Pittsburgh sports media veteran and college hockey aficionado Mike Prisuta returns to RMUColonials.com to provide insights on the Colonials throughout the season.

It would be a stretch to suggest Daniel Leavens has advanced from spare part to sniper.

But it would likewise be a miscalculation not to recognize Leavens' transformation or the impact he's having for No. 17 Robert Morris.

"It's mainly confidence," he said of the difference between this season and his freshman campaign. "Last year at times I wasn't playing a lot, sometimes I was scratched. I understand it's a learning process and it was an adjustment for me.

"I feel like I've really adjusted. This year it's been great just to produce and help the team out any way I can."

Leavens (6-foot-2, 182 pounds) spent last season sharing a fourth-line wing position with sophomore Jay Llewelyn (6-4, 225). Leavens emerged with one goal, three points and a minus-4 rating to show for his 26 games played.

This year he's fifth among Colonials in scoring (3g, 10a, 13p) and sixth in plus/minus at plus-8 heading into this weekend's visit to Atlantic Hockey rival Mercyhurst (7:05 p.m. Saturday, 4:05 p.m. Sunday).

"Daniel is an offensive player and we brought him in to be an offensive talent," head coach Derek Schooley said. "He just needed to learn the game a little bit. He got to play in 25-plus games last year, played in our NCAA Tournament game, and got a lot of experience. And that's how it works sometimes.

"Sometimes you come in and you have a freshman that has to find his way his first year and then really breaks out his second year. We're seeing that so far in Daniel."

This season began for Leavens the way last season had ended. He dressed for the opener against Lake Superior State and was scratched for the second game in favor of Llewelyn.

A concussion suffered on Oct. 17 against Niagara kept Leavens from playing anywhere for the next three games, and the circumstances around him likewise conspired to eventually alter Leavens' role.

Schooley decided to begin playing junior center David Friedmann at left wing on a consistent basis after the opening weekend.

Senior winger Jeff Jones got hurt (knee) on Oct. 18 at Niagara.

And junior center Greg Gibson got hurt (ankle) on Oct. 31 against RIT.

The resulting line shuffling eventually landed Leavens on the right side of a line that also included Friedmann and freshman center Brady Ferguson for RMU's game on Nov. 1 against RIT.

That threesome has accounted for 13 goals, 19 assists and 32 points in the seven games since, including three goals, eight assists and 11 points from Leavens.

"We're putting pucks in the net every night and we're not giving up goals, either," Leavens said. "We're playing solid two-way hockey.

"I've known David since I was a little kid. We played together growing up at times. It's kind of like we just picked up where we left off."

Friedmann is from Toronto and Leavens is from Thornhill, Ontario. The two won silver medals together as members of the Team Canada East entry in the 2011 World Junior A Challenge in Langley, British Columbia.

"And Brady plays similar to us so the three of us have been clicking," Leavens continued. "Hopefully, we can keep it going."

They'll get the chance to against Mercyhurst (7-4-2 overall, 5-2-2 in the AHC).

"They have tremendous chemistry and they've had tremendous production," Schooley said. "You don't break that up."

The Colonials opened the season with two established, productive lines with senior Scott Jacklin between senior Cody Wydo and junior Zac Lynch, and with Gibson centering junior Matt Cope and junior Brandon Denham.

The emergence of the Friedmann-Ferguson-Leavens third wave has helped RMU fatten its records to 10-1-3 overall and 8-1-3 in the AHC. The first-place Colonials lead the fifth-place Lakers by seven points (19 to 12) but Mercyhurst has played three fewer conference games.

Leavens might even wind up on the power play when the Colonials and Lakers get together. He's been seeing man-advantage minutes since RMU's series against American International on Nov. 21-22.

"Last year I'd get out there in the last couple minutes, maybe, if we were blowing a team out," Leavens said.

Things have changed since then.

But not so much that Leavens has become overly enamored with the numbers he's suddenly piling up. 

"I wouldn't get too ahead of myself," he said. "Just take it one game at a time and see what happens."

A longtime member of the WDVE Morning Show, Prisuta also previously served as a reporter for the Beaver County Times and as a columnist for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. The Michigan State University graduate got his start in the profession covering the Spartan hockey program. Follow him on Twitter at @DVEMike.