3 Players to Watch at VGK Rookie Camp | Ryan Rose

by Ryan Rose

What Happened

The Vegas Golden Knights brought a 23-player rookie camp roster together and opened with a practice at City National Arena in Summerlin on Friday, September 11. From there the group traveled to the Rookie Faceoff in San Jose, which ran September 12 to 15. That is the whole runway. One practice at home, then games.

The Review-Journal published a short piece naming three players to keep an eye on during that window. Their picks were not the loudest names or the highest draft picks. They were the players whose next step is the most interesting one.

Ben Hemmerling is the clearest example. He was a sixth-round pick in 2022, which usually means a long road and no guarantees. Last season he answered that with 50 points in 68 games for Henderson. He also carried a plus-26 mark at five-on-five, meaning his team was on the right side of the goal count by a wide margin when he was on the ice in even-strength situations. Scoring gets attention. Scoring while your line is also winning the run of play is the harder trick.

Trevor Connelly is the other name we can confirm. He wore No. 24 at camp. Numbers in the 20s and 30s are the numbers you often see on players the organization treats as close to the main roster, while camp invitees and later draft picks tend to get numbers up in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. That is a soft signal, not a rule, and it can change week to week. Still, fans read it every September.

Hemmerling's No. 63 is a good reminder that the number is not the story. A sixth-round pick with a 50-point season in the American Hockey League does not need a low number to be taken seriously. He needs minutes, and rookie camp plus the Rookie Faceoff is where the coaching staff decides how many of those minutes he has earned.

The 23-player camp roster is small on purpose. There is nowhere to hide in a group that size. Every player gets real reps. Every shift gets watched by people who write reports. A rookie camp is closer to a three-day job interview than to a tryout.

Young hockey players lined up along the boards listening to a coach during camp

Why It Matters to Las Vegas Residents

Most Clark County families are never going to see these players at T-Mobile Arena first. They are going to see them in Henderson. That is the practical reason a short list of three names is worth reading. The prospects who take a step at rookie camp are the ones most likely to be on the ice for the Henderson Silver Knights this season, where group tickets start at $35.

That price point is the part I would circle if I had kids in the house. Thirty-five dollars per seat in a group is real family entertainment money in a town where a lot of live events are priced for visitors instead of residents. It puts a full night out inside a normal weekend budget, and it puts your family close enough to the glass to actually learn the game.

There is a second reason this matters locally. Youth hockey in the Las Vegas valley keeps growing, and it grows fastest when kids can see a path. A sixth-round pick who put up 50 points in the American Hockey League is a much more useful example for a 10 year old than a first-overall superstar. Hemmerling's season says the door is not only open to the obvious prospects. It is open to the ones who keep getting better after the draft.

For homeowners, the connection is quieter but it is real. Summerlin and Henderson both built part of their family identity around ice. City National Arena is a Summerlin anchor that draws people in on ordinary weekday mornings, not just event nights. Amenities like that do not show up as a line item in a home appraisal, but they show up in how quickly a neighborhood sells and who wants to live there.

And there is the simple community piece. Rookie camp week is one of the few times of year when the gap between a professional franchise and the people who live nearby gets small. The players are young. The crowds are manageable. The whole thing feels like a neighborhood rink instead of a sold out arena.

It also gives locals something to talk about that has nothing to do with the Strip. A lot of Las Vegas conversation gets pulled toward whatever is happening downtown or on the resort corridor. A three-name list of prospects at a Summerlin practice rink is a resident story. It is the kind of thing you hear about from a neighbor, not from a travel article.

Families watching a hockey game from the seats close to the ice

Background and History

Every NHL organization runs some version of rookie camp in early September, and every one of them uses it the same way. It is the first live look at drafted players, signed prospects, and camp invitees after a summer of training. Coaches watch conditioning. Development staff watch habits. Front office people watch who competes when they are tired.

The tournament piece is newer than the camp piece. Multi-team rookie showcases like the one in San Jose grew out of the simple problem that intrasquad scrimmages only tell you so much. Prospects need to play against other prospects who are also trying to earn something. That is why the schedule runs the way it does, with a home practice first and games immediately after.

For the Golden Knights, City National Arena has been the front door of that process since the franchise started. It is the practice facility in Summerlin, it is where a lot of local hockey gets played, and it is where fans have learned they can go see the next group before anyone outside Nevada knows the names.

The Henderson connection is the other half of the history. Having the American Hockey League affiliate in the same valley as the NHL club is unusual and useful. A player can be reassigned without a plane ticket. A family can follow one player through two levels without leaving Clark County. Hemmerling's 68-game season in Henderson happened 20 minutes from the arena where he is trying to end up.

That structure is also why a sixth-round pick gets a fair hearing here. When the affiliate is local, the coaching staff sees the player constantly rather than in scouting clips. Fifty points and a plus-26 at five-on-five is not a stat line someone had to go digging for. It happened in front of the people making the decisions.

It is worth understanding what a sixth-round pick normally means. The later rounds of a draft are where teams take swings on players who are young for their age group, still growing into their bodies, or playing in leagues that are harder to scout. Most of those picks never sign a professional contract. The few who do usually take longer to arrive than a first-round pick, and they arrive with a different reputation, built on work rather than on projection.

That is the frame to keep in mind when you read Hemmerling's 50 points in 68 games. It is not just a good season. It is a good season from a player the league did not expect much from four years ago, produced in a professional league against grown men. Front offices notice that specific combination, because it suggests the player's ceiling was underestimated rather than already reached.

The plus-26 at five-on-five matters for a related reason. Plus-minus at even strength strips out power play time, which is where a lot of inflated point totals come from. A strong five-on-five number says the player was helping his team in the ordinary parts of the game, not just in the moments designed to create offense.

Empty ice rink with freshly resurfaced ice and arena seating in the background

What Happens Next

The Rookie Faceoff in San Jose ran September 12 to 15, so by the time most people read a story like this one, the games are already on tape. What comes next is the part that actually decides things. Main training camp follows rookie camp, and that is where these players stop competing against other prospects and start competing against professionals with contracts.

For Hemmerling, the question is whether a 50-point season in Henderson translates when the checking gets harder. Point totals at one level do not automatically carry to the next. What usually carries is the underlying stuff, and a plus-26 at five-on-five is a hint that his game travels. Watch whether he gets minutes with established players rather than only with other young forwards. That is the tell.

For Connelly, the thing to watch is role. A player wearing No. 24 at rookie camp is usually being looked at as a near-term option rather than a long-term project. Whether that turns into anything depends on main camp and on what the roster needs.

For the third name on the Review-Journal list, we are marking it [NOT VERIFIED] and we would rather come back and add it than publish a guess. If you read the original piece and want to fill in the blank, we will take the correction.

The broader thing to watch is Henderson's opening night roster. That list is the real scoreboard for rookie camp. Whoever moved up in September shows up there in October, and whoever is on it is who your $35 group ticket is buying you a look at.

One more thing to keep in perspective. Rookie camp is a small sample. A player can have a rough three days and still have a great season, and a player can look terrific in September and spend the winter figuring things out. The purpose of the week is information, not a verdict. Treat the Review-Journal's three names as a reading list rather than a ranking.

Ryan's Take

I pay attention to this stuff for a reason that is not really about hockey. When I sit down with a family moving to Summerlin or Henderson, the questions are almost never about square footage first. They are about what their kids are going to do on a Saturday. A rink that runs youth programs, an affiliate team 20 minutes away with $35 group seats, and a pipeline of young players people can actually name adds up to a real answer to that question.

That is also why the Hemmerling story sticks with me. A sixth-round pick who puts up 50 points in 68 games is the version of a sports story that works in a neighborhood. Nobody handed him the spot. He is still climbing. Families who just moved to Nevada and are trying to build something here recognize that shape.

If you are shopping in the northwest valley or in Henderson and ice time matters to your household, say so out loud when you start looking. Proximity to a rink changes which streets make sense, what your weekday mornings look like, and how much driving you sign up for. It is a small filter that saves a lot of miles.

Hockey pucks and a stick resting on the ice near the boards before practice

What You Can Do

Start with Henderson. Silver Knights group tickets start at $35, and that is the cheapest reliable way for a Clark County family to watch these prospects in person over a full season. Group pricing usually means you need a handful of seats together, so it works well for a couple of families going in together, a birthday, or a team outing.

If you want to see the Golden Knights side of the pipeline, keep an eye on the schedule at City National Arena in Summerlin. Camp practices and open skates there are the closest thing Las Vegas has to free professional hockey, and they happen on weekday mornings when the building is quiet enough to actually watch.

For following the players themselves, pick two or three names and track them instead of trying to follow all 23. Watch where they are assigned after main camp, watch what line they skate on in Henderson, and watch the ice time. That is more informative than reading prospect rankings.

And if you have a kid who wants to try the sport, September is the right month to ask around. Local programs build their rosters in the fall, and the valley has more entry-level options than most people assume.

Have questions about how this affects your home or neighborhood? Reach out to Ryan Rose or text/call 702-747-5921 anytime.

Sources

Las Vegas Review-Journal, "3 players to keep an eye on during Golden Knights rookie camp." Published September 2026 [NOT VERIFIED, the exact publication date could not be confirmed because the article body sits behind the Review-Journal bot wall].