“He needs to be a good two-way player. He’s our number-one centre, he’s going to be matched up against the other teams’ best players all the time, and in the early going he’s done a good job on the defensive side of the puck.” Rutherford said.
He added, “But I agree with what you’re saying, we feel the same way, coming off the year he had he’s not going to flip the switch and all of a sudden get 110 points again, although he’s capable, he has the skill level to do that. But we’ll really look at his two-way play and how the team ends up doing is going to be important as to the impact that he has, and it’s more about can he impact the games at the right time? It’s not about whether he gets 100 points, can he be a difference maker? We know he can, we’ll see if he can do that.”