HE’S GOING TO SELL A LOT OF TICKETS (IN THE OHL).

as 15-year-olds.

Still, the OHL denied the request. It’s possible the league was gun shy after Sean Day was granted the status in 2013, but then was drafted fourth overall in the OHL and slipped to the third round of last year’s NHL entry draft, but there were more obvious reasons than that.

At this time last year, Hughes was 5-foot-7 and 135 pounds. Today, he’s not a whole lot bigger.

“Even if we got in, we didn’t know if we would actually take it,” said Hughes, who has not yet decided if he will play in the OHL next season or follow his older brother Quinton to the U.S. National Team Development Program. “It might not have been good for me to jump in the league among a bunch of in major midget. And because he’s so dangerous with the puck, he also wears one of the biggest targets on his back.

“This playoff run it’s been how can we try to physically take Jack out of the game?’” Marlboros coach Steve Devine said of opponents’ tactics. “They’re not even worrying about the puck. It’s been really ruthless.”

Hughes, who from a young age learned “to use my brain more than my physical attributes,” is Gaudreau-like greasy when it comes to evading contact. But he can’t avoid it completely. In a recent playoff game, he got tagged with a hard hit and had to miss a game. When he returned, that bull’s-eye on his back seemed to loom even larger. But if Hughes was scared, he didn’t show it.