Vladislav Gavrikov is a proud girl dad.
On Sunday afternoon, he joined teammates Joel Edmundson, Warren Foegele and David Rittich at LA Kings Ice in Palos Verdes to skate with the girls Continue to Play Program, designed for girls in the Little Kings program to take the next step in their hockey player lives. The program gives young female players to further develop on the ice, after completing the Little Kings program, in an environment with other female players.
It was cool for Gavrikov specifically to have the chance to skate with a girls program and to see the growth of women’s hockey here in California. Growing up, access to all-girls skates just wasn’t a thing, in many areas of the world. Certainly not at such a young age. Now it is, and it’s a real positive for Gavrikov and his teammates to be a part of.
“It’s growing, obviously it’s growing and back in the day, we didn’t have the girls teams and everything now, it’s really good that kids have opportunities to do what they love,” he said. “That’s really important to me.”
For Edmundson, he’s a young father himself, of a young boy born just last month.
He’s been around the league, skating in St. Louis, Montreal, Washington and Toronto throughout his career, which is a wide variety of different hockey markets. Now he’s here in Los Angeles and has seen the women’s game specifically take off. It starts at younger ages and seeing this skate in Los Angeles was special for him.
“Women’s hockey is growing all over North America, especially with the PWHL, it’s awesome, we watch it all the time,” he said. “It gives the young girls something to look up to, not only NHL players but now they have their female role models too, so it’s pretty cool, just growing the game, day-by-day.”
Seeing that joy in the face of any youth hockey player, the smiles seen throughout the afternoon made it all worth it for Gavrikov and his teammates.
Though it was technically their day off, it didn’t feel like an obligation to come out and skate with the kids. Seeing those younger players have such a good time on the ice made it all worthwhile.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s hockey or any other sport, to see whoever you’re looking up to growing up, that’s really special and really important, to give them that kind of energy,” he added. “You can see it in their eyes how happy they are, that’s what it’s all about.”
When he was younger, Gavrikov grew up playing in Russia and had two memorable experiences that never left him.
The first was with legendary Russian forward Alexei Yashin, an IIHF Hall of Fame inductee in 2022. The second was with longtime Buffalo Sabres winger Maxim Afinagenov, who played more than 1,000 professional games between the NHL and KHL.
“When those guys showed up, you’re fired up,” he added. “It was pretty special to be around those players being a kid and now you understand more how important it is.”
For Edmundson, he’s from the province of Manitoba and it was the WHL’s Brandon Wheat Kings who would occasionally attend his practices.
“Those are the guys I looked up to, I couldn’t imagine having an NHL team on my back doorstep, so it’s got to be pretty cool for the kids,” he said. “I just remember being in their shoes and being able to skate with those junior players, I thought it was the coolest thing ever. It goes a long way.”
Great day on the Local Rinks Tour!
Every @LAKings player was out in the community today, split up at seven different rinks.
A few 📸 of Joel Edmundson, Warren Foegele, Vladislav Gavrikov & David Rittich with @SportBlake’s all-girls program at LA Kings Ice in PV! pic.twitter.com/Fr6dsoqyxz
— Zach Dooley (@DooleyLAK) November 18, 2024
In total, the group in Palos Verdes was one of seven different stops on Sunday throughout the day.
Anze Kopitar, Trevor Lewis and Kevin Fiala were here at Toyota Sports Performance Center in El Segundo, skating with the 24 Degrees of Color program, which introduces young people in underserved communities to ice sports.
Phillip Danault, Adrian Kempe and Erik Portillo were at LA Kings Iceland in Paramount, skating with the LA Lions, an all-girls travel hockey program, while Mikey Anderson, Tanner Jeannot and Kyle Burroughs were at the Valley Ice Center to skate with the Little Kings program, an introductory group just getting into hockey. Both ends of the experience scale.
Quinton Byfield, Akil Thomas and Jacob Moverare were out at Pickwick, skating with the Black, Silver & Bold Program, consisting of BIPOC Youth Players, while the quartet of Alex Laferriere, Andreas Englund, Jordan Spence and Arthur Kaliyev were at The Cube, on the ice with the SNAP Flyers, a group for disabled youth and adult hockey players. Trevor Moore led a group of Brandt Clarke, Samuel Helenius and Alex Turcotte to Iceoplex in Simi Valley, for another skate with younger, introductory players.
Busy day, certainly, but an important day.
“There’s nothing better, because we’re in our own bubble, we’re traveling, we’re busy and then you get outside and you really get a chance to touch the fans, especially the young [hockey players],” Head Coach Jim Hiller said. “You get to see how much they really appreciate you, that you’re a Los Angeles King, what you do for a living. It brings everything back into perspective and it’s good. It’s good for the community, for sure, but it’s also really good for the players.”
A nice day to get on the ice, but in a much different way than a full practice.
Important to do those things throughout the course of a long season, and Sunday presented the right opportunity to do so for each of the Kings players healthy enough to participate.
“I’d love to do that as much as we can, because you can see the kids are happy, smiling, asking questions, they really enjoy that and the excitement,” Gavrikov added. “They’re so excited and I just love to be here, be around them, it’s always fun.”
Edmundson certainly agreed.
“It’s awesome, these events, we always look forward to as players, seeing the smiles on the girls faces today, they’re having a great time,” he added. “Just being able to answer any of their questions and teach them a few things, I think it’s just awesome. Just trying to grow the game in this community, it was a fun day.”
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