It unfolds in the blink of an eye. If you look away too long, you might miss it.
It begins with a blocked shot, and a couple of bounces later, a powerful stride to break past two opposing defensemen. He’s down the sheet of ice in mere seconds before executing a silky stickhandle and snappy release.
Hands in the air, he barrels into the boards, rival fans hushed to stillness. It was a perfect move, and everyone knows it.
But make no mistake — that’s not Connor McDavid tearing in at speed, or Patrick Kane deking or Cole Caulfield picking his corner and finishing.
That’s Jonathan Castagna.
“He's just a terror,” said associate head coach Sean Flanagan. “He's a high-paced player, and he just makes things happen offensively. It's really hard for guys to stop him.”
Castagna, an alternate captain and men’s hockey’s most coveted offensive weapon, is a player unlike any other. Besides the numbers from his breakout junior campaign — 15 goals, 34 points and an NCAA-best 65.2% faceoff win rate that blew away the rest of the competition — he is a combination of all the exciting things you see in your favorite players.
“He’s a pretty dynamic player for us,” said head coach Casey Jones ’90. “His speed is so good, the pace of play. He's so competitive. He hasn't left anything on the table in terms of development. He gets after it. He wants to do that. He's in.”
Castagna’s tenacity did not go unnoticed even before his time at Cornell, which came to an end on March 30 when he inked a three-year entry-level contract with the Calgary Flames. It’s rooted inside him.
“He’s got this hunting mentality,” said David Manning, head Varsity hockey coach at St. Andrew’s College in Ontario, where Castagna played prep hockey for two seasons before arriving at Cornell in 2023. “He's just always on the hunt. He's just always trying to make something happen and be on his toes.”
Castagna never relents — not for one shift, forechecking hard, backchecking harder.
But step off the ice, and you’ll be met with something completely different — a polite, well-spoken Canadian kid, who is quietly humble despite becoming one of the Calgary Flames’ shiniest new prospects.
It’s night and day from the player on the ice.
“He’s got that gift, I would say, that when he steps over the boards and on the ice, he flips the switch,” Manning said. “He's got a quiet confidence. He doesn't need to tell you anything about himself. … And for how aggressive and how offensive he is on the ice, he definitely takes his time and is careful with how he interacts. I think that's a big part of his personality.”
‘He always had this presence about him’
Castagna and Manning don’t exactly have their stories straight.
“He probably didn’t tell you,” Castagna said with a grin.
It was October 2021. Castagna was on his official visit at St. Andrew's College, perched up in the stands of La Brier Family Arena as practice wore on.
Castagna was sporting a cast on his wrist. He had broken it at an Ontario Hockey League summer camp a few months prior with the London Knights, the organization that had drafted him to play Major Junior hockey, on his very first shift at camp. Had Castagna not broken that wrist, he might have joined the Knights organization, forgone college hockey and never stepped foot on Cornell’s campus.
Serendipitous, but besides the point. It was not a typical visit — Castagna was already playing in the Ontario Junior A Hockey League, set to return to the ice as soon as his wrist would let him. The school year at St. Andrew's was underway, and Castagna was not on the team. Yet.
“A little bit before that, I had spoken with Coach Manning at SAC because of just mutual connections as well,” Castagna said, “and he actually said no.”
In his conversation with The Sun, Manning — who has spent 18 years as the head Varsity coach at St. Andrew's — did not mention his initial reluctance to bring Castagna onto the team. But considering how under-the-radar Castagna has flown in his career, it’s not too surprising.
But a couple of months into the season, Manning changed courses, and phoned a disbelieving Castagna.
“[Manning]’s like, ‘You want to come to SAC?’ I was like, ‘Hell no, you said no to me, what's going on here?’” Castagna laughed. “And then he’s like, ‘Come on, just come check out campus, just give it a chance. You owe it to yourself.’ So I go check it out, and it was one of the coolest things I'd ever seen at the time. Once I saw the campus, it was just impossible to turn the opportunity down.”
“I remember running the practice, and him and his family were here watching, and I came to see him afterwards,” Manning recalled. “We were chatting, and the way he responded … I always called him an old soul. He's a very thoughtful young man, he chooses his words carefully. He always had this presence about him.”
When Castagna officially enrolled, there was a lot of work to be done. Castagna’s uncontainable energy is evident in every shift — it is what makes him a game-changer. But he needed to learn how to contain it, and Castagna’s first year at St. Andrew's — a so-so 10-10–20 in 35 games — was proof of that.
“[Castagna] had a good [first] year, but it wasn't a great year,” Manning said. “I think the big thing for the draft was his motor, his energy. And then it became, is he skilled enough? Is he refined enough?”
Worries melted away quickly when Castagna, in his second year at St. Andrew's, played his way onto NHL draft boards.
And even after Castagna posted a 29-43–72 stat line in his second and final year at St. Andrew's — a mountainous improvement — there was more to be done.
Enter the NHL Scouting Combine, where Castagna — up against now-established NHL players like Connor Bedard and Will Smith — placed in the top 10 in six different categories, from bench press to the Wingate Test to agility.
“He continued to get better as the season wore on. That's really what it came down to,” Manning said. “And so I think when [NHL teams] see a player with that engine who's getting more refined, and he's a super athlete — that, I would say, was the last little nudge to get him over the hump.”
“That was probably the best thing that could have happened for me that year in terms of the NHL draft, because I ended up killing the combine,” Castagna said. “As a kid whose name wasn't even on the radar for most teams at that point, and [who] was a nobody at the beginning of the year, I'm sure it was an eye-opener for NHL teams to see. ‘Hey, this kid's legit, let's take a look at him.’”
When NHL Central Scouting released its preliminary rankings in October 2022, Castagna was tabbed as a C-rated prospect — a player that could maybe get selected in the fourth or fifth round. By June, he was a third-round pick and bound for Division I hockey.
“I had no idea that that was even an option for me at that point, so that wasn't even in my mind,” Castagna said. “I just had a little more experience, was a little more comfortable, was moving into a larger role at SAC in hockey terms, because of all of our graduating seniors. Just a classic example of having a little more experience and confidence.”
‘He just goes’
So, what exactly makes Castagna so formidable on the ice?
“I think he's just kind of always got his feet moving,” said freshman forward Aiden Long, Castagna’s winger. “His motor is always going.”
“His feet never stop,” Flanagan said. “I think his best games are when he is playing with pace, but he's also distributing the puck. It’s on his stick, off his stick and guys can't handle his skating.”
“You see him play, his feet never stop,” Manning said. “He just goes, like he’s just got a motor that not many players have.”
His feet.
“I'm sure I was born with a little bit of God-given talent in skating, and maybe all the other sports I did, like lacrosse, helped me with agility and footwork,” Castagna said. “But there was a lot of work that was put in when I was younger, just establishing a great foundation and all these habits and skating that I could still notice when I'm on the ice today.”
Looking at Castagna’s production is enough to flag him as a special player. But look at everything else he does — from winning 50-50 puck battles, to forechecking, to skating, to faceoffs — and Castagna covers all the bases.
“But one of the things that he had to work a lot on was just basic puck control,” Manning said. “His motor was so high that he made a ton of mistakes with the puck, and he could get away with it. And so we really focused in on slowing down his puck movement, making sure it was a more consistent thing that would put him in the spots to make better plays.”
Considering how well Castagna fared on the playmaking side of the game this past season — a career-high 19 helpers — it’s hard to believe that was ever a weakness to his game. Castagna downplayed his offensive ability in his post-NHL draft media availability back in June 2023, saying it “needs exploring” and was something he had to “solidify.”
Safe to say, goal accomplished.
“He’s got such a good shot release now,” Jones said.
“He, very much, is always on his toes, and he's hunting, and he sees that as a way to create offense,” Manning said. “Whether he's playing defense or offense, he's always on the offensive. That's his mentality — disrupting and creating as much chaos, good things will happen.”
Chaos is an apt way to describe Castagna on the ice — you never really know what you’re going to get, whether it’s a hard check along the boards or a negated icing or a lethal wrist shot.
And no matter what he’s doing, he’s doing it fast. Others can’t keep up.
“It’s probably my biggest strength,” Castagna said. “In today's game, if you want to play professional, you have to be fast. I've been told [that] by pretty much everyone who would be involved in my development at the next level. So it's not an ability that I take lightly. I do realize it is my strength, and I try to use it as my strength.”
‘In 25 years, I might have one Jonathan Castagna’
Castagna was nervous when he skated out for his first game at Madison Square Garden, as part of the biennial Red Hot Hockey contest between Cornell and Boston University. A freshman at the time, Castagna had never played in a building quite like that.
But in that moment, Castagna was reminded of a moment that yielded the same kind of goosebumps.
“It was ‘We Will Rock You,' a Queen musical,” Castagna recalled. “I was one of the four leads in it, and yes, I did have to sing. That was almost as nerve-wracking as playing in MSG.”
St. Andrew's was not just a place where Castagna had to play hockey. Because when he wasn’t on the ice, he was playing lacrosse, or hanging out with his friends — or acting.
“It was an awesome experience. I would do it again if I got the chance,” Castagna said. “My drama teacher — he was one of those wicked, scientist-type people. You see them, and they're just so captivating and fascinating. He could have talked you into going free diving out of an airplane. That was the kind of guy that this guy was.
“And he believed in everyone. I don't know if I had any business [acting], but he had a vision for me, and he was like, ‘You're gonna be perfect for this.’ And I listened to him, and I have zero regrets. It was honestly one of the coolest things I've ever done.”
And that’s coming from one of the most productive players in college hockey, averaging over a point per game in his junior season — Castagna, who has scored all kinds of big goals, flashy goals, game-winning goals, and won faceoffs at a higher rate than anyone else in the NCAA. Even he sometimes needs that little extra push to own it.
“Jonny's all-in as a teammate. He's a consummate teammate, and he's a consummate Big Red player,” Jones said. “He loves his teammates, he works hard, he's completely invested in his development, but he's completely invested in the team, too.”
“In 25 years, I might have one Jonathan Castagna,” Manning said. “He plays two sports. He should have been our Athlete of the Year. He was our lead in the spring play. He gets NHL drafted. He's great in his boarding house. Like, these guys don't come around that often.”
Manning knows the fabric of a promising college hockey player, but even better understands what connotes a solid Cornell hockey player — since 2014, seven of his players (and counting) have gone on to suit up for the Red.
Some of those players, aside from Castagna, include junior forward Luke Devlin, freshman forward Connor Arseneault, Matthew Galajda ’21, Morgan Barron ’21 and Matt Stienburg ’23, the latter two of which have gone on to play in the NHL.
“We're a school that happens to have a great hockey program, and I think Ivy League institutions are great schools that happen to have some great sports programs,” Manning said. “[Players] believe in what St Andrew's has to offer and how that relates to what they're trying to do at Cornell.”
Jones noted, with a laugh, that he lost lots of recruiting battles with Mike Schafer ’86 and Cornell when Jones coached at Clarkson from 2011 to 2024. Now, he’s looking forward to being the beneficiary of the SAC-Cornell pipeline.
There’s a common thread between a St. Andrew’s player and a Cornell player — big, brooding styles of play. Guys that play with an edge. And, of course, leaders — Castagna, Devlin, Arseneault, Barron and Stienburg were all captains at St. Andrew’s.
“All those guys share a bunch of qualities — they're all hard working, they're all really coachable, they all have a quiet confidence,” Manning said. “I've noticed that the next crew of players aspires to be that Cornell guy, … to be our captain and to get that opportunity. It's become a thing.”
‘You’ve got to come see this guy’
Tucked into the back of his phone case, Castagna keeps something valuable stowed — a ticket, circa March 2022, from his very first visit to Lynah Rink.
“It's probably all worn out by now,” he said.
Castagna made the trip to Ithaca for a Friday night ECAC quarterfinal playoff game between Cornell and Colgate. From the atmosphere alone, Castagna was hooked.
It helped, of course, that Stienburg — St. Andrews’ very own — scored the game-winning goal that night.
“That was pretty cool as a SAC guy, and the atmosphere was incredible,” Castagna said. “I didn't even need to see the game to commit. But after that, I was like, ‘Wow, this is awesome.’”
One might think that, among all those doubting Castagna or undermining him as a player, Cornell was not one of them.
Wrong. Manning had a hearty laugh when reminded about Castagna’s recruiting story.
“You can put this in there, because Coach [Ben] Syer needs to read this in print,” Manning said, mentioning a conversation he had that spring with Cornell's former associate head coach Ben Syer, who is now the head coach at Princeton.
“I said to him, ‘You've got to come see this guy. He's starting to kind of make the progression.' He had his ups and downs, and it was sloppy and he played with so much energy and intensity, it just needed to be reined in a little bit,” Manning recalled. “They didn't fully see it. And I think Coach Syer, if he's being 100% honest, would say they had to take a little bit of a leap and trust my judgment that [Castagna] was gonna get there.”
Castagna, on the other hand, didn’t have to hesitate when it came to Cornell being his landing spot.
“It was kind of my dream spot once I went to SAC,” Castagna said. “Yeah, I was talking to other schools, but I was really just waiting for Cornell to offer, and once they did in that summer before Grade 12, it was a no-brainer. I committed the next day.”
Cornell ultimately took that leap of faith. You could call it serendipitous. You could also just call it finding exactly where you’re supposed to be.
This sensational season, for Castagna, was a culmination of all of that — finding a place, putting your head down and working towards it. And, in the end, having it all pay off.
“You come in as a freshman and you're all wide-eyed and you don't really know what's going on, as much as you may think you do as you get further into the year,” Castagna said. “And I say that because looking back now, being in my third year, you start to really see things a little differently, whether it's hockey or not even hockey. You start to put life into perspective a little more and how, for one, lucky you are to be here.”
Jane McNally is a senior editor on the 143rd editorial board and was the sports editor on the 142nd editorial board. She is a member of the Class of 2026 in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. You can follow her on X @JaneMcNally_ and reach her at jmcnally@cornellsun.com.
