Ronning Is Traded to Wild

On a day when NHL teams attempted to see into the future, otherwise known as the first day of the league’s two-day entry draft, the Kings exorcised a bit of their most recent past Saturday, trading forward Cliff Ronning to the Minnesota Wild.

Ronning, acquired in a March trade that sent defenseman Jere Karalahti and a fourth-round draft pick to the Nashville Predators, was unable to fill the Kings’ need for a productive top-six forward. After contributing one goal and four assists in 14 regular-season games and no goals and one assist in four playoff games, he was benched for the Kings’ Game 7 loss to the Colorado Avalanche in the first round.

Unwilling to pick up the $1.85-million option on Ronning’s contract for next season, General Manager Dave Taylor sent the diminutive winger to the Wild for a fourth-round pick, the No. 104 choice overall, in this year’s draft.

“Really, we were looking at a short window with his time in Los Angeles,” Taylor said of Ronning, who was the Predators’ leading scorer. “When we acquired him, we realized that it might be on a rental basis.”

The teams are hoping the players drafted Saturday, by contrast, stick around longer.

The Mighty Ducks, picking seventh, sought size, toughness and scoring when they selected 6-foot-1, 194-pound center Joffrey Lupul of Medicine Hat in the Western Hockey League. The Ducks hope that Lupul, who turns 19 on Sept. 23, will make an impact quickly.

The Kings, with the 18th pick, took Russian defenseman Denis Grebeshkov, who, like all but a handful of the players selected this weekend, probably won’t be ready to make the jump to the NHL for several years.

In the second round, the Ducks picked center Tim Brent, rated as a solid two-way player with St. Michael’s in the Ontario Hockey League, and the Kings took Russian left wing Sergei Anshakov.

In the third round, the Ducks drafted Brain Lee, a defenseman from Erie in the Ontario Hockey League, and the Kings took Petr Kanko, a right wing from the Czech Republic who plays for Kitchener in the Ontario Hockey League.

The final six rounds of what has been called a thin draft will be conducted today.

The teams with the first three picks--the Florida Panthers, Atlanta Thrashers and Columbus Blue Jackets--shuffled the order.

The Blue Jackets, their eyes on forward Rick Nash, swapped their No. 3 pick for the Panthers’ No. 1. The Panthers also acquired the right to swap first-round picks with the Blue Jackets in the 2004 draft.

The Panthers, in an effort to ensure that defenseman Jay Bouwmeester would be available, gave the Thrashers their third- and fourth-round picks. So Bouwmeester, long tabbed to be the No. 1 pick, slipped to third, after the Blue Jackets took Nash and the Thrashers drafted Kari Lehtonen, a goaltender from Finland.

Lupul led the WHL with 56 goals and was second with 107 points. The Ducks were so intent on drafting him that they sent one of their two third-round picks to the Predators, who drafted sixth, to ensure that Lupul would be available.

“We thought he would go fourth and when he kept going by people we were pleasantly surprised,” General Manager Bryan Murray said. “He’s as close as anybody in the draft to being able to play in the league.”

Lupul is expected to be at training camp in September but probably will return to Medicine Hat next season.

“My goal right now is definitely to make the Ducks next year,” he said. “Whether that is realistic or not, we’ll see at training camp. I am definitely going to make it hard on the Mighty Ducks to send me back to juniors.”

Grebeshkov has no illusions about playing for the Kings right away.

Nor do the Kings, though they like his potential. Likening him to current Kings Mathieu Schneider and Lubomir Visnovsky, Taylor said of the 6-0, 190-pound Russian: “What we like about him [is], he’s got excellent mobility, good offensive skills and he’s the type of defenseman that could quarterback the power play.”

Also Saturday, Murray said he had begun talks to sign center Stanislav Chistov, the Ducks’ No. 1 pick in 2001. The Ducks also announced the hiring of Chuck Fletcher as director of hockey operations. Fletcher was the Panthers’ assistant general manager.

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