TAMPA - Sam O’Reilly, the 20-year-old forward who won back-to-back Memorial Cup championships and was named MVP of both the OHL playoffs and Memorial Cup, skated Saturday with Tampa Bay Lightning NHL veterans for the first time this camp, one day before the team hosts the Nashville Predators in its 2026 preseason opener at 5 p.m.
O’Reilly - the only skater in Group A without an NHL game appearance - practiced on a line with Gage Goncalves and Conor Geekie and worked the penalty kill alongside Jeffrey Viel. He was voted the OHL’s most outstanding player in 2025-26 and enters his first season of professional hockey in 2026-27 competing for a roster spot.
“I’ve watched them for a long time now, and it’s really good to get on the ice with them,” O’Reilly said of skating with Tampa Bay’s NHL veterans. “It’s a lot of fun out there. I’ll just keep working hard and taking in all the details.”
Lightning forward Brayden Point offered an early endorsement of the rookie’s game. “He has really good puck skills, can shoot it well and it looks like he’s a smart player,” Point said. “He really sees things well out there, so it’s exciting to have him and I think he’s done great so far.” Point added that the adjustment to professional speed should come quickly for a player of O’Reilly’s hockey intelligence. “It’s just the speed, the quickness at which things happen. Obviously it’s a different game than junior, but for a guy with his smarts it comes quick, so it’s been exciting to watch him.”
Assistant coach Rob Zettler pointed to O’Reilly’s anticipation as the trait that caught the coaching staff’s attention. “We obviously see what he did in junior. We saw a little bit of him last year at camp. We like his brain. He’s smart enough to get to places early so he can read plays and understand where it’s going. He kind of has a feel for where the puck’s going, so it’s a sign of a good penalty killer,” Zettler said. He tempered expectations with a challenge: “But at the end of the day, we’ll see when the real bullets start flying. He’s a great player who won all those awards in junior, and now it’s the NHL versus the big boys. Let’s see what you’ve got, and he’ll get a chance to show it over these next few games.”
The Lightning have not released their roster for Sunday’s preseason game against Nashville, which could give O’Reilly another opportunity to make his case. The regular season opens Oct. 1 at Madison Square Garden.