Since I had Dean Lombardi on the phone, I thought I would drop in a question about the decision to let Oscar Moller play in the World Junior Championships. Beyond the question of why they thought it was a good idea, I wanted to know if the Kings had any thoughts of sending Moller back to his junior team after the tournament ended.

LOMBARDI: “This isn’t a thing where we were going to send him back to junior. That’s a very special tournament in the growth of a hockey player. There’s an enormous amount of pressure that comes with that tournament. It’s in Canada and he’s expected to be one of the leaders. We had Hickey get selected as captain for Canada, and in talking to those (Sweden) people, they said he will be one of their captains. So there’s a lot of growth potential there, in terms of playing and learning to lead. There’s a lot of pressure there to perform. You balance that against the interests of the team in the immediate sense. We talked to some players, because we didn’t want them to think that the Kings are less important. There are a couple kids who deserve a spot, and who can fill that role when he goes. This gives him a chance to perform in that environment.”