McDavid aids NHL in its skills competition revamp

The NHL All-Star Skills competition is getting a major overhaul in 2024 thanks to creative input from Edmonton Oilers star Connor McDavid.

The skills competition will take place at 7 p.m. ET on Friday, Feb. 2, at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto during the NHL’s All-Star Weekend.

Steve Mayer, NHL senior VP and chief content officer, met with McDavid on multiple occasions to get the star center’s thoughts on what the skills competition should look like. McDavid gave feedback on what the players wanted out of the events, and helped the NHL create a skills competition that has more hockey skill testing and less gimmickry than in previous editions.

“He’s a world-class, all-star level of endorsement,” said Mayer of McDavid.

Instead of every all-star participating, the new format will feature just 12 NHL players battling each other in eight events. They’ll receive points for where they place in those events. The individual player who accumulates the most points on the night will win $1 million.

The first eight players will be determined by the NHL’s hockey operations department and the NHLPA. Fans will vote in the final four skaters to compete in the skills competition. Only players who were named to the NHL All-Star Game are eligible to become part of the 12 skills competition participants.

The 2024 NHL All-Star Skills events are:

1. Fastest Skater

2. Hardest Shot

3. Stick Handling

4. One Timers

5. Passing Challenge

6. Accuracy Shooting

7. The NHL Shootout (top 8 players)

8. The NHL Obstacle Course (top 6 players)

Each player will compete in four of the first six events, earning points for their respective finish in each event.

First place receives five points, and then each place receives one fewer point down to sixth place and lower, which receive zero points. The scoring is intended to encourage participation in events that might be less populated than others.

“You have to be very strategic in how you choose events and what you participate in,” said Mayer. “Sometimes you’ll get 10 people to do one event, but you’ll only get a few people to do another event. Players will now realize that just participating gets you a point.”

The four lowest point-earners after the first six events will be eliminated. The eight remaining players advance to a seventh event: The NHL Shoot-Out. It’s a penalty shot event that will also feature all eight NHL All-Star goaltenders.

In a novel twist that should make for some intrigue, the skaters will choose which goalie they’ll shoot against. “The guy that’s in last place going into that event? He picks the goalie that he thinks he can score on first,” said Mayer, who said there will also be a prize for the top goaltender.

The top six point-earners from The NHL Shoot-Out will advance to the eighth and final event: The NHL Obstacle Course, which will include aspects of the previous seven events and will crown a winner for the night.

“Instead of accuracy with four targets, it’s accuracy with one target. It is all the different pieces, but you’re going from station to station,” said Mayer. “Everything will come alive in that final event.”

The points will be doubled in the NHL Obstacle Course, which is intended to keep the players engaged until the end.

Mayer said to expect some “twists” on the traditional skills events, which will be announced later. He also said that the NHL’s technology — which includes puck and player tracking — will be used in a “very, very cool way” during the night.

The NHL considered revamping All-Star Weekend after last season’s event in South Florida. First, the league decided to revive its All-Star Game draft concept – and in the process, extended its All-Star Weekend to Thursday night for the draft in Toronto.

Then it was time to rethink skills. The league decided to reorient All-Star Skills events back to their core hockey roots. The NHL dabbled in hockey-adjacent events in recent years that ranged from “hockey golf” to players being dropped into dunk tanks.

The NHL also wanted to have fewer players competing in the skills competition, rather than having every All-Star participate. The inspiration here: “Battle of the Network Stars,” a TV show which saw celebrities compete against each other in a series of events to accumulate points. Mayer helped produce a variation on that classic when he was an executive at IMG.

“I’ve spent a fair amount of time doing these types of events. I truly believe they’re entertaining. When high caliber athletes compete, even in a made-for-television event, they compete hard. It’s just the nature of the athlete. They’re wired a certain way,” said Mayer. “I absolutely think that when these guys get on that ice and start going from event to event and you start to see the standings changing, I think their competitive juices start flowing.”

The NHL had the rough sketches of that format when it started talking with McDavid about the skills competition. When NHL commissioner Gary Bettman met with McDavid in Edmonton during the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the all-star format was one of the topics. Mayer and McDavid spoke at the NHL Awards in Nashville and again in Edmonton, where they met for over an hour.

The Oilers star endorsed the event’s new direction and offered his input.

“You could see that he was interested. His support for this format kind of led us to develop it more. It made us feel like we were on the right path,” said Mayer.

McDavid helped determine the skills that, in his opinion, make for a great all-around hockey player. That included what skills players mastered while growing up, and how proficiency in those skills should be judged.

“That’s where his input was welcomed and impactful. It was him saying, ‘Hey, you’ve got to have stick handling and here are the ways that we’ve done it. Here’s where I also think this will be visually interesting,'” said Mayer.

McDavid, one of the NHL’s biggest generators of game highlights, also understood that the Skills competition needed to be engaging.

“I do think that he clearly understands that it’s in an arena, it’s not practice. It needs to be something that fans will lean into and think is entertaining. But at the same time, it needs to show off a player’s skill,” said Mayer.

Barring “a complete failure, which it will not be,” Mayer said the NHL intends to stick with this format for multiple All-Star Weekends.

“I do think we feel really good about this and there will be a bit of a commitment to do this again. But we’re going to see reaction from fans and we’re going to see reaction from other players who are participating,” he said.

Something Mayer is already considering for future editions: Creating more buzz-worthy, hockey-adjacent taped events away from the arena — like when players shot pucks within the fountains at the Bellagio in Las Vegas — that would utilize the all-stars that didn’t get selected for the skills competitions.

“Our players love those, too. I mean, they did enjoy hitting pucks at dunk tanks,” he said.