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

TAMPA — Brandon Hagel has a pretty thick skin. He’s got the kind of scar tissue that might have made some players quit long ago. But not this guy.

“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 said Monday. “I’ve been kicked in the head a lot.”

No, really.

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

“And then, you get an opportunity and somebody 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 moment.

The point 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 while GM of the Sabres 10 years ago. It was in the sixth round, 159th, the team’s eighth player taken in that draft.

Not overly surprising he went that low. Hagel was a scrawny kid and had just come off a 13-goal season with WHL Red Deer.

But Murray saw enough.

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

Exposure, as in not many scouts seemed to give him much of a second look after their first viewing, Murray said. But again, the Sabres saw enough. Unfortunately, with Murray fired a year later in 2017 and no longer at the helm in Buffalo, the Sabres decided not to sign 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 said.

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

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

Jake Evans sure remembers. He was at the same camp.

“I’ve said it many times to the guys here, we missed out on a really good player, which is crazy,” the Canadiens forward said. “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 actually brought that up a few times. Every time we play them, I feel like I bring 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 was finding my groove in Chicago, working my way up the lineup, getting some more opportunities and really appreciative of that. I loved Chicago, their organization, everyone was great,” 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 in the second season of an eight-year contract carrying a bargain $6.5 million cap hit, blossomed into a two-way star here in Tampa, so much so that he got on Team Canada’s radar.

Bruce Cassidy got a first-hand look at Hagel as part of Team Canada’s coaching staff for the 4 Nations Face-Off and the Olympics. Cassidy, in charge of the forwards, got a better understanding of what makes the player special.

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

His inclusion on the 4 Nations roster last season might have caught some people off-guard, but it shouldn’t 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 said. “After the first game against the U.S. at 4 Nations, I think everybody 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 forget the three fights in nine seconds to open the U.S.-Canada round-robin game 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 had discussed initiating the opening faceoff fights in a group chat that afternoon.

To which Hagel delivered the quote of the tournament a few days later on the eve of the championship game and a rematch with Team USA.

“We’re out there playing for the flag, not the cameras,” Hagel said 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 looked a bit sheepish when that quote was brought up on Monday. What motivated him that day to make that comment?

“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 sent 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’s Hagel. He cares deeply about 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 said. “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 loved him at the Bell Centre that night. Now they’ll be booing him for Games 3 and 4.

Teammate Nick Paul gets why some fans in other markets still may not have appreciated the full measure of the player Hagel is.

“I think he’s one of the best wingers in the league,” Paul said. “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 goals in a Game 1 overtime loss. He was Tampa’s best player and a handful for Montreal to handle. He’s not done putting his mark on this series.

At 27, it’s already been quite a life lived for Hagel. From unwanted at every stop to indispensable in Tampa.

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

That certainly wasn’t true seven years ago. But that was before Hagel proved them all wrong.