The story of Arber Xhekaj has been talked about to death, so we won't go into detail about his time before he made it to the NHL. Famously, Xhekaj was working at Costco, before sigining with the Montreal Canadiens and playing with the Kitchener Rangers.
Xhekaj was undrafted and signed in 2021, and spent a year with the Kitchener Rangers in the OHL as a physical and commanding defender.
It was during that time that I had the honor of interviewing Xhekaj before a game, the transcript of which can be found here. First of all, Xhekaj was a great interviewee, very kind and personable and a great guy to talk to.
He talked about putting himself in a leadership role both physically and off the ice. He also mentioned about some of his short-comings, namely his struggles in his first couple of NHL preseason games in reading the ice and opposing players.
"Yeah definitely. Playing in those two NHL games it’s definitely an awakening to see how much attention to detail you need to have there. I’m obviously a bigger guy and can handle myself in that respect, but it’s just building the attention to detail part of the game, knowing where guys they are and always reading what hands they shoot and which sides they are coming down and all kinds of stuff like that."Arber Xhekaj
It was a great answer and look into his shortcomings as a young, undrafted player and how he planned to address it. At that time, Xhekaj could already hold his own physically with the biggest of opponents, even in the NHL, but knew he had to work on his reading of the game to make the most of his hockey career.
It wasn't long after that that Xhekaj jumped the AHL entirely and started the season with the Montreal Canadiens, and gained the reputation as one of the biggest, toughest guys in the league. He could fight with the best of them and throw his body around to protect his teammates.
The thing is that such an aggresive physical game comes with some significant downsides. In his first two years of playing in the NHL, Xhekaj has not been able to play a full season, playing just 51 and 44 games, both seasons cut short by shoulder injuries.
As an example, in his first NHL season, Xhekaj finished with 101 penalty minutes in 51 games. That is good for the 12th most penalty minutes in the league, with all players above him having played more games. That included 9 fights in one season.
Xhekaj during those two years represented a double-edged sword. He wasn't able to put up many offensive numbers, 8 goals and 23 points in those two seasons, but he is likely never going to be an offensive number producer.
However, untimely penalties and a general sense of liability in his own zone made him tough to trust. But he kept opponent's honest with their physical play, and could protect and avenge his teammates and put pressure on the other opponent's tough guys.
This year, however, Xhekaj has become a smarter, more responsible player. It hasn't always been there, but his confidence and ability seems to grow with every passing game. He almost scored a nice goal against Boston, its just that his centering pass went off Cole Caufield's skate (it was awarded to Xhekaj initially), and his game against the New York Islanders was one of the strongest of his whole career.
While Xhekaj has avowed that he won't shy away from the physical side of the game this year, he has avoided taken as many unforced penalties and unnecessary fights. He still isn't perfect in this regard, but there has been a marked improvement.
And just by the simple eye-test, Xhekaj looks more comfortable with the puck on his stick in the offensive zone and when making reads in his own zone. The hard work that Xhekaj has been clearly putting in the mental work and it is paying off in spades.
Now, Xhekaj isn't just a boogeyman to scare off opponents, but struggling on the ice. Xhekaj is still that physical, scary defender, but now he can play and lead in a strong way. It will be a joy to see where he grows from here.