With the Los Angeles Kings down several forwards, they\u2019re doing something they haven\u2019t done all season: recalling skaters from the American Hockey League.<\/p>\n
Due to injuries to Anze Kopitar, Joel Armia and Trevor Moore, along with Corey Perry stepping away to deal with an ill family member, the Kings have brought Taylor Ward and Andre Lee up from the Ontario Reign ahead of tonight\u2019s game against the San Jose Sharks.<\/p>\n
Of the two forwards, Lee has more NHL experience, appearing in 19 games and registering three points, all last season. Ward has only appeared in one NHL contest, the Kings\u2019 final game of last season, but he did score a goal in that game.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cI do think that game last year helped me out a lot, especially coming in here today, [I] feel a bit more comfortable than I probably did last year,\u201d Ward said. \u201cIt\u2019s been a big help, and there\u2019s a lot of the same faces in this room, so much more comfortable this time.\u201d<\/p>\n
They earned their call-ups thanks to strong performances during training camp and with the Reign this season.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201c[Lee and Ward] both had solid camps,\u201d head coach Jim Hiller said. \u201c[Lee\u2019s] playing extremely well. [The Reign] tell us [he\u2019s been] physical and scoring goals, so he\u2019s doing all the good things. And [Ward] had such a great camp, been solid for them. So they\u2019ll get in tonight, and they\u2019ll get some minutes for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Both players face the challenge of slotting into a team filled with established players who have developed chemistry from playing together all season, and in some cases for multiple seasons.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s pretty easy to get in your own head in situations like this,\u201d Ward said. \u201cSo just to keep it simple and play my game, that\u2019s pretty much where my head\u2019s at.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat they want from me is [to] play my type of game, playing heavy, physical, hunting down pucks, being strong around the net,\u201d Lee added. \u201cAnd, I mean, they have a really good team. So I just try to help as best as I can.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ward, Lee and Hiller all noted the importance of the similarities in systems between the Kings and Reign, specifically designed to make this type of transition easier.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you go up and down, it\u2019s not that big of an adjustment on that front,\u201d Ward said. \u201cWhich obviously helps us just focus on our game, and not too much about the Xs-and-Os part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Reign are currently under the direction of first-year head coach Andrew Lord, who is building up his relationship with Hiller after taking over for Marco Sturm.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe usually have a chat after practice,\u201d Hiller said. \u201cJust catch up. You know, they watch our team. Of course, we don\u2019t see them as much, but they pop by and talk \u2014 \u2018Who\u2019s playing well for you?\u2019 \u2026 not just the Wards and the Lees and all these guys. How are our younger guys, our rookies doing? So it\u2019s really good. They\u2019ve done a great job down there. Lord\u2019s slipped right in there, and built right on what Marco has built, and just kept it going.\u201d<\/p>\n
Unsurprisingly, both players are excited for the opportunity and looking to embrace their first chance of the season to prove themselves at the NHL level.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody\u2019s pretty excited for tonight, so it\u2019s great,\u201d Ward said. \u201cJust gonna do my best to help this team win and go from there.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With the Los Angeles Kings down several forwards, they\u2019re doing something they haven\u2019t done all season: recalling skaters…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396417,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5126],"tags":[3281,367,869,5,2098,973,186,1760,240,5303,793,145,5304,5302,40,4,3286,1861,5695],"class_list":["post-396484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles-kings","tag-andre-lee","tag-anze-kopitar","tag-corey-perry","tag-hockey","tag-jim-hiller","tag-joel-armia","tag-kings","tag-la","tag-la-kings","tag-lakings","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-kings","tag-losangeles","tag-losangeleskings","tag-news","tag-nhl","tag-taylor-ward","tag-trevor-moore","tag-tst-los-angeles"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115856513816996056","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396484\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}