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It’s never easy for Wisconsin men’s hockey coach Mike Eaves to tell one of his players he won’t be playing in a game.

But six straight times this season, that was the message he had to deliver to forward Michael Davies.

“When you look into a young man’s eyes and you tell him he’s not playing a game, it hurts deep,” Eaves said. “But at the same time, I admire his maturity in how he handled it.”

As hard as it was for Eaves, though, it was an even tougher pill to swallow for Davies, a junior from St. Louis.

“At first, obviously you’re going to be very disappointed,” Davies said. “You just have to look at yourself and just work hard. You can’t really control a lot.”

According to Eaves, Davies just wasn’t playing to the level the coaching staff knew the 24-point scorer from a year ago was capable of playing at. As a result, he was benched for the team’s two home games against Michigan Tech and two road series against Minnesota Duluth and St. Cloud State.

“I know it’s tough on him. It’s tough on anybody not being out there,” said junior forward Aaron Bendickson. “But like coach says, you can only control what you can control.”

Since the year began, Eaves has been wanting Davies to step up his performance during 5-on-5 play. Last season, seven of Davies’ 13 goals came on the power play. His lone goal of the season prior to last week’s Michigan game — part of a 6-5 losing effort to Denver — also came with the man-advantage.

The missing link was Davies’ ability to produce at even strength.

“Mike Davies was playing at a certain level,” Eaves said. “We wanted him to play at a higher level all the time so that he could make our team better in more than just one way.”

Being benched was a scenario Davies never could have envisioned entering the 2008-09 campaign. He missed just one game last year and played in all 41 games in his freshman season — which began with a bang, as he scored two goals in his first game with Wisconsin.

Now, as a veteran on the team, he’s missed more games in his junior season than he did during his first two years combined.

“When you first come here, you never really think about that stuff,” Davies said. “You just want to work hard and get in the lineup. Once I got out of the lineup, I had to work harder to get back in the lineup.”

This past weekend, Davies made his return to the ice for the Badgers. It didn’t take him long to get back on the score sheet, tallying a goal Saturday against Michigan — a goal that proved to be the game-winner in a 3-0 UW victory.

“It felt great,” Davies said of the goal. “Before I was playing, I was struggling to contribute a lot. It was fun to be able to [put] one in, especially at that point in time against Michigan.”

Ironically enough, Davies’ goal against the Wolverines came on the power play when he collected the rebound off a shot from teammate Brendan Smith.

“That’s one of my strengths is the power play,” Davies said. “I was able to just get a bounce off the goalie’s pads from [Smith].”

Davies found himself on the fourth line for both games of the College Hockey Showcase this weekend, a spot he was in only once earlier in the year. He started Wisconsin’s opening game on the top line and later bounced back and forth between the top three.

At this point, though, any line is a good line for Davies.

“Right now, I don’t care who my line mates are. I just want to play,” Davies said. “You realize that whenever you’re sitting out — you don’t care who you’re playing with as long as you’re in the lineup.”

On a fourth line that seems to change weekly, Davies was joined over the weekend by sophomore Podge Turnbull and Bendickson, who said he and Davies have always seemed to connect with each other on the ice.

“I always like playing with Mike,” Bendickson said. “We like to play the same style of game, in a way. We get along really well. Sometimes that helps out when you play hockey, too. I just know him a lot and know what his tendencies are.”

“Bendickson’s a great player,” Davies said of his line mate. “We play well together.”

Davies and Eaves both know scoring a goal against Michigan wasn’t a permanent fix to the situation but rather a temporary solution while Davies continues to work in practice to get to the level of play the coaches expect of him.

“There’s still fundamental things about Michael’s game that we’re going to continue to stay hard on that he’s got to get done,” Eaves said.

“Right now, I’m focusing on just being consistent in practice, which hopefully leads to consistency during games,” Davies said. “I’m just working hard. … It just makes you realize that you never know when it’s going to be your last shift out there.”

The hard work has not gone unnoticed.

“He played well this weekend,” said team captain Blake Geoffrion, who is also one of Davies’ roommates on campus.

Bendickson, who also missed six games this year — although his absence was due to a wrist injury — has also noticed what Davies has been able to do.

“I’ve seen a lot of improvement,” Bendickson said. “I think he got a fire lit underneath him, and that’s what he needed. He’s as good as he wants to be.”