Development Camp Day 2 Recap + “Finnishing Touches” with Simontaival, Jamsen and Salin

Day 2 is in the books!

Today’s scrimmage session started out in more of a controlled setting, as the two teams ran end-to-end drills, playing 5-on-5, with whistles stopping and starting play. Yesterday’s scrimmage had a couple of breaks in the action, but was generally played as a steady, 5-on-5 scrimmage without much stopping and starting. Today was much different during the afternoon session, as the development staff controlled the drills with a focus on board battles, breakouts and transition play.

The most exciting goals of the afternoon were scored by a pair of Finnish players – defenseman Otto Salin and forward Aatu Jamsen. Early on Day 2, Salin activated off the rush and collected a pass from Jamsen before he deked to his backhand and through the fivehole for the finish. Later in the day, Jamsen did it himself, as he danced his way through the slot, around a pair of defensemen in front and finished on the backhand for a nice solo effort.

The scrimmage on Day 2, overall, saw less scoring and fewer chances buried than we saw yesterday, a point that Player Development staffer Jarret Stoll pointed out after the scrimmage. As for exactly why that was, probably a variety of reasons, but it’s something the group will focus on throughout the week.

“Trying to be a little bit too fancy, a lot of guys pass up shots, but if you’re doing it over and over and over again, if there’s a pattern there, you want to fix it and you don’t want that to continue to happen,” Stoll said. “We talked about it this morning, there was a shooting day a couple of days ago, learning about different shots and taking advantage of opportunities and today was about puck protection. You get to the middle of the ice, with puck protection, you’ve got to take advantage of that. If you get inside the dots, you’ve got to take advantage of that and get a shot at least.”

After the controlled session, the two teams played around 10 minutes of straight 5-on-5, with camp invitee Sam Alfano burying the only goal we saw upstairs before heading down for locker room availability. A bit tighter and a few less chances converted, but we’ll expect that to continue to improve as the week progresses.

Now that we’re finished with the scrimmage recap, let’s take a look at some……Finnish players!

Forwards Aatu Jamsen and Kasper Simontaival, as well as defenseman Otto Salin, are all attending development camp this week with the Kings, the first time attending for both Salin and Simontaival.

First things first, it was a LONG road to get here. Jamsen detailed their travel from Finland, which had a 10+ hour flight across the Atlantic that originally stopped in Dallas, which was followed by a two-hour layover and another four hours on a plane to Los Angeles. Simontaival talked about some serious jet lag, but felt a bit better on the ice here for Day 2, as all three players got the legs going a bit better with one day under their belts.

Of the three players, Jamsen is the “veteran” of that group, as he was here last summer for both rookie camp and development camp. Jamsen turned some heads during the Rookie Faceoff in San Jose last September, before he returned to Finland where he collected 32 points from 43 games played against professionals, at just 20-years-old.

Coming out of last season’s camp, Jamsen’s takeaways were quite clear – strength.

“It’s one year later now and I’ve gained some weight, I’m a lot stronger now than last year,” he said. “Definitely pretty comfortable compared to last year.”

While a lot of the focus is on the ice, Jamsen pointed to the work done in the gym as his biggest takeaway from his time with the Kings last season. Jamsen said he took back some off-ice workouts that have helped him to put on weight and muscle over the last 12 months.

In North America, that part of the game is more important. It’s a smaller ice surface, nearly 15 feet narrower, which means things come at you faster and more quickly here. Jamsen feels he’s improved when it comes to areas of the game like puck battles, which is a focal point this week for the forwards.

“Off the ice workouts, I’ve gained some weight, so I’m stronger in the puck battles, that’s the biggest thing for me,” Jamsen added. “There are a lot more puck battles on the smaller rink than there are back in Finland.”

His skill was on display today, with the goal described above, and a clear focus on improving in some of the harder areas of his game is good to hear. Jamsen said his plan is to play another season in Finland and then see what happens from there. Still just 20-years-old, Jamsen is a young prospect who has developed quite well when compared to his draft position in the seventh round.

For Simontaival, he came into development camp as one of the most highly-awaited arrivals for the Kings.

Though he was selected back in the 2020 NHL Draft, this is Simontaival’s first development camp with the organization. He’s a point-per-game player in the World Junior Championships, across two tournaments, with silver and bronze medals to his name. Simontaival also posted similar offensive numbers to Jamsen, playing in the top men’s professional league in Finland. At just shy of a half-point-per-game, he spoke about the battle-level required to play professionally at such a young age.

“The battling is hard because every guy there is so strong, so you have to put everything into every battle if you want to win it,” he said. “Here, it’s the same, you have to put everything into every battle to win it and when you win the battle, what’s the next play, it’s quick.”

Simontaival isn’t foreign to the smaller ice surface in North America, but it’s not exactly second nature to him either.

Stoll described a play Simontaival made during the first day, where he had a pass picked off that might’ve been completed in Europe, when things don’t move quite as quickly. To his credit, the player immediately recognized the mistake when he came back to the bench, but it’s just one facet of the game that played a little bit differently here in North America.

“There are a couple of situations with these guys, just passing the puck a little bit harder, they’re trying to make a cross-ice pass and it’s tighter, so you’ve got to put some mustard on it, you’ve got to zip it,” Stoll said. “I know Kasper had a situation yesterday where it was a turnover and he came back to the bench and he’s just saying ‘yeah, I’ve got to make that harder play’. That’s just the smaller ice, maybe over in Europe that play’s made, but not here.”

Simontaival spoke about the differences in intensity and pace, which is something he knows he has to adjust to.

“It’s pretty tough because even though I played pro in Finland, it’s so different here, everything is coming so much quicker and everything’s happening faster, lots of battles on the boards,” Simontaival said. “It takes time, I think if I would come here, it would take a week or two to get used to the intensity, it’s so much higher here. I’ll get used to that for sure.”

Despite any potential holdups, his offensive abilities shined during the positional sessions for sure, as a player who is more experienced at the professional level than most. He possesses a high level of offensive ability and showcased the ability to stand out in that way against his peers. An exciting player to watch as the week goes on.

For the third Finnish prospect coming over, Salin didn’t feel quite as much of an adjustment with the size of the ice surface, though this was his first week here with the Kings in North America. We probably wouldn’t have much of a comparable for Salin even if he did.

Salin was the only player selected in last season’s NHL Draft who did not attend development camp in 2022, making this his first appearance at Toyota Sports Performance Center in a Kings jersey. During today’s scrimmage, we saw the type of ability Salin can bring, as he activated off the rush, took a feed in stride and finished on the backhand for one of the most exciting goals of the week thus far.

“That’s what I’ve tried to do out there, both ways,” Salin said of showcasing his play. “Both the offensive side and the defensive side of my game, that’s what I’ve tried to bring out there for the other players and coaches, everybody who’s watching.”

Sean O’Donnell spoke about both the ups and downs in Salin’s game when he addressed the media after Day 1. He said Salin did a lot of “really nice things” on the ice, but there were also some things in the defensive zone where he found himself on the wrong side of a player in front of the net, or outmatched by a bigger player. As a younger player even for a development camp, there’s time to sort that stuff out, but the Kings always liked the offensive side of Salin’s game enough to invest time into rounding out the other areas.

Salin spent the bulk of last season playing in the same league as Jamsen and Simontaival though his role was a bit smaller, as he logged just over 15 minutes per game playing in mainly a third-pairing role. He had eight points and a +14 rating from 27 games played. He also skated in eight of his team’s 11 playoff games, but saw time in Finland’s minor leagues at times as well. A very strong showing from an 18-year-old skater, but he’s got his sights on securing a larger role this coming season.

“My all-around game, you always try to improve that, but I think just playing bigger minutes in Finland and trying to get a bigger role there [is my goal].”

All three players talked about the benefits to having other Finns here together at camp, with the ability to speak in their native tongue, as well as seeing a familiar face here and there, being a big reason as to why. Exciting to see each of those guys in action and speak with each for the first time with the Kings.

More to follow in the coming days! We’ve got feature stories on Francesco Pinelli and Jakub Dvorak, as well as coverage from each of the next three days of camp. Just feels good to be back covering hockey at the rink once again!

Scrimmage scenes 🎥 pic.twitter.com/jZt19reiqY

— LA Kings (@LAKings) July 7, 2023