Patrick Kane has, by necessity, gotten pretty good at repairing his public image.

Gone are the headlines about the 28-year-old's off-the-ice conduct, replaced by thrilling goal highlights and commercial appearances, including recent ones for Chevrolet and hockey equipment brand Bauer. The turnaround comes just one year since a district attorney in upstate New York said he would not pursue criminal charges after investigating a Buffalo woman's allegation that she was sexually assaulted by Kane.

It's a familiar script for the Chicago Blackhawks star forward, who has had to rehabilitate a damaged reputation for the third time in his 10-year professional career. While last year's investigation was by far the most serious of his setbacks, it added to a track record that includes disorderly conduct for punching a cabdriver in 2009 and public displays of drunkenness that pervaded the internet.

While sexual assault accusations rarely stick to superstar athletes in courts of law, they can stick in the court of public opinion. In this case, Kane ran the image recovery play perfectly. He abandoned social media for eight months after the allegations surfaced in Buffalo, generally avoided media attention and was absent from ads. And he topped it off by turning in the best season of his career, winning the Hart Memorial Trophy as the NHL's most valuable player.

The result has been a nearly full image comeback, according to data from New York-based marketability measurement firm Q Scores. In January—six months after the allegations came to light and two months after the DA said there would be no charges—Q Scores' survey of 1,600 adults nationwide showed that 20 percent of people who are familiar with Kane had a "fair" or "poor" impression of him, up from 12 percent in August 2015. A change of more than 5 percentage points over a six-month period represents a significant change in public opinion of an athlete, according to Q Scores. But by last August, that "negative Q score" percentage had dropped back to 15 percent.

'OUT OF THE WOODS'

Among men who were surveyed, Kane's "positive Q score" measuring likability rose by 6 points over the year to 23 percent of respondents in the most recent report, while his negative Q score among men has returned to where it was before the investigation.

That has translated into a renewed deal with Gatorade and a series of new endorsement offers over the past eight months, according to Kane's agent, Pat Brisson. It's proof, he says, that even blue-chip brands have regained their appetite to be associated with the Hawks star.

"I believe he's completely out of the woods," Brisson says. "I'm glad (the investigation) is behind him and that he showed a lot of character, proving to the world the player that he is. When we mention his name, (brands) are definitely interested."