by July 1, might be showered with the richest contract of his life.
“I play a tough fashion of hockey. I believe folks get upset by issues and labored up, however I attempt to tune them out. I’m simply attempting to play my recreation. I’m simply attempting to assist my workforce win. I simply attempt to push all that noise away,” Bennett advised reporters Tuesday on the Panthers’ resort in downtown Toronto.
He appeared like a man who slept simply high quality.
Sure, he conceded, he “undoubtedly” performs on the sting. However that Stolarz hen wing?
“Only a bump. There’s no forceful motion,” Bennett stated. “The very last thing I’m enthusiastic about is attempting to elbow him within the head.”
And when you’re shopping for that, we’re comfortable to promote you 9 acres of swampland in southeast Florida.
“I play the sport onerous, and I believe it must be performed onerous within the playoffs. Typically that’s what it takes to win,” defined Bennett, when pressed. “When guys are injured, after all I really feel dangerous. That’s by no means my intent. On the identical time, hockey’s a bodily recreation.”
Which is why the appreciation for a unicorn like Bennett — who has 29 objectives and 62 factors in 90 playoff appearances — flies off the charts in hockey circles.
“There are only a few folks like him, proper?” says teammate Evan Rodrigues. “He’s bodily. He’s expert. You hate enjoying towards him.
“He’s the kind of man that you do not need to line up towards, proper? Like, when you get put within the fallacious spot, his hits do injury. So, (Tom) Wilson’s most likely the closest factor nonetheless within the league.”
It took Rodrigues a minute to heat to Bennett as soon as their skates got here off.
“He kinda retains to himself. He provides off this very stern aura to him. However he’s truly humorous. If you happen to get him right into a dialog, he opens up fairly fast, and he can get chatty,” Rodrigues says.
“However when you have interaction him within the dialog, he’s truly, like, overly pleasant. Perhaps that’s one thing he will get a nasty rap for. I believe he is a means friendlier man than we give him credit score for.”
Lorentz delivers an analogous persona scouting report.
“Doesn’t come off as tremendous outgoing and stuff. He’s fairly even-keel. Doesn’t smile a complete lot within the mornings,” says Lorentz, who smiles a complete lot within the mornings.
“However when you get to know him, he’s an amazing man, nice human being. He’s obtained a coronary heart of gold. We obtained to know him and his fiancée (Zoe Zeleny) fairly properly, they usually’re simply nice folks. Most guys are like that off the ice. He’s a hockey participant. That’s his job. When he comes on the rink, it’s all enterprise.”
Born lower than a yr after Bennett, fellow Toronto product Mitch Marner has identified the man since boyhood. Once more, talking hours previous to the Stolarz hit, Marner was fast to reward Bennett’s velocity, shot, and playmaking.
“However his physicality, his willingness to get round nets and simply do issues for his teammates is fairly high-end,” Marner stated. “I noticed it first-class at 4 Nations.”
Followers of the purple Maple Leaf rooted for Bennett three months in the past, when he scored within the gold-medal recreation and fought American Brady Tkachuk.
“Perhaps one of many heaviest guys within the league and one of many craziest,” based on Marner. “ that he is gonna usher in each single recreation, and also you gotta be sure to’re able to match that depth.”
Provides Brandon Carlo, now tasked with defending Bennett for a 3rd straight post-season: “There’s not many conditions you’ll see him not in. He’s capable of do just about the whole lot on each side of the puck, in order that makes him a really particular participant. He’s very heavy. He’s onerous within the corners and performs actually competitively. So, simply that compete facet units him aside.”
Andy O’Brien, coach to the NHL stars, brings up Sidney Crosby when requested about Bennett.
O’Brien has been working with Bennett independently since his rookie season, and that relationship deepened as soon as O’Brien obtained employed as a high-performance advisor with the Panthers. Much like how the well being and efficiency skilled labored one-on-one with Crosby earlier than his stint on the Penguins workers.
“Not lots of people had seen that ultra-competitive aspect that Benny has. As a result of off the ice, he is very mild-mannered. He trains onerous,” O’Brien says over the telephone. “He appears very laid-back. However once you get him in a extremely aggressive ambiance, it comes out.”
O’Brien factors to Bennett’s elimination of Carolina’s Jaccob Slavin within the 2023 Japanese Convention last as an eye-opening second. The potential for explosions of dangerous physicality:
“Within the 4 Nations, for him to return in as an additional ahead, then assert himself the way in which he did, and arise for his nation and his teammates and rating an enormous aim within the final recreation, it says lots about his character,” O’Brien says.
“Working with him behind the scenes for a very long time, I noticed that. Definitely, the those who know him noticed it. However I believe it was type of the place the hockey world began to see that, and that’s one of many the reason why he’s a very talked-about participant proper now. There’s not a variety of gamers which have that mixture of physicality, compete, talent. He’s been a gem to be round.”
The factor about gems is, not solely are they priceless, they’re robust to interrupt.
The Maple Leafs haven’t been capable of. The Division of Participant Security doesn’t appear too excited about attempting.
And Maurice is simply comfortable he has this specific gem in his pocket.
“He performs onerous. There was a success two and a half years in the past that you just guys have proven 4,000 instances. There was a parking ticket seven years in the past that I believe truly made the video,” Maurice stated Tuesday of the newest media mayhem over Bennett the Menace.
“He’s obtained the puck, he’s on an influence play, goes to the web. I perceive. Name the fireplace division. Put your hair out. Let’s transfer on. Please.
“Sincere to God, I’ve seen each hit that Sam Bennett has thrown since he was 12 years previous this morning. I get it. Go forward. Run with it. We’re good. Puck’s gonna drop.”
And Bennett’s gonna Bennett.
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