Promotion to the Second Line Brings Newfound Confidence to Liam O’Brien’s Game

Since his assignment to Hershey in December 2014, Liam O’Brien has become a fan favorite. The Halifax, NS native won over Bears fans with his grit and hard-nosed style of play. But a recent promotion to the second line has O’Brien only two points away from matching his season total from last year. Heading into Christmas Break, O’Brien is riding a four-game point streak, which was extended with a beautiful assist to Paul Carey on Sunday night.

“This is basically our third year with Liam, and his skill set has certainly improved,” head coach Troy Mann said. “One thing I brought up during my interview process three years ago was to involve more skill development with our team prior to practice. We’ve been doing it here for the third season. Liam as a prospect, young player, has been a big part of that, and a lot of the credit goes to Ryan Murphy. One of his strengths as a coach is his ability to break down the skillset. He does a nice job with the forwards.”

“I’ve gotten a lot of help from the coaching staff,” said O’Brien. “I was working with Murph this week on skills, and I’ve been working with him for three years now. I’m getting the opportunity to play with some pretty good players, too – guys like Paul Carey, [Jakub] Vrana, [Travis] Boyd. For me, my job is to win the battle, get the puck, try and get it to them, and they put it in the back of the net.”

That’s exactly what O’Brien has been doing. Since being moved up to the second line on November 25, the 22-year-old is now almost a point per game player, with ten points in 11 games. Prior to the promotion, O’Brien had only four points in 13 games, only a 0.31 PPG average.

“Liam has bought in, and when it’s his turn to go on early, he has embraced it,” said Mann. “You’re seeing the benefits of it now. He’s playing with confidence, as well. He has spent most of his time here playing with [Zach] Sill, [Garrett] Mitchell, those types of players, but I really wanted to get him involved in with some skill guys because he is such a physical presence out there. He’ll hunt pucks down, and when the power play wasn’t going well here a few weeks ago, it was because we didn’t have a lot of traffic in front of the net, and he provides that. Now you got him making plays, confident in his ability and taking the eyes away of the goaltender, he’s been a nice addition there.”

That theme of confidence was echoed by linemate Travis Boyd, who has seen that new mettle in O’Brien’s game. “I don’t know if he would necessarily be known as a guy who would make a lot of plays, but he’s playing with a lot of confidence right now, and he’s making a lot of plays. He’s tearing it up right now.”