2023 belongs to NHL sorcerer Connor McDavid – 2024 and 2025 probably will too

A t the age of six, Connor McDavid was already special – not just talented, but driven and determined. His parents tried to get him into a competitive league for kids a year older, but he was denied. So they found a solution. They put him in a house league – with nine-year-olds. McDavid played up. He did it again when he joined the Ontario Hockey League at 15, and when he joined Team Canada’s World Juniors team at 16. After that, of course, was the NHL.

Which is, technically speaking, as high as he can go. The thing is, McDavid is still ready to play up – he just can’t. So, instead, he puts up seasons like this one, which include months like March. On the 14th, McDavid hit 129 points on the season, the highest single-season point total among all active NHL players. On the same day, the next highest points-earner on the year (as it has been all season) was McDavid’s teammate, Leon Draisaitl, with 100 – 29 points behind. If you only took McDavid’s assists into consideration, he’d still rank in the Top 20 overall points leaders on the year. On 22 March, McDavid notched his 60th goal of the season in just 72 games (Auston Matthews hit 60 in 73 games last season).

CONNOR MCDAVID.GAME WINNER.60 GOALS. pic.twitter.com/IU90IanBZW

The last player to hit 60 goals in a season faster than McDavid did this year was Mario Lemieux, who did it in 70 games in 1987-88. This is McDavid’s sixth season with at least 100 points, unsurprisingly putting him in a league of his own. The only other active NHL player with six 100-point seasons is Sidney Crosby, who’s currently in his 18th year; McDavid’s been in the league for just eight. Lemieux, who played 17 NHL seasons, managed to break the 100-point barrier 10 times. Wayne Gretzky notched 15