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The London Knights are in jeopardy of being without their top scoring line again when they make a three-game eastern Ontario swing this week.
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Kasper Halttunen was officially suspended four games for what the OHL called a “reckless” check from behind on Saginaw defenceman James Guo in a 6-5 win Saturday. Maple Leafs first rounder Easton Cowan is day-to-day with a lower-body injury suffered Saturday and Flyers prospect Denver Barkey is also working through an ailment.
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Neither Cowan nor Barkey were on the ice for practice Tuesday.
The star forwards could miss a second straight game Thursday in Peterborough and there is an outside chance they will not play at all this coming weekend. Cowan is sitting on a 54-game regular-season point streak and needs one more in his next outing to match Doug Gilmour’s OHL record run of 55 games with Cornwall in 1982-83.
CURIOUS BAN: The Knights were dismayed by the length of Halttunen’s suspension issued early this week. He got two more games than Jr. Knights grad Will Bishop, a Saginaw defenceman, received for nailing a Soo Greyhounds player from behind in a much more nasty-looking hit a month ago.
Halttunen was a first-time offender and Guo didn’t suffer an injury on the play.
“It was disappointing,” Knights GM Mark Hunter said of the decision. “I don’t understand it. I don’t get it. We just want consistency. That’s all.”
The Ontario Hockey League’s department of player safety, now overseen by former NHL official Greg Kimmerly, called the Halttunen hit “reckless” rather than careless and pointed out that it was “a check that could have been avoided.”
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“The London player has lots of time to recognize that his opponent is in a vulnerable and defenceless position and drives hard with his shoulder right on the numbers of the opponent,” officials with the player safety department wrote in an email to The Free Press.
“The Saginaw player maintains a consistent skating path, and was sent head-first into the boards. The offending player needs to recognize when an opponent is situated in a dangerous position relative to the distance from the boards.”
The league suggests Halttunen could have instead initiated contact by pinning or using a bear hug to force the opponent into the boards.
ARROWSMITH DEALT: The Knights moved 17-year-old American forward Blake Arrowsmith to the Niagara IceDogs Tuesday for three draft picks – Brantford’s third-rounder in 2026, London’s third-rounder in 2028 and Sarnia’s sixth-round selection in 2025.
“He needed an opportunity to play,” Mark Hunter said. “He’s 17 and he’s caught in some numbers games here. He’s a good player and he has pretty good stats for limited ice. He could be a Josh Anderson (type) and those players take a little longer to figure out how to play. People have to be patient, but there’s lots of upside.
“He’ll get more ice time there.”
Arrowsmith, a 6-foot, 181-pounder from Solon, Ohio, scored four goals and six points in 15 games with the Knights this season. He had 12 goals and 28 points in 32 games with the London Nationals in Junior B action last season.
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