Found money: How Nick Schmaltz evolved to fit Mammoth’s needs
First-line center is the hardest position for an NHL team to fill. In a time of need, Schmaltz stepped up and did it.
Utah Mammoth center Nick Schmaltz (8) and Los Angeles Kings center Anže Kopitar (11) prepare for a faceoff during the first period of an NHL game at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City on Monday, Dec. 8, 2025. | Rio Giancarlo, Deseret News There are two ways for a professional sports team to fill its needs: acquire a player or promote someone from within.
All else being equal, the latter option is always preferable. It’s gratifying to see an existing player take on increased responsibility, and the team doesn’t have to give up assets in a trade or overpay in free agency. In the NHL, the number-one center spot is one of the hardest to fill.
Those guys rarely become available as free agents and teams don’t trade them away for anything less than an arm and a leg. So, when it became obvious during the then-Utah Hockey Club’s inaugural season that they’d need an upgrade at 1C, it seemed as though the team’s dreams of success might be on hold until Logan Cooley was ready for that responsibility. Utah’s Summer 2025 additions included everything but a center.
Again, those guys don’t grow on trees, so that wasn’t exactly surprising. But it did look like it would hurt them when Cooley, Barrett Hayton, Jack McBain and Alexander Kerfoot were all injured in the preseason. It was at that point that Nick Schmaltz took off his glasses and parted his buttoned shirt, revealing the Superman logo on his chest.