Prior to selecting Liam Greentree in the first round of this summer’s NHL Draft, the Kings had gone two years without a pick in the opening round. Due to a trade for Vladislav Gavrikov, LA began the 2023 Draft by selecting defenseman Jakub Dvorak at No. 54, which came in the lower half of Round 2.
Nonetheless, he added a key piece to their prospect pool and gave them something they were looking for — a big, left shot defenseman. By selecting him out of Europe, it also gave the team the most flexibility from that point forward. Rather than taking a college or junior player (which typically require at least two years, sometimes longer, before moving to the AHL), they could essentially assign Dvorak to any league they felt would be a good fit for his development.
In a rather shocking turn of events last December, the teenage prospect opted not to play for his native Czechia at the World Junior Championship — where he was expected to be part of their leadership group and wear a letter too. Instead, Dvorak took a few weeks off for the holidays and left the club he had been part of for two seasons and wanted to try his hand in North America. Over the second half of last season, he played 21 games for the Swift Current Broncos (WHL).
Now comes the difficult part, where will play this season?
Throughout training camp, Kings management will be watching closely as they prepare to decide if he’s earned a spot in AHL Ontario.
“We’re just anxious to see where he’s at after a good summer of training,” AGM Nelson Emerson recently said on Kings Of The Podcast. “He’s kind of that left defenseman that we’re hoping that will — under the tutelage of Matt Greene and Sean O’Donnell — become that size on left D that that we need in the in a year or two.”
Step one in the evaluation process came this past weekend when the Kings hosted this year’s NHL Rookie Faceoff tournament. Dvorak played in all three games.
“I would say it was pretty good,” Dvorak told Mayor’s Manor, when asked for an evaluation of his performance. “It was kind of kind of tough, in that I played [three games in four days]. But I think as a team, and me as a player, we handled it pretty well.”
He also felt the games were played with a different level of intensity than perhaps a junior game.
“All of the games were pretty tough and pretty physical,” Dvorak shared in the moments after Monday’s finale. “Me and all the boys had to adjust to it. I think there are still some things that we need to work on, but I think we were getting better.”
Recency bias can creep into situations like this, especially when something happens at the end of a game. Dvorak has played a rather solid game defensively on Saturday, then took a penalty in overtime and didn’t play a later sequence effectively when Utah ended up scoring the game winning goal.
After a day off on Sunday, two more penalties in the event finale on Monday didn’t help erase any of those previous thoughts.
“I would say all of them were questionable penalties,” Dvorak said, after admitting he was rather frustrated with that part of the weekend. “The one in overtime [on Saturday] was especially confusing for me. But the boys handled it pretty good on the ice. With the overtime penalty, we didn’t give up a goal, so that was a positive.”
Those penalties were also a topic coach Marco Sturm helped shed some light on.
“[It] just shows you, he’s still a little bit unsure in certain situations,” said the former NHL player turned coach. “That’s something he needs to get better at, and we’ll try to find the best place for him to do that. If that’s here, great. Then, we’re going to deal with him and try to get him better every day because [in the long run], I believe he’s a good defenseman. He will be a good defenseman for us. You have to almost guide him to the right track, whatever it is.”
On both Friday and Monday, Dvorak also had an opportunity to play with Brandt Clarke, something the young European blueliner said he thoroughly enjoyed.
“For me, it was definitely easier to play with him because he’s making the right decisions on the ice,” remarked the Czechia native. “I’m trying to take as much as I can from it. I know I have some offensive potential in me too; so, if I’m on the ice with him, it’s much easier because the o-zone play, and all of those things connected with offensive skill, is what he brings in great levels.”
Following Game 1 on Friday, Clarke offered his assessment of the pairing:
In talking with several people from Kings management over the past week or so, there doesn’t seem to be a clear consensus of what would be best right now for Dvorak. Thus, the remainder of training camp will likely play a large role in swinging the votes one way or the other.
However, when Mark Yannetti was on Kings Of The Podcast recently, he offered a little more insight into the situation.
“I’ve seen Dvorak play a bunch of times over the past two years,” said LA’s longtime Director of Amateur Scouting. “He seems to play better when I watch him at the higher levels, because at the higher levels it’s a little more structured. His game, his defensive style — his quick puck movement style — lends itself to a more structured game. The way he positions himself, the way he defends. When he plays junior hockey, he holds the puck a little longer.
“Now this is good too, don’t get me wrong; you want him to try new things in junior because you can get away with it. You want him to hold the puck longer so he can work on his puck skills. He can work on his deception. He can work on running up the ice and having to come back. You don’t want to see him do at a higher level, but when you see a kid doing them at the junior level it’s not as big of a deal. Kurtis MacDermid got to play on the power play in Erie (OHL) his last year of junior. MacDermid is never going to see a power play the rest of his life. So, if he’s going to work on skills and things, that’s the time to do it.
“When you watch Dvorak play in the WHL, he played a different style. It was a little looser, it wasn’t as good defensively. The best parts of his game weren’t as good because he was playing, but he was working on the part of his game that wasn’t quite as good. So there’s that trade-off. For me, I do think he excels at the higher levels. And I do think it’s because he plays a more defensive smart simple style.”
For his part, Dvorak is still trying to keep an open mind about where he could be off to next.
It sure seems like the WHL is off the table for now, though.
Following the Kings win on Monday, Sturm intimated that Dvorak was “probably not too impressed” with junior hockey and classified the upcoming decision as a “tricky” one.
“He’s still very young, it’s going to be a hard decision,” Sturm said. “It also has to be the right fit wherever it is. The biggest goal is that wherever he’s going to go — or if he’s going to stay — that he’s going to get the right treatment, the right development on the ice, and also off the ice.”
Dvorak essentially doubled down on those comments when discussing the various possibilities with us.
“Yeah, that’s exactly where I am,” he said, when we asked if he’s thinking more AHL or Europe, instead of going back to the WHL for another season. “I’m heading to main camp now, so the decisions are up to them. We’ll see how it’s going to end up.”
Would he have a preference if given a choice?
“I don’t know,” Dvorak stated. “That’s a tough question for me.”
There is also another option in all of this — and it could very well be the path selected. Dvorak could start the season in the American League for further evaluation. How he plays in actual games with the Reign, rather than just preseason exhibition settings, can be used to drive the Kings toward their final decision. This was even an idea Emerson mentioned on the podcast, and one that seems to be gaining some chatter behind the scenes. Perhaps it ends up as the best option for all involved.
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