London Knights assistant coach Dylan Hunter laughs at the idea that he might have a player on the current roster who reminds him of his former Knights linemate, Corey Perry.

“No,” Hunter answers, without hesitation — and that’s no slight to his team, which just won its second-straight OHL championship to punch a ticket to the Memorial Cup.

“I mean, Perrs is on a level all his own,” Hunter says of the friend he last played with two decades ago. “For a guy who’s as skilled as he is, he’s also built that unique kind of persona and character.”

Hunter says his pal’s unique characteristics have allowed him to thrive in his 20th NHL season, which has seen Perry play stretches on Edmonton’s top line alongside Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl. As the Oilers get set to play in the Western Conference Final — they await the winner of Dallas and Winnipeg — Perry co-leads Edmonton with five goals. Only five players in the league have scored more than Perry this post-season.

Hunter and Perry first met as 16-year-old OHL rookies and “he hasn’t changed since,” the coach says. “Anything we did, he was always looking for that extra edge to win — and he didn’t mind if he had to cut a corner or two to get that edge on you. I think a lot of skilled guys don’t have that extra layer — that grit, that compete — but it just comes naturally to him.

“You just don’t see a guy that’s won an MVP award and won a Cup and at his age still like — and you know, we laugh — but he’s in front of the net, he’s on his back and he’s battling, stuff he doesn’t really have to do at this point in his career, but he’s just so competitive. He loves the game, and I think it shines through how he plays at his age still. It’s special what he’s doing.”

On Friday, two days after the Oilers dropped the Kings in five games, Perry turned 40. He’s the second-oldest player in the post season (Hurricanes defender Brent Burns is a couple months older) and Perry was the fourth-oldest active player on any roster this season, a stat led by goaltender Marc-André Fleury.

The veteran winger has been around long enough that in his 2005-06 rookie season in Anaheim, he played for not just the Ducks, but the Mighty Ducks. He won the Cup a year later, won the Hart Memorial and Rocket Richard trophies in 2010-11, lost in the Western Conference Final in 2016-17, and was then bought out by Anaheim at the end of the 2018-19 season.

Since then, Perry has made it to the Stanley Cup Final four of the last five years, with Dallas, Montreal, Tampa Bay and Edmonton, losing each time. Compared to last post-season, he has already been more productive, with seven points in 10 games compared to three in 19 during Edmonton’s last run to the Cup Final.

Perry has told media he’d like to play until he’s 45, and Hunter says he wouldn’t be surprised if his buddy pulls that off. “He’s gonna play until they take his skates away,” the coach says, with a laugh. “He will play ‘til his body doesn’t let him anymore or ‘til nobody wants him, and I respect the hell out of it.”

Hunter sees Perry every summer, since Perry also calls London home, but they also got together in March as the Knights celebrated the 20-year anniversary of their first Memorial Cup championship with the roster dubbed “the team of the century.” That same year, Perry became the Knights all-time franchise leader in points, with 380.

That 2005 Memorial Cup final was a showdown against Rimouski Oceanic, featuring the guy who’d be selected No. 1 in the NHL a few weeks later, Sidney Crosby. “I remember Perrs going, ‘I’m just gonna shut him down — I’m going to annoy him and be on top of him and try to make sure he doesn’t get any looks,’” Hunter says. “The way he thought of it when he was 19, he thought of it like he was a coach. There was no selfishness to his game.”

Perry was named tournament MVP.

He has since won every big title in hockey — Olympic gold, the Stanley Cup, world and world junior gold and the World Cup. Now, Perry is eight wins away from a second Stanley Cup.

“He’s one of those guys that we always look for on our team, players that elevate other guys,” Hunter says of what allows Perry to thrive with any linemates, in any role. “There’s always some goal-scorers that need a guy to give them the puck, or they need players to drive the play; he drives the play, he drives a line. You can put him with anybody really, any kind of skill level.

“He can make those area plays, he’s really good in transition that way, but then he’s really good down low. He gets pucks back, he can cycle, he can play that game in the O-zone for them.”

In Edmonton’s overtime victory in Game 2 of their first-round series against Las Vegas, it was Perry who started the play that led to the winner. He skated toward the puck as it rimmed around the boards on the wing in the neutral zone, picked it up off his skate, then backhanded a quick pass to a streaking McDavid, who then found Draisaitl, who then found the back of the net.

“He came back and he made that little soft play. Nobody really talks about it, but when we watch that goal, it’s a really smart play,” Hunter says. “He’s just so skilled.”

Heading back to the Memorial Cup with the Knights brings back memories for Hunter of winning it himself alongside Perry 20 years ago. That team was backstopped by Adam Dennis, who joined the Knights that year after playing in Guelph, which reminds Hunter of yet another memory of his then-linemate’s unique persona.

“The year before, we were playing [Dennis] in Guelph — they had a good team — and Perrs would always stand by the net and drink Denny’s water, and it would drive Denny absolutely crazy,” Hunter says, laughing. “Denny would be yellin’ at the refs, and the refs would be going, ‘Well, there’s really no penalty for that. I don’t know what to tell ya.’”

Hunter laughs again, then adds: “There’s really nobody quite like Perrs.”