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Connor Clifton’s hits change hockey games. Mark Lozito can demonstrate this with a story.

Clifton was a bantam playing for Lozito’s New Jersey Titans. They were losing a game against the New Jersey Rockets, and Lozito knew his players needed a spark. He leaned over to Clifton, his hard-hitting defenseman, and said, “Connor, come on, man. We need to change this game.”

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The Rockets had a player named Max Gottlieb, who would go on to become the captain at Brown and play in the AHL and ECHL. He came across the neutral zone, and Clifton crushed him with a clean check.

“He hit him so hard he ruptured his spleen,” said Lozito, who still trains Clifton at Hockey Essentials in New Jersey. “He had to be rushed to the hospital.”

Clifton didn’t just change the game with a hit, either. He ended up scoring the winning goal in a comeback win for the Titans. That, Lozito says, sums up the type of player the Buffalo Sabres are getting after signing Clifton to a three-year contract worth $3.3 million per year in free agency this summer. At every level, Clifton has been the player everyone on an opposing bench takes notice of. He’s only 5-foot-11, so it’s not like Clifton is physically intimidating to the eye.

“Connor just knows when and how to hit,” said Toby Harris, who coached Clifton with the New Jersey Hitmen. “That’s all I can really say. If you played, you know exactly what I’m talking about. He knows how to explode through a guy … He changes momentum without having to do it offensively.”

Last season, the Sabres were last in the league in hits, according to Money Puck, and they trailed the next closest team by more than 100 hits. Last season, Clifton had 185 hits at five-on-five, according to Natural Stat Trick. Zemgus Girgensons led all Sabres with 92 hits at five-on-five. To say Clifton’s physicality will be welcome would be an understatement. There were times last season when general manager Kevyn Adams wondered if the Sabres were being pushed around. Speed and skill helped the Sabres become a top-three scoring team in the NHL, but they lacked the physicality that Clifton brings.

This is also the type of opportunity for which Clifton has been waiting. He spent the last five seasons with the Boston Bruins but last season was his first in a full-time role, playing 78 games. Prior to that, he topped out at 60 games. He never averaged more than the 18:12 minutes of ice time per game he had across 44 games in the 2020-21 season.

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So Clifton carefully considered his next move when he became a free agent. He and his agents, Dan Plante and Eric Quinlan of Forward Hockey, studied depth charts across the league and knew Buffalo could be a suitor. There were other offers for more money and longer term, but Clifton zeroed in on the Sabres. It was a chance to play for a young, rising team with skilled defensemen who complement his playing style. But most importantly, playing for the Sabres means playing for Don Granato, who coached him at the United States National Team Development Program a decade ago.

“Don has always fought for Connor,” said Tim Clifton Sr., Connor’s dad. “Loyalty goes a long way in the Clifton family. It’s essential. We’re loyal and Don’s a loyal guy. Connor’s got a little extra step in his workouts this summer.”

Clifton’s not someone who’s ever needed extra motivation, either. Tim Sr. can’t remember a time when Connor ever missed an off-ice training session. That’s how he built the strength behind his bruising style of play. That strength allowed him to play for the Hitmen at age 14 in the Empire League, a junior league made up mostly of 19- and 20-year-olds. At the time, Connor’s brother Tim Jr., who is three years older, had just finished his first season in the Empire League and was moving up to the Hitmen’s EJHL team. Tim Sr. told Harris he had a younger son and suggested he take the same path. Harris was hesitant when he learned Connor was 14. At that time, you couldn’t play in that league until you were 15, but Connor was one of two kids in the country to get an exception.

“He fit right in,” Harris said. “Believe it or not, he was our most physical player at 14 years old. He was mean as a snake and tough as nails. That’s what he’s always been. He was always the guy that was going to stick up for his teammates.”

In one of Clifton’s first games for the Hitmen, he fought one of the older players in the league and more than held his own. Harris remembers the chirps that came from his team’s bench letting the opponent know he’d just fought someone six years younger than him.

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“The guy had nothing to say,” Harris said with a laugh.

Off the ice, Clifton Sr. says none of his three boys have ever been in a fight, but “Connor never had fear. It wasn’t in his DNA.”

That’s how he became a coveted college recruit, but he made it clear to teams that he came as a package deal with his brother Tim. That opened the door for Quinnipiac to sign the brothers.

Pecknold has never been able to figure out why exactly Connor got overlooked at various points in his career despite being one of the biggest recruits in Quinnipiac history. Pecknold thought Clifton was one of the eight best defensemen in that age group, but he wasn’t one of the 16 defensemen invited to selection camp for the USNTDP U-17 team. It wasn’t until another defenseman left to play in Canadian juniors that Clifton got called to play in games. But academics came first in the Clifton house, and Christian Brothers Academy was going to unenroll Connor if he missed too much school. So the Cliftons said USA Hockey either needed to put him on the team permanently or send him home. USA Hockey sent him home but continued to have him fill in. The next season, Granato made sure he was on the team.

Clifton became one of the best defensemen in the country at Quinnipiac, but it was a process. He had 106 penalty minutes in 36 games as a freshman, so again, fear wasn’t an issue. Pecknold had to find a way to tame him a bit, though. He had to get him to realize there was more to the game than running around and hitting people.

“He had more than an edge,” Pecknold said. “He was tough. He was mean. He plays much bigger than he is. He probably hits harder than any player I’ve ever had.”

Over time, Clifton rounded out the rest of his game. He became a nasty penalty killer, and Pecknold always marveled at the way he never seemed to tire deep into his shift. As a junior, Clifton was Quinnipiac’s best player on its run to the Frozen Four. He matched up against first-rounders on Boston College and North Dakota and more than held his own.

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“He was dominant,” Pecknold said.

Clifton was a captain as a senior and when his college career ended, Clifton, a fifth-round pick of the Coyotes, decided to become an unrestricted free agent. He got only two AHL offers.

“I thought it was absurd and ridiculous,” Pecknold said.

Clifton didn’t have an issue putting his head down and getting back to work. The slights continued during his NHL career. During the 2021 expansion draft, the Bruins didn’t protect Clifton, but Seattle passed on him in favor of Jeremy Lauzon even though the Kraken had just hired Clifton’s old AHL coach Jay Leach as an assistant. As his dad puts it, “he’s earned every shift he’s ever gotten.”

Tim Sr. always tried to keep his kids as level-headed as possible. He was never one to lecture on the car ride home from a game. The boys learned early to move on from a bad game and put any rejection behind them. They always had confidence, but it was a quiet confidence. What matters more to Clifton is being part of a team.

That comes from home. Tim Sr. used to go out of his way in New Jersey traffic to pick up other kids on the team and get them to practice. The Clifton house was the one in the neighborhood with the hockey nets out front and the crowd of kids playing. Tim Sr. is the fire chief in Matawan, N.J., and owns an insurance agency. Connor’s mom, Joan, worked in the financial district in Manhattan and retired in 2018. This family understands what it means to work but also has a real appreciation for every minute, good and bad, that life has to offer.

Connor isn’t one to complain about any perceived slight along the way. He just keeps working. He still goes back home to New Jersey to train, and when he’s there, he has no problem jumping on the ice with the 14-year-old group to make their day. If ice is available, he’s going to get a workout in.

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“Connor has absolutely no ego,” Harris said.

Even though Clifton was a scratch for the Bruins’ final game of the playoffs, he left Boston with nothing but gratitude for Bruins coach Jim Montgomery. Clifton said he finally felt like he built confidence at the NHL level this year.

“He wanted me to contribute offensively,” Clifton said. “It was great to hear that behind you, someone believing in you. That’s exactly how it was for me and it took my game to a whole new level.”

It’s no wonder playing for Granato was such an attractive option in free agency. He knows Granato emphasizes playing fast and playing fearless, and Clifton loves to do both. Granato knows Clifton has the skating ability to keep up with Buffalo’s style of play. At 28 years old, Clifton will be one of the older players in the Sabres’ locker room, too, so he’ll get to take on a bigger leadership role.

“The way he fits into a team, he’s just a culture driver naturally,” Granato said. “There’s nothing manufactured. He’s just authentic.”

The Sabres would have been the farthest thing from a free-agent destination three or four years ago. But Clifton sought them out because he saw the same up-and-coming team the rest of the league does. Those games he played against the Sabres last season, especially Buffalo’s 4-3 overtime win in Boston on New Year’s Eve, turned Clifton into a believer.

Now Clifton is bringing his hits to the Sabres. They’re the kind of hits that make opponents think twice about taking liberties with talented scorers and provide energy to the bench and the building, opening up time and space on the ice.

Clifton is the type of player for whom so many Buffalo hockey fans have been waiting.

“Buckle up, baby,” Tim Sr. said.

(Photo: Gregory Fisher / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

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