{"id":465804,"date":"2026-02-21T15:49:19","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T15:49:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/465804\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T15:49:19","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T15:49:19","slug":"gavin-mckenna-cements-nhl-draft-status-with-wild-8-point-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/465804\/","title":{"rendered":"Gavin McKenna Cements NHL Draft Status With Wild 8-Point Night"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-23975084\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/1771688959_326_Gavin-McKenna.jpg\" alt=\"Gavin McKenna Penn State\" width=\"650\" height=\"366\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-media-credit\">\u00a9 Barry Reeger\/Imagn<\/p>\n<p>Just two weeks ago, it looked as if\u00a0Gavin McKenna\u2019s college hockey career may have come to a premature end. The\u00a0Penn State\u00a0star and presumptive No. 1 pick in the 2026 NHL Draft was arrested and faced felony assault charges after an incident outside of a local bar.<\/p>\n<p>Those <a href=\"https:\/\/brobible.com\/sports\/article\/gavin-mckenna-felony-assault-charge-dropped\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">charges were later dropped<\/a> after police deemed that the evidence did not support the initial allegations against him.<\/p>\n<p>McKenna did not miss a game for the Nittany Lions, and on Friday night against Ohio State, he reminded the world why he\u2019s considered a potential generational prospect.<\/p>\n<p>The freshman from Canada put up a jaw-dropping eight points in an 11-4 victory over the Buckeyes, including one goal a remarkable seven assists.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">\ud83c\udfd2 Gavin McKenna sets a Penn State men\u2019s hockey program record with 8 points in tonight\u2019s 11-4 win over Ohio State:<br \/>\u2022 1 goal<br \/>\u2022 5 primary assists<br \/>\u2022 2 secondary assists<br \/>\u2022 7 shots on goal<\/p>\n<p>Dynamite. \ud83e\udde8 <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NHLDraft?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#NHLDraft<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/OtCzfiSijN\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/OtCzfiSijN<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 NHL News (@PuckReportNHL) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/PuckReportNHL\/status\/2025060829586948138?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">February 21, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p>According to <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/chnews\/status\/2025085306962411754?s=46&amp;t=C6npKMgUh2yEqPvUeSTS1A\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">College Hockey News<\/a>, McKenna became the first college player with eight or more points in a game since Bob Joyce of North Dakota on January 2, 1987.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was just having fun out there. A lot of stuff going on in my life right now,\u201d McKenna told reporters after the game.<\/p>\n<p>That feels like an understatement.<\/p>\n<p>McKenna did draw the ire of some for a Conor McGregor-esque celebration after scoring his lone goal of the night. The superstar winger appeared to imitate the former UFC champion\u2019s iconic strut, giving a nod to the fact that he did, in fact, <a href=\"https:\/\/brobible.com\/sports\/article\/gavin-mckenna-penn-state-assault-charge-details\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">punch someone in the face outside of a college bar<\/a> (whether or not that person deserved it is a separate discussion).<\/p>\n<p>One thing is certain. Regardless of the allegations and charges against him, McKenna is a ridiculous hockey player, and teams will still likely be lining up to select him in this summer\u2019s NHL Draft.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u00a9 Barry Reeger\/Imagn Just two weeks ago, it looked as if\u00a0Gavin McKenna\u2019s college hockey career may have come&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":465805,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[462],"tags":[1880,766,5,4,465,466,20590,2147],"class_list":{"0":"post-465804","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl-draft","8":"tag-college-hockey","9":"tag-gavin-mckenna","10":"tag-hockey","11":"tag-nhl","12":"tag-nhl-draft","13":"tag-nhl-entry-draft","14":"tag-nittany-lions","15":"tag-penn-state"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116109415965042260","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465804\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}