Patrick Williams, TheAHL.com Features Writer
If it’s spring, there is an excellent chance that Curtis McKenzie is playing for the Calder Cup.
Durable as always, the Texas Stars captain, now in his 12th professional season, played in 67 of the team’s 72 regular-season games and finished with 15 goals and 15 assists. In his four seasons since returning to Cedar Park, he has dressed for 272 of the Stars’ 288 games plus 17 more in the playoffs, despite a physical, grinding style against opponents often a decade or more younger than him.
McKenzie won the Calder Cup with Texas as a rookie in 2014. He went back to the Finals in 2018 before the Stars lost a Game 7 against the Toronto Marlies; he churned out 11 goals in 22 games that postseason. In 2019 with the Chicago Wolves, he was in the Finals again.
Drafted by Dallas in 2009, McKenzie won the Dudley (Red) Garrett Memorial Award as the AHL’s rookie of the year in 2013-14. After five seasons with the organization – including 99 games in the NHL – he spent two years with the Vegas organization and one with St. Louis organization before returning to the Stars in 2021.
Texas, which begins its 2025 Calder Cup Playoffs with Game 1 of a best-of-five division semifinal series in Grand Rapids tonight, has every reason to think that it can make another run this season. The Stars went back-and-forth with Milwaukee for the Central Division lead down the stretch, ultimately finishing just two points behind the Admirals.
McKenzie has long been a dependable playoff producer. He had seven points in seven games last spring, and he has put up 65 points (29 goals, 36 assists) in 90 career Calder Cup Playoff games across nine trips to the AHL postseason.
And for younger teammates like Matěj Blümel, Arttu Hyry, Antonio Stranges and this year’s Garrett Award winner Justin Hryckowian, McKenzie can be looked toward as someone who has been through everything that the AHL can throw at a player. The regular-season grind. The long postseason. Even Game 7 of the Calder Cup Finals.
Plenty of Texas alumni have used their postseason experience to ready them for NHL success. The Stars played in three Finals during the 2010’s, with rosters including Jamie Benn, Jamie Oleksiak, Radek Faksa, Roope Hintz and Jason Dickinson. The Calder Cup Playoffs can be the final boost that a prospect needs to land a full-time NHL job.
McKenzie, who is completing the final year of a two-year AHL contract he signed in 2023, understands how reaching the NHL can be an all-consuming thought for young players. But he also knows that there is business to handle at this level also.
“Most guys that play in this league, the majority of them [were] stars on their team and everything has gone generally well in their whole career,” McKenzie said earlier this season. “So it’s the first time a lot of players hit adversity, and it can be tough. I just try to help them out, to stay on track, to trust their route and process because it’s not overnight that everyone gets to the NHL, if they get there at all.”
If the regular season tests young players, the postseason is another level altogether. Surely there will be adversity for the Stars – or any other hopeful Calder Cup champion – this spring. There are elimination games. Double and triple overtime. The games accumulate quickly. So does the physical wear-and-tear.
Development is such a dominant theme in the AHL, and the Calder Cup Playoffs form a sizable portion of that process of taking young talent and turning someone into an NHL player.
“[The AHL] is a tough league,” McKenzie said. “You’re that close to being an NHL player, and all that’s on everyone’s minds is, ‘How do I get there?’ You just have to work hard and push forward and keep on the game through the tough times because the AHL can swallow guys up. You want to get guys the best opportunity to be in a position to move on to the next level.
On the American Hockey League beat for two decades, TheAHL.com features writer Patrick Williams also currently covers the league for NHL.com and FloSports and is a regular contributor on SiriusXM NHL Network Radio. He was the recipient of the AHL’s James H. Ellery Memorial Award for his outstanding coverage of the league in 2016.
