As expected, the LA Kings made several transactions today as they narrow down their roster towards what will ultimately be a group of no more than 23 players by Opening Night on October 7.
From the outset, it was not a secret that the Kings plan to use their final two exhibition games as dry runs for the NHL group. That includes the games in Utah and Los Angeles, certainly, but it also goes for practice as well. You don’t want your NHL skates bogged down with 30 players on the ice, which limits repetitions for the players who will be playing on October 7. Therefore, roster moves needed to be made and today is the day they come.
The following players are involved in today’s transactions –
Loaned to the Ontario Reign (AHL)
Kenny Connors
Jakub Dvorak
Kirill Kirsanov
Francesco Pinelli
Erik Portillo
Otto Salin
Jared Wright
Jack Millar
Tim Rego
Isaiah Saville
Placed on Waivers for the purpose of being assigned to the Ontario Reign
Samuel Bolduc
Logan Brown
Martin Chromiak
Pheonix Copley
Glenn Gawdin
Cole Guttman
Joe Hicketts
Andre Lee
Akil Thomas
Taylor Ward
Re-assigned to OHL-Windsor
Liam Greentree
Today’s transactions are extremely wide ranging and, frankly, included more players than I would have expected……however, with the information provided above, it is understandable why the Kings opted for such a defined split.
The first group of players is very self explanatory. These are young players who you would consider to be NHL prospects, players who are either on their entry-level contracts or early in their professional careers, or players on AHL contracts. These players do not need to clear waivers and will be directly loaned to the AHL’s Ontario Reign. Included are several first-year professional players, such as Kenny Connors and Jared Wright, who will begin their professional journeys this season with Ontario. The seven players listed above will practice today with the Ontario Reign.
The other simple move is with regards to forward Liam Greentree.
For Greentree, his path this season was either to play in the NHL with the Kings or to be assigned to the OHL’s Windsor Spitfires. Though he made his mark in camp, Greentree will now play one last season in the OHL before beginning his professional career, either this spring or next fall. Will ask about Greentree after today’s skate to get the evaluation, but I think that while he showed well of himself during camp, there was not a Top-9 roster spot available and the best path forward, the Kings believe, is to be a star in the OHL rather than the 13th forward in Los Angeles. Best case, he’s on the fourth line and while there’s benefits to that, you have to balance the pros and cons of playing 10 minutes in the NHL versus 25 in the OHL. While I wish that the AHL was an option for him, it isn’t. So, he’ll head back to the OHL where he’ll have his sights set on furthering his playoff success with Windsor and hopefully cracking Team Canada’s roster at the 2026 World Juniors event this winter.
Heading back now to the second group of players because it’s the one with a less-clear outcome. First things first, these players will not practice today with the Kings. Each of these players will be placed on waivers later on today. The rules of waivers state that those players will be on waivers for 24 hours and tomorrow, we’ll learn their fate. All 31 other teams will have the opportunity to claim these players, as the Kings will have with the players placed on waivers by the other 31 teams in the NHL. Should a player be claimed, he would immediately report to that team at the NHL level. For the players who clear, the plan is that they will each be assigned to Ontario’s training camp on Thursday.
Most of these names shouldn’t be a huge surprise, as barring a standout camp, Ontario was always the most-likely destination. Three names who perhaps are a bit more surprising are Akil Thomas, Andre Lee and Taylor Ward who were in contention for the final roster spot. As the group above stands, perhaps pending some injury news related to defenseman Kyle Burroughs, the Kings could open the season with 13 forwards and eight defensemen, with both Burroughs and defenseman Jacob Moverare both making the team out of camp. That’s not shocking, but initially I thought a 14F/7D split was more likely.
One thing I’ll say, though, is that you can’t look at any player who was on the bubble and say they didn’t get an opportunity to showcase themselves. Hiller felt that last night was a real showcase opportunity and seemed pretty disappointed in several who he didn’t think made their mark there. Most of those players did earlier in camp, certainly. But last night he seemed like he was hoping to get more from some in that group that didn’t come. He added that any time he and Ken Holland spoke about players on the bubble, there was never a discrepancy in how they both felt. Seemed to be very much in lockstep leading to this morning’s moves.
So, with that, the NHL roster stands at 25 players, including injured defenseman Angus Booth and injured forward Corey Perry.
Booth and Perry will likely begin the season on injured reserve, which frees up no salary-cap space for the Kings but does open up a roster spot. 23 players remain on the roster beyond those two players, so that means one more transaction will need to be made before Opening Night. Burroughs’ status is currently not fully known. He left last night’s game in Boise early. Hiller said Burroughs was “banged up” and that while an initial look was negative, the was held out for precautionary reasons and is being re-evaluated today. Will update here once the Kings practice, but in looking at this group, that’s 23 healthy players. That’s a roster.
For this morning, here’s the group of players still on the NHL roster entering today’s practice –
Goaltenders (2) – Anton Forsberg, Darcy Kuemper
Defensemen (8) – Mikey Anderson, Kyle Burroughs, Cody Ceci, Brandt Clarke, Drew Doughty, Brian Dumoulin, Joel Edmundson, Jacob Moverare
Forwards (13) – Joel Armia, Quinton Byfield, Phillip Danault, Kevin Fiala, Warren Foegele, Samuel Helenius, Adrian Kempe, Anze Kopitar, Andrei Kuzmenko, Alex Laferriere, Jeff Malott, Trevor Moore, Alex Turcotte
Injured (2) – Angus Booth, Corey Perry
Practice today, game in Utah tomorrow, practice on Friday, game at home against Anaheim on Saturday. That’s all that remains here in the preseason. Sunday is a team day off and Monday is the first practice of the regular season. Tuesday is Game 1 and Wednesday is Game 2. Then off we go!
Exciting times. Will have more to follow later on today after the Kings hit the ice in El Segundo, especially after speaking with Jim Hiller, sharing my thoughts on how the roster got down to this point.
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