OHL: Ryan Murphy reaches full stride with darkhorse Rangers

The Ryan Murphy they know and love in Kitchener is back — assuming he was ever gone.

Even before the defenceman was named the OHL player of the week Monday, those keeping tap on the Rangers could easily espy that the Carolina Hurricanes first-round pick had found the form that makes him worth the price of admission on his best nights. The 18-year-old defenceman is clearly past a bad-things-comes-in-three autumn that including hanging around with the Hurricanes into October but not getting to make his NHL debut, missing a month due to a concussion caused by a headshot by Niagara's Tom Kühnhackl and, finally, being unable to make his best case for Canada's national junior team. Numbers don't tell the story, but Murphy has had as many points in the Kitchener Rangers' past four games, 11, as he did at Christmas. He's jumping into rushes and pinching down from the point with the same gusto he showed last season.

"It was definitely a tough first half," the 5-foot-11, 176-pound rushing defenceman says. "There was getting sent back, then the concussion a few weeks later and and getting let go off of Team Canada, so the first half was a real big roller-coaster ride. This is a new half, the team's doing great, we just want to keep it going."

Murphy adds he scarcely needed any pointed reminders from the Rangers coaching staff when he was having trouble putting up points or raising the lot of Kitchener's power play, which is 17th-best in the 20-team OHL after being third and fourth in his first two seasons. This was a matter of patience and patient, heal thyself.

"They weren't saying much, which was one of the better things," Murphy adds. "They just let me figure it out myself. As the games went on I did get called out by the coaches a couple times and that helped me realize I had to step it up."

Rangers assistant coach Troy Smith notes the coaching staff didn't get on Murphy that much more than any other player. What's on display of late — witness Murphy's half-rink-length rush to score the third-period game-winning goal on last Saturday in Belleville — just needed time to resurface.

"Ryan's a resilient kid," Smith says. "He's responded very well and he's a strong kid mentally and we're seeing what he can do now."

Boston Bruins first-rounder Dougie Hamilton (50 points in 34 games for Niagara) and likely first-rounder Cody Ceci is also a point-a-game scorer (44 in 44 for the Ottawa 67's) are the OHL's only two defenceman who average a point a game. Murphy's almost up to that clip (four goals, 25 points in 27 games) after his recent roll.

'Younger team'

That might sound like a drop-off from a year ago, when the Aurora, Ont., native put up 24 goals and 79 assists in 63 games, gaudy totals for a 17-year-old defenceman. However, this season's Rangers aren't as deep in what coach-GM Steve Spott calls "natural offence" as their immediate predecessors. They're winning with defence, having allowed the third-fewest goals (120) in the OHL. Their leading scorer, Edmonton Oilers pick Tobias Rieder, is 38th in the league.

"My first two years I had a great offensively gifted class with Jason Akeson, Gabriel Landeskog, Jeff Skinner," Murphy says, referring to last year's OHL co-scoring champion and two NHL top-10 picks who went directly from the draft floor to the big league. "I had a bunch of guys who would take it end-to-end basically and get me an assist. This year we have a younger team who's not as offensively gifted as in previous years. So this year I'm going to focus on making the players around me better.

"We have a good young team," he adds. "We have a lot of guys who are trying to make names for themselves. We have a hard-working team and we have to stick to that."

Murphy notes it would be big to achieve some team success now that he's one of the Rangers' veterans. Kitchener (30-13-1-0, .693) has firm grip on the third place in the Western Conference, 10 points behind London in their division and 10 points ahead of fourth-place Sarnia. They nabbed the No. 3 seed last season but were knocked out in a seven-game first-round series by the Plymouth Whalers. It should be illuminating to see if Murphy can help the Rangers morph into a playoff darkhorse in a field where London and Plymouth are heavy favourites.

Teammates say Murphy didn't let the uneven first half affect his mood to the point where it spread to teammates.

"It's easy to just get down on yourself but he battled through it," captain Michael Catenacci says. "He's a character guy. He spent extra time on the ice [after practices] and now he's playing well.

"Most nights we do go on his back and draw on his leadership," Catenacci adds. "He's always been positive, as tough as it can be sometimes in those situations. That's been really good for us."

Would Murphy leading the Rangers on an OHL playoff run prove that Hockey Canada should not have cut him each of the past two years? Likely not; the two are apples to oranges. Please keep in mind that Murphy said after Team Canada's final cuts that he had tried to alter his style of play to help his chances of making the team. Now he's back to playing the creative, chance-taking style that suits him. That seems to be enough motive for him; assuming he's out to avenge being cut again might be a little knee-jerk.

"I don't think Ryan's that kind of kid," Smith says about the motivation question. "The world junior is a once-a-year thing and hopefully he'll get a chance next year. It's behind him."

Neate Sager is a writer for Yahoo! Canada Sports. Contact him at neatesager@yahoo.ca and follow him on Twitter @neatebuzzthenet (photo: OHL Images).