While their parent club looks to finally lay the ghosts of seasons past to rest, coach Marco Sturm and the Ontario Reign are ready to embark on their own playoff quest.
Game 1 of their 2025 opening round series gets underway tonight at Crypto.com Arena — no, that is not a typo. Due to building availability, the Reign will play two games in Downtown LA before returning to Ontario for any future home games in this year’s Calder Cup Playoffs. First up in their journey will be the San Jose Barracuda.
Veteran goaltender Pheonix Copley will get the start in net for Game 1. Kings prospect Carter George is up with the Kings, where he’ll serve as the third netminder on the team’s trip to Edmonton for games this weekend. Meanwhile, Jacob Ingham will back up Copley to start things off.
Following a slow start to the season, Copley found his stride, finishing strong with a 2.49 goals-against average over 42 games. Copley is no stranger to the Calder Cup Playoffs either, having made three appearances in the tournament over his 10-year AHL career.
Defenseman Angus Booth, who missed Ontario’s season finale after suffering an injury Friday night, is expected to return to the lineup tonight. The rookie has been nothing short of impressive this season, drawing frequent comparisons to Mikey Anderson from various coaches throughout the organization. Having him back for the playoffs is a crucial boost, as Sturm has come to rely on him quite heavily.
Up front, the availability of Charles Hudon and Kings prospect Aatu Jamsen are two of the bigger question marks. Should the former return from a recent injury, he is a strong candidate to replace Taylor Ward on the top line — which then has a domino effect on the other lines. We are not expecting Jamsen back just yet. He’s been out the past few weeks after an injury suffered vs. San Jose. Getting him back to game action would likely inject some additional offense into Sturm’s lineup, as the young Finn has been a nightmare for the Barracuda this season, racking up four goals and an assist against Ontario’s NoCal rivals.
Fellow Kings prospects Martin Chromiak and Andre Lee both closed out the season strong and are eager to get the playoffs started. Chomiak completely rewrote the narrative that had followed him all year with his play down the stretch. Now, he’ll look to carry that momentum into the playoffs — especially after watching from the sidelines when postseason action began last April.
Lee coming on at the end of the year sounds all too familiar to 2024. It’s a similar story to when he caught fire late and made a big impact in the playoffs. Now, he’s aiming for another monster postseason run.
One of the most important keys to victory for Ontario in this series will be discipline — i.e. staying out of the penalty box. San Jose closed out the season with the top-ranked power play in the entire AHL. Giving them a man-advantage this series could prove costly.
NEWLY ADDED KINGS PROSPECTS
As noted several times over the past few weeks, the Reign recently went from calling up guys from the ECHL to fill out their lineup to now having too many players (or said differently, an abundance of options at both forward and defense). This worm turned as the Kings started signing and/or assigning prospects to the AHL when their respective seasons began to end in various other leagues.
It was 10 years ago this month when the Kings brought a teenage Adrian Kempe over from Sweden and snuck him into three games near the end of the AHL’s regular season. The rest is history, as they say. He scored eight goals in the playoffs and coach Mike Stothers guided that club to the organization’s first (and only) Calder Cup Championship.
Presently, Sturm has a handful of newly added Kings prospects to select from, should he choose to give them game action.
Jared Wright – Fresh off a deep run with his Denver University squad in the NCAA playoffs, Wright was recently signed to an entry level contract with the Kings. At 6-foot-3, elite skating is this winger’s calling card and that could be enough to encourage Sturm to play him tonight. Wright also plays a strong 200-ft game, something all coaches appreciate.
Koehn Ziemmer – He played three games before the 2024-25 regular season wrapped up. The fact Ziemmer didn’t have any points is not concerning in the slightest. He’s is a wrecking ball type power forward who is just getting used to AHL action, where the players are bigger and stronger than what he was facing in the WHL. We wouldn’t be surprised to see him get some postseason games, but we’d put his Game 1 odds at 50/50.
Otto Salin – This is where things are perhaps most interesting. Salin arguably had the best season among Kings defensive prospects not playing in the AHL. Like the others listed above, he played three regular season games with Ontario. He played against men over in Finland, so there shouldn’t be any sort of concerns about giving him a start in the playoffs — except one thing. The most likely person he’d replace in the lineup is Jack Millar, a non-prospect in his first season of pro hockey; and in 62 games played this season, he never scored a goal. However, he’s 6-foot-4. If history is the best prediction of the future, Sturm will likely want that type of size in his lineup for Game 1.
Another option to get Salin in would be to move Millar up to the top pairing, where he’d replace another non-prospect in Joseph Cecconi. That would involve benching a guy with around 350 games of AHL experience to make room for a rookie. Seems a bit unlikely at this time.
And if that’s not enough to contemplate, just wait until next week:
SERIES SCHEDULE
Game 1: Thursday, Apr. 24 at Crypto.com Arena, 7pm
Game 2: Saturday, Apr. 26 at Crypto.com Arena, 6pm
Game 3 (if necessary): Monday, Apr. 28 at Toyota Arena, 7pm
REIGN PROJECTED LINEUP vs. BARRACUDA
Should there be any key changes during warmups, alignment below will be updated.
Ward – Gawdin – Chromiak
Lee – Studnicka – Fagemo
Olson – Pinelli – Wright
Element – Lawrence – Doty
Hicketts – Cecconi
Booth – Millar
Dvorak – Walsh
Copley (starter)
Ingham
Other roster options include: (F) Hudon, Jamsen, Singleton, Ziemmer and (D) Jones, Rowe, Salin
Injured: (D) Krygier and (G) Portillo
Puck drop is scheduled for 7:00 pm Pacific Time and the game can be viewed on FloHockey. An audio only feed is also available on the ESPN LA app.
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