Back from the Reign’s afternoon practice at Center Ice Arena, where there were some fairly tired hockey players.
Taylor said the players were on exercise bikes for an hour prior to the practice. “The guys were tired when we got here. We went really hard.” In spite of that, Taylor said, “the guys had lots of pace, lots of energy. I really like what we did. We got our systems started. Lots of work to do, then just decided we needed to shut it down.”
The goalies got more work today than on Friday, as Garrett Zemlak, Mike Zacharias and Kellen Briggs faced plenty of point-blank, one-on-one chances toward the end of practice. “It shows them that we care,” coach Karl Taylor said, “and it’s also to help them.”
I caught up with the three open-tryout invitees — Josh Newton, Gabriel Andre and Mike Thomson — and will have a story about them in tomorrow’s editions of the Sun and Daily Bulletin.
There were no new players in practice today — just the same 15 skaters and three goalies as yesterday — as all the absent signed players lived to see another day in American Hockey League camps.
Meanwhile up in Edmonton, Jon Rheault scored for the Calgary Flames in a 5-1 win over the Oilers. Rheault started the game on a line with former Kings enforcer Raitis Ivanans, which if anything means the Calgary staff is serious about possibly keeping him on as a fourth-line winger.
Hold on to those Jon Rheault memories. He won’t be making any new ones here this season.
