Ontario Reign: Angus Booth’s Season Review

With the Ontario Reign season over, we will head into our season reviews for the prospects. Up next: Angus Booth!

2024-25 stats

Games:

Goals: 2

Assists: 11

Points: 13

+/-: +6

PIM: 38

2024-25 season

Angus Booth wasn’t a name many people heard about heading into the season, but that changed relatively quickly. From day one, the 21-year-old left-handed defenseman earned high praise from head coach Marco Sturm and teammates for his play.

“I liked him. He played solid. He was one of our best defensemen out there, probably the best, I thought. No mistakes, but showed it all preseason long.” – Sturm on Booth’s play after his first professional game (October 12, 2024 postgame availability).

“Probably. He’s still learning a lot, but that’s the way he plays. A lot of people compare him to Mikey Anderson. Do we ever talk about Mikey? No, right? We never talk enough about those guys who do a lot of things well and also a lot of things for the team.” – Sturm on if Booth is a player who doesn’t get talked about as much (December 15, 2024 postgame availability).

From day one, Booth was a staple, mainly on the third pair, on the backend for Sturm’s squad when he was healthy. The 21-year-old defenseman climbed the trust ladder quickly as Ontario’s bench boss wasn’t afraid to match him up against the opposition’s best players, no matter who the defenseman was paired with. It also helped that the trust had slowly built during the Rookie Faceoff tournament, where the young defenseman had a decent showing. He saw time on the penalty kill, and if not for an injury that caused him to miss 21 games in the second half of the season, he likely would’ve played in every game.

“I think the guys are a lot bigger. The game’s a lot faster. You don’t have a lot of time with the puck.” – Booth on the difference between playing in juniors and the pros (October 12, 2024 postgame availability).

“Backend, I would say Angus Booth has been doing an awesome job. A lot of growth out of him and a lot of development that you can see every day and see him get more comfortable on the ice.” – Jeff Malott on Booth when asked whoch prospects have stood out (December 21, 2024 postgame availability).

Two areas I liked in Booth’s game were his gap control and ability to make the first pass. He is mobile and doesn’t wow you away with flashiness. Like all left-handed defensemen in the Kings’ prospect pool, Booth doesn’t have a lot of upside offensively, but his skating stands out among the group. While he isn’t a flashy, creative offensive defenseman, Booth understands his game and keeps it simple, which attracted the praise he received from the coaching staff and teammates. Although he gained a lot of praise from the coaching staff, he’ll need to get stronger heading into year two. If he makes that jump to the NHL in the future, it’s most likely as a third-pairing defenseman, the pairing he played on most of the season for the Reign.

“Really good year… when young guys come in, you know I have been around a while now, and you try and make their transition to professional hockey a little easier. It’s why I asked him and Frankie [Pinelli] to live with me.. but the strides that Boother [Booth] took this year were great. He put the work, and it was able to translate onto the ice. – Joe Hicketts on Booth’s rookie season (April 26, 2024 postgame availability).

“He was excellent. I think that injury threw him off a little bit, but overall, what a great season he had. I’m really looking forward to seeing more and seeing him grow as a person and hockey player.. I think he can easily make the jump to the NHL because he’s that good. If you would’ve told me a year ago, I would probably say not as fast. But he proved everyone wrong.” – Sturm talking about Booth when asked to evaluate the season of the young defensive core (April 26, 2024 postgame availability).

The highlight of his season was scoring his first professional goal in a 6-4 loss to the Colorado Eagles.