Kessel finally comfortable in spotlight

5:52 PM ET

PITTSBURGH — Welcome to the curious, and in many ways inspiring, story of Phil Kessel.

The Penguins winger’s journey has more turns than straightaways, and if you look simply at the former top-5 draft pick’s raw talent and uncanny ability to elevate his game at crucial times — rather than focusing on the enigma of his personality — it’s not so hard to see how Kessel has gone from “addition by subtraction” to playoff MVP candidate.

It has been easy over the years to paint Kessel, 28, as a kind of outlier, someone who didn’t quite fit into the larger puzzle of his various teams.

And yet this spring, Kessel’s name comes up — often unbidden — when members of the Pittsburgh Penguins discuss what has made this team unique, and perhaps a team of destiny that now sits three wins away from a Stanley Cup championship.

Take Kris Letang.

The Penguins defenseman references Kessel immediately when asked about the closeness of this resilient crew.

“Sometimes you have groups that tend to be separated in different groups,” Letang explained. “But Phil, he wants to hang out with everybody, wants to have fun. It kind of brings everybody together when you have a guy who has played that many games in the league.”

Phil Kessel? Bringing teammates together?

It’s easier to create a persona for players or coaches. They are intense, happy-go-lucky, boisterous, moody, thoughtful or cantankerous. The thing is, sometimes they’re all of those things, even if it doesn’t fit the two-dimensional space we create for them.

Kessel is like that.

Pittsburgh coach Mike Sullivan has, at times this spring, described Kessel as “misunderstood.” But perhaps his most telling comment came recently when I asked Sullivan about Kessel’s evolution as a player with the Penguins.

Sullivan described him as a player committed to the whole ice and to a complete game. Again, a description that doesn’t quite fit the preconceived notion.

“I think he’s made great strides over the last couple of months in some of the areas of his game where we’ve asked him to improve and get better,” Sullivan said.

Colorado Avalanche defenseman and native Minnesotan Erik Johnson has known Kessel since he was in his teens. He, too, speaks in terms that don’t necessarily fit the public persona. “He’s basically been the best player pretty much on every team he’s been on,” Johnson said recently. “Just a really likeable guy and easy to get along with. Laid back and fun to be around.”

Well, not all the time.

On the ice, Johnson recalled Kessel making he and other young defenseman feel very mortal.

“He can hit zero to 100 in a few strides,” Johnson said. “I think he put the fear of God in some of us guys. He was very fast and elusive.”

It’s the speed and the ability to unleash a heavy, accurate shot while in full stride that has …

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