LA Kings: Did Todd McLellan just reveal the Opening Night roster?
By Ryan Sikes
LA Kings head coach Todd McLellan hinted changes to groupings are expected in training camp, as the team heads towards Opening Night.
For the first three days of training camp, LA Kings head coach Todd McLellan spread his team into two balanced groups. Drew Doughty and Olli Maatta were paired together in Group B, while expected regulars in Mikey Anderson and Matt Roy were in Group A. The forwards were similarly spread out.
However, several changes were expected as the team resumed training camp on Monday following Sunday’s day off.
“We have to make some moves so that we can begin to work on important parts of the game — power play, penalty kill,” said head coach Todd McLellan. “You can’t do that when your players are spread out in two different groups. We’ll work on the power play and we need the units together, we’ll work on the penalty kill and we need the units together.”
“I told them this, ‘If you’re in Group A and you think you’re on the National Hockey League team, you’re dreaming right now because we’re nowhere near making final decisions. If you’re in group B, and you feel like you didn’t make it, shame on you because that’s not the case.”
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And sure enough, the following group roster splits were released for the week of January 4.
Groups A and B for #LAKings training camp this week. pic.twitter.com/wGKpuEdrBc
— Rink Royalty (@RinkRoyalty) January 4, 2021
While nothing is finalized, it appears the groups were separated into the NHL and AHL roster. From this, we can assume a loose Opening Night roster of:
Forwards
Iafallo – Kopitar – Brown
Kempe – Vilardi – Frk
*Wagner – Lizotte – Carter
Grundstrom – Andersson – Fagemo
Extras: Amadio, Moore
Taxi squad: Luff, Anderson-Dolan
*Athanasiou will be able to join the roster as soon as Thursday
Defense
Maatta – Doughty
Anderson – Roy
**Clague – Walker
Extra: MacDermid
Taxi squad: Durzi
**Bjornfot is making his way back from the WJC. General manager Rob Blake confirmed via Zoom call last week that Clague and Bjornfot would split time between the NHL and AHL roster.
Goalie
Quick
Petersen
Taxi squad: Grosenick