EDMONTON — That Connor McDavid will become the youngest captain in the history of the National Hockey League sometime in the next week or so became a foregone conclusion on the afternoon of April 10, 2016.

That was the day when, after another fruitless season in Edmonton, Taylor Hall conducted what became his final interview as an Oiler.

“He was the leader on the ice by the end of the season,” Hall said that day.

Here was the face of a team — the long suffering, first of the No. 1 overall bonus babies — telling the hockey world that, in case you missed it, the 19-year-old became their best player. In just 45 games.

On Tuesday McDavid returned from the captaining Team North America at the World Cup to his club team in Edmonton, practising with free agent left-wing signee Milan Lucic for the first time. Lucic tried his best not to spill the beans, but — spoiler alert — he didn’t exactly leave a lot of doubt.

“He’s a very mature young man. It’s surprising he’s only 19 years old, the way he carries himself,” Lucic said. “That’s what going to make him a great leader and, at some point, the next captain of the Oilers.”

So the debate boils down to this: Should a 19-year-old, no matter how good, carry the yoke of NHL captaincy? Can a player who has played 45 NHL games possibly be ready to become the Alpha dog on an NHL team?

“You don’t just go out and name someone,” said trusty Oilers veteran Matt Hendricks. “That someone becomes that person.”

One thing we’ve learned over the years is, the players know. They spot a phony coach long before the hockey writer does. They know the real tough guys, and the ones who pick their spots. And they are the first to know who the best players are, long before it dawns on the rest of us.

McDavid, as Hall offered, became the Oilers best player pretty early last season. Today, after the World Cup, he returns for his sophomore season as the best and fastest player from Team North America, the ridiculously quick and fabulously skilled team that stole the show in Toronto.

Today, McDavid is the best player in Edmonton by a mile. He enters the season as, at worst, a top-five player in the entire league.

“I got to play with him last season, and got to see him play in Russia at the world championship, and at the World Cup,” Hendricks said. “What I see is, his game rises to the occasion; he gets better in bigger games. You watch him play at the World Cup, against the best players in the world, and he gets better and better and better.

“He wants to be the best player in the world. He wants to win championships. That’s the kind of people I want to be surrounded by on my team.”

There is a kind of a jet stream that the truly great players attain. When they get there, it literally drags the rest of the team up to speed. Teammates want to follow. They have to follow, or they risk being exposed as someone who can’t help anymore.

“I’ve been in different markets where they’ve had different belief systems in who leads the team,” said two-time Cup champion Kris Versteeg, who is here on a professional tryout with Edmonton. “It’s the best player, the guy who plays penalty kill, power play — all facets of the game – who the team follows the most.”

Who was the best leader Versteeg ever saw?

“Johnny Toews,” he said. “My Dad always said to me, ‘If I were going to war I wouldn’t choose my own son. I’d choose Jonathan Toews.’ He’s the guy who shows you how to do it.”

Who was the best leader Lucic ever saw?

“Big Z,” he said, referring to Zdeno Chara. “He had a lot of guys around him to help carry out his message, but he started that culture. He set the pace for practice. He set the pace for how hard we were going to be to play against as a team, (back) when we needed to turn it around in Boston. He set the tone, and made it easy for guys like myself to follow.

“Connor has the ability to push that pace, set that tone, with just his speed alone. It will give everyone else a lot of confidence to push the level of their game.”

There will be questions across the league, as there was when the Red Wings made Steve Yzerman the youngest captain, when Pittsburgh did it with Sidney Crosby, or in Colorado, where Gabriel Landeskog is about to see his term as the youngest captain in NHL history come to a close.

“His ability. It is phenomenal,” marvelled Versteeg. “Now, getting to know Connor as a person, seeing what kind of kid he is, there’s no reason he can’t be.

“His presence about him, just walking through the room. People look for him, look at him — it’s just how it is with top guys. People want to follow him.”

Soon it will be made official. McDavid will have the C sewn on to his Oilers jersey.

But realistically? The players already know.