No one was expecting Maggio to replicate his final junior season, where he scored 54 goals, notched 111 points and took home the OHL scoring title and MVP, in the AHL, but the Bridgeport coaching staff wants to see him simplify and round out his game. That messaged appeared to take hold in the second half of last season, as he recorded 19 points in the final 31 games for Bridgeport.
“They were just always on me about playing simple,” Maggio said. “I’m playing against older guys, the stuff that maybe worked in juniors won’t work here, but still having that creativity, just simplifying my game and for checking hard, I’m a guy that likes to play with a lot of speed. I like to think that I have a good motor on me, and using that motor to kind of get in on offense and create turnovers, create offense for myself.”
Maggio feels he’s more prepared for the grind of the AHL schedule as well, including the three-in-threes, where teams play three games in three days (and sometimes condenses to two-and-a-half days if Sunday is a matinee). Kowalsky recalled a conversation with Maggio from his rookie year about how much of a grind the jump to pro was, but remarked about how his mentally has continued to mature.
“It’s a man’s league,” Kowalsky said of the AHL. “A lot of these guys haven’t faced that adversity, the grind of it, and that’s what the American League’s for… I think he’s learned, obviously by bringing that [adversity] up a lot and prepared over the summer. He can take what he learned, and you look for him each year to take another step.”