Gaudreau insists it’s real, this weight, insists that the lure of American food once he got back from a stint in Russia has done the trick, gotten him all the way to 155. It’s hard to tell where he has put the extra pounds, though. His frame remains lithe and wiry, his face that of an eighth grader.

He’s only 5 feet 8 inches, but it’s not just the height that makes the Boston College sophomore seem small. He’s not even the smallest player on his own line. Steve Whitney is listed at 5 feet 7 inches. But Whitney, like BC greats Brian Gionta and Nathan Gerbe before him, has a little more heft. He’s solid. Gaudreau is not.

“At least I’m 165, 170,” said the 5-5 Gerbe, who now plays for the Sabres. “The first time I met him, I couldn’t believe how skinny he was. But it works.”

The stories are everywhere. Meet Gaudreau, and you assume he’s 12 years old. That’s the age that everyone offers, from the coach who initially recruited him to Northeastern to the coach who led him to the World Junior championship to his linemate at Boston College.

“I was sort of taken aback because he looked like one of my kids,” said Phil Housley, coach of the United States world junior team that won the gold medal in Russia last month. “He’s got these boyish attributes. But when he steps on the ice, he plays like a man.”

Freedom to improvise

Some coaches fall in love with size. It can’t be taught, after all. Some coaches yearn for the 6-footers, the 200-pounders, the players who look like, well, players. As BC coach Jerry York said, “Hey, you can win that way. But you overlook some very, very good players.”

York rarely does.

Once they’re identified — whether they’re 5-5 or 6-5 — that’s when York allows them their freedom. He likes creative players, so when he gets them, he lets them be creative. He doesn’t want his players turning into a game of table hockey — stiff robots without the vision to move.

“They all like to score goals,” York said of the diminutive forwards he has brought to BC. “They think red lights. They’ve all been career scoring leaders. And they’ve all got that competitive drive. They’re all a little different personality-wise, but all the skating is extraordinary.”

When he finds those players, those with the ability to make things happen, he can disregard their relative lack of strength. He can accept their low numbers in the weight room.

As Gaudreau’s linemate Patrick Mullane said, “We’re not trying to change players into something that they’re not.”

So York reels in the Giontas and the Gerbes and the Gaudreaus. He finds the forwards with small stature and outsized abilities. They are willing to commit to a program that values them. They have heard too often from those who don’t believe in them.

“He’s not afraid to play the smaller guys,” said Gaudreau, acknowledging that legacy is a major reason he came to BC. “A lot of coaches like big guys, and I think it’s a great unique tool that Coach York has, putting smaller guys in his repertoire.

“I’m really fortunate that he likes small guys.”

At first, almost everyone overlooked Gaudreau. Northeastern recruited him early, assistant Albie O’Connell spotting something in a kid who looked as though he would never make it at the college level. By 16, Gaudreau was signed.

York had barely heard of him.

Even Greg Cronin, then the coach at Northeastern, had his doubts.

“I said, ‘How the hell is this kid going to play college hockey in a couple years?’ ” Cronin recalled. “He clearly was a really weak-looking kid, very small, very boyish-looking.”

Then Cronin saw him play.

“That’s the first time I actually said that I would pay money to see youth hockey,” said Cronin, now an assistant coach with Toronto. “He was that dynamic in the game. I couldn’t believe how skilled he was, and how extremely competitive.

“His competitiveness was visible right away, and he reminded me a little bit of Wayne Gretzky. That’s a really, really far reach, but in the game I watched, he made plays that you would see once in a decade.”

Then Cronin left for the Maple Leafs. O’Connell left for Harvard. Gaudreau backed out of his commitment, and by then, the rest of the top coaches had seen him, heard of him, wanted him. The sweepstakes was on.