The big, bad Knight blueline

Header image for Interrobang article CREDIT: THE LONDON KNIGHTS
Big, bad Nikita Zadorov will be a London Knight this season.

Remember that time when the London Knights had one of the youngest defences in the Ontario Hockey League?

That was a long time ago — almost three months.

Now the Knights have one of the OHL's toughest and oldest defences, and look ready to finally play the hockey they were supposed to.

Nikita Zadorov is back to join the Knights roster after spending time with the Buffalo Sabres in the National Hockey League. Once the Sabres announced they were making front office changes, their “youth movement” was put on a hiatus — meaning Zadorov was expected to return to the OHL.

He has, and the Knights couldn't be happier.

“You see some good organizations and how they go about it,” Sabres head coach Ted Nolan told Buffalo News. “You don't forcefeed somebody and say we're a rebuild. Rebuild is important, but how you rebuild is really important.”

“[GM Pat LaFontaine] and I have been talking about it since we got involved. I think you can have some young kids, a few of them, but not as many as we have.”

At 6 ft., 5 in. and 220 pounds, Zadorov played seven games in the NHL, scoring one goal. He had a -4 rating and hadn't played in a game since November 8.

The Knights hope he'll become their mammoth shutdown defenceman like 2011/12 captain Jarred Tinordi.

Flashback to the 2013 Memorial Cup and the lack of that Tinordi type defenceman was one of the reasons why London couldn't keep up with the Halifax Mooseheads and the Portland Winterhawks.

But Zadorov isn't the only addition to the Knights' blueline.

Knights general manager Mark Hunter sent 18-year-old defenceman Miles Liberati to the North Bay Battalion in exchange for over-ager Zach Bell's rights. Bell is currently in California, playing for the Ontario Reign of the ECHL.

Liberati has four points in 22 games with London and was a +5 this year.

According to Yahoo Sports Neate Sager, Zach Bell inked a deal with the St. John's IceCaps in the American Hockey League after “serving notice that he preferred to play for a contender in his overage season rather than join the Battalion.”

Now that London owns his OHL rights, that wish could come true.

At 6 ft., 2 in. and 228 pounds, the Brampton native adds solid size and experience to the Knights' blueline. Through his short 14- game stint in the ECHL so far, he's got a pair of assists and 20 penalty minutes.

With the addition of Bell, the London Knights have three overage defencemen — Bell, Brady Austin and Alex Basso.

The Knights did have over-ager Paxton Leroux, but he was traded to the Kitchener Rangers on the morning of November 20.

The only downside to the Bell trade is giving up a defenceman like Liberati, who would be returning for next season. Then again, the Hunter brothers want another Memorial Cup this season, and bearing that in mind, this was the right move to make.

Along with the three over-age defencemen, factor in Zadorov, Dakota Mermis and new addition Tim Bender, the Knights look set to finally have the defensive corps they craved — at least on paper.