Charles Hudon is making the jump from junior hockey to the pros look easy.

Eighteen games into his first season with the Hamilton Bulldogs, the 20-year-old forward is leading the AHL’s rookie scoring race.

He’s also tops on his team in scoring and tied for the fifth-highest point tally in the league — all while playing for a club that has historically struggled to find the back of the net.

But how?

How has he managed to make the transition look so seamless?

It’s because he wants to learn and is willing to do it, says linemate T.J. Hensick. He’s always asking questions, always watching video, always “involved.”

“A lot of it is behind the scenes,” he adds. “He just wants to get better.”

Hensick, 28, knows a thing or two about taking the next step. In his case, though, it was eight years ago, and he was just off a nearly two point-per-game season at the University of Michigan.

The following year, with the AHL’s Lake Erie Monsters, his production fell by nearly 50 per cent.

It’s a complicated shift, he explains. And not just on the ice.

For one, he went from playing about 40 games a year in college to north of 70 in the pros. He was also travelling more and further, and practising almost every day.

But for Hensick, the biggest adjustment was simply figuring out what to do with his newfound downtime.

“I didn’t have to go to class,” he says. “I didn’t have that to worry about.”

That’s the stuff that outsiders tend to forget about, says Bulldogs coach Sylvain Lefebvre — the stuff that happens away from the rink.

And if you ask Hudon, that’s probably the stuff he’s still getting used to.

Take last week, for example, when the team returned from a road game in Utica in the wee hours of the morning.

“The next day, if your fridge is empty, you need to go get some things,” says Lefebvre. “It’s more like real-life situations, and you need to adjust to that.”

Hudon admits it’s not easy.

During his junior hockey career, he was billeted with a family where all the essentials — everything from grocery shopping to paying the bills — were taken care of.

These days, however, he and his girlfriend fend for themselves.

“That’s pretty tough to make sure you have food on the table,” he says. “But I think it’s going well.”

Even, he adds, when it’s his turn to make dinner.

“When I was a kid, I was always in the kitchen with my grandmother and my mother, so I love to cook,” Hudon grins.

A skill, it seems, both on and off the ice.