Bigger things coming for Jets' Nault

Brandon Nault had been in and out of the Metro Jets’ lineup all season, but last Saturday night, he officially arrived.

And in a huge way.

Nault put a first-period hat trick on the board against Grand Rapids. Impressive? Yes. But consider he scored at even strength, shorthanded and on the power play and it’s obvious the 18-year-old from Madison Heights is valuable on the ice whatever the situation.

His three goals doubled his season scoring output as well. Last year,

“He works hard in practice and we put him on the first unit of the power play to be the big body in front of the net,” Jets head coach Jamie Hayden said. “He’s actually got real decent hands for a guy his size (6-foot-2, 185 pounds) and his skating needs work to go to the next level, but (assistant coach) Ryan (Skop) put him out there on the first unit with (captain) Adam (Novack) and Mick (Kolbasowski) to add the size dimension. That’s what we’ve been expecting of him, but I definitely didn’t expect him to score a hat trick.”

Nault missed a handful of games in late-September battling an illness that kept him from hockey-related activities. He’s now 100 percent and, it appears, then some.

“For him to get a hat trick, and in the first period, was a bonus for us,” added Hayden. “That got us going in the right direction right off the bat.”

If that consistency can keep going for Nault in the near future, it’s not out of the question for more notches in the “win” column for Metro to be attributed to Nault.