D.J. Smith steps up to the ice after the L.A. Kings announced the termination of Jim Hiller<\/p>\n
After about two years of coaching the L.A. Kings, it was announced on Sunday that their head coach, Jim Hiller, had been respectfully let go, and they have promoted D.J. Smith to temporarily fill the position.<\/p>\n
Hiller\u2019s termination came the morning after the team ended their five-game losing streak against the Calgary Flames, 2-0. Before that win, they were defeated by not only the Edmonton Oilers but also the Vegas Golden Knights twice, all on home ice.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to thank Jim Hiller for his dedication, professionalism, and the commitment he showed to our players and our team every day. He is a respected coach and person, and we appreciate the work he\u2019s done behind our bench,\u201d Kings Vice President and General Manager Ken Holland said Sunday. <\/p>\n
The Kings are currently holding fifth place in the Pacific Division. With 62 points and a record of 24-21-14, the team would not be able to qualify for the playoffs if the regular season were to end today.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt this point in the season, we believe a change in leadership is necessary to give our group the best opportunity to reach its potential and compete at the level we expect. These decisions are never made lightly, but our responsibility is to position this team for success now and moving forward,\u201d Holland stated. <\/p>\n
Smith is in his second full season as an assistant coach of the team. He joined the organization in 2024 after coaching for the Ottawa Senators. Smith was also an assistant coach for the Toronto Maple Leafs and spent four seasons behind the bench with Hiller before they got hired to their respective teams.<\/p>\n
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The Kings are scheduled to play their next game on Monday night as they are slated to host the Colorado Avalanche. The Avalanche currently has the best record in the NHL.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"D.J. Smith steps up to the ice after the L.A. Kings announced the termination of Jim Hiller After…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":482145,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5126],"tags":[193,146,5,186,6304,1760,240,5303,1326,793,145,5304,5302,4],"class_list":["post-482144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles-kings","tag-avalanche","tag-edmonton-oilers","tag-hockey","tag-kings","tag-l-a-kings","tag-la","tag-la-kings","tag-lakings","tag-las-vegas","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-kings","tag-losangeles","tag-losangeleskings","tag-nhl"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116163430681140499","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482144","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=482144"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482144\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/482145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=482144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=482144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=482144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}