Michael Hage : In-Depth Scouting Report
Michael Hage is a super talented Canadian right-handed center who decided to bring his talent to the United States, opting to continue his development in the NCAA with the excellent Michigan program. He played with the Chicago Steel this season in the USHL. Despite a slightly slower start to the season, he still finished 4th among the points in the league.
Hage stands out from his rivals on the ice with his very high level of individual skill. His puck handling ranks hands down (shame on me, that pun was fully intended) among the elite in his draft class. He has one of the most attractive repertoires of dangle of his cohort. Few players excel as much as him in one-on-one situations. He can take down a defender at any time when he’s on the ice and that’s what makes him so exciting to watch play. What is interesting is that many of his dangle are done at full speed and he goes inside to head towards the goalkeeper.
One thing that makes Hage such a good player at disposing of an opponent is that he doesn’t just use his hands to achieve his goals. He also incorporates (wonderfully) shoulder movements. He can quickly drop his shoulder to attack his coverer head on and look to get under him and he also uses very good changes of direction to sell a misroute to the player in front of him.
Hage is possibly the player in this draft who takes the most advantage of changing angles on his shot. He uses Toe-Drag as well as anybody. His puck control in these situations where he manages to find a shooting line in front of a kneeling opponent is magnificent.
I would also describe the quality of his shot as being above average. He has good velocity behind his wrist shot and he often takes shots where the puck quickly gains elevation, without losing any of its speed, giving goalkeepers a lot of difficulty in managing their rebound properly.
Another area where Hage demonstrates skills far above his peers is inside his pass receptions. He manages to receive saucer passes where the puck is not quite flat on the ice with remarkable ease. The most prevalent aspect of this facet is during transitions. In the lower levels, like the USHL, not all zone exits goes flawlessly, inaccuracies in defenders’ breakout passes still happen quite frequently. This is where Hage’s talent level comes into play. It’s hard to give him a ‘bad’ pass. He has no problem catching the puck with one hand behind his back, in his skates, whatever.
This also leads me to talk about one of the strong points in his game which is his success rate in transition. He has an apparent ease in carrying the puck into enemy territory. It is with the help of the aforementioned qualities that he manages to achieve such a success in these situations. I would add to that that his skating is also a quality in his game. His speed is above average and he is very comfortable switching from inside crossover to outside crossover if an imponderable arises in front of him.
If we look at his playmaking skills, I would describe them as somewhat average overall. Some passes he manages to make are still quite impressive. The problem lies in the fact that when we watch games of him, there are few sequences where his plays benefit his teammates. Even if we see hints of it, very promising, on occasion, this does not offer a worthy representation of his game, which remains more focused on individual skills.
It is in transition that the majority of his playmaking occur. Which remains consistent with what has been presented about his identity so far. One thing is certain, we can’t blame him for not being able to make plays at full speed. Many of his set-up are made in these situations and this is what determines the effectiveness of these plays. It’s difficult for opposing defenders to cover Hage’s passing targets as they rush in at full speed. Especially if they want to avoid taking a penalty for obstruction.
I’ll admit to having been higher on Hage for the first two thirds of the season. One of the reasons is that I saw certain fragments within his ability to make plays that gave me a glimpse of hope that he had a lot of room to develop in this facet. Even more so due to the fact that he will spend, possibly, at least 3 years with the University of Michigan. Without using any of these nuances in abundance, Hage still demonstrated that these aspects are mastered and that it is possible that he manages to integrate them at a higher frequency; subtle delays before a pass to allow time for a teammate to free himself, elements of ‘Deception’ with his posture and his gaze, leaving no clue as to the identity of his target, and I also particularly liked the way he took information by looking over his shoulder and then making a more informed decision.
As of today, I’m perhaps less optimistic than I was a few months ago about whether or not his playmaking can reach the next level, but even back then I saw it as a project over a few years, so only time will tell.
Another reason why I was full of optimism for Hage is that, although he was far from the archetypal difficult player to play against, he still demonstrated some ‘Hard Skills’. More specifically, a propensity to cut to the net with the puck. He is one of the high-profile forwards who have completed the most net-drive in my viewing. He doesn’t shy away from any opportunity to lean his shoulder and attack the goalkeeper head-on. He is definitely not scared and not all players with his talent are inclined to attack this dangerous area with such speed and ardor. This resulted in several goals for his team during the season.
Moreover, Hage took a lot of shot this season as he leaned his shoulder to get under the defender responsible for covering him. We observe a very high level of intelligence on his part as he perfectly understands how to exploit the defender’s response in these scenarios. Generally, their reflex will be to try to pokecheck the puck by extending their reach with their stick. This has the effect of increasing the size of their triangle (space defined between the base of their skate and their stick). Hage places the puck inside this space to take his shots. Brilliant.
Note that without the puck, Hage continues a lot of action at the net.
An aspect that I find extremely important when evaluating prospects is to see how they react following a mistake, a poor shift or, when challenged physically. This season, there seemed to be some rivalry between Chicago and the Madison Capitols. Hage was hit pretty hard twice during one of these clashes and his on-ice habits haven’t changed; he continued to attack the net, playing boldly with the puck (which can be provocative in the eyes of his opponents). In short, he hasn’t faded at all. This even motivated him to give a few shoulder checks of his own.
Although a marked increase in his offensive production was observed in the second half of the season, the product I anticipated on the ice did not materialize. Hage just doesn’t ‘Drive’ the ‘Bus’ enough for me. The occasions where his talent benefits his teammates are too few for my taste. It must be said that the Chicago Steel is not what it used to be so, not having much support for him, I showed myself more lenient towards him, but little by little, this clemency that I had crumbled. Strangely, my projection of the player is no different than when I was higher on him: there is no real in-between in his case, he will be a 2nd line player in the NHL or he will not establish himself in the league.
In the past, I’ve been caught judging a player based on their flashes and not their overall game, and it came back to bite me in the butt. This is why I had to move Hage down a few ranks following my last viewing.
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