After five seasons in the Los Angeles Kings depth chart, defenseman Jacob Moverare is headed back overseas. He has signed with EV Zug of Switzerland’s National League per a team announcement. Moverare served as Los Angeles’ full-time, extra defenseman last season and slotted into just 15 NHL games.
This move will return him to a feature role after a failed run at climbing the Kings’ depth chart.
Los Angeles selected Moverare in the fourth-round of the 2016 NHL Draft. He was drafted out of Sweden’s U20 league but followed his selection with two seasons in Canada’s OHL. His junior career was followed by a turn towards the pros, though his break into the pro flight came in Europe.
Moverare played through two seasons in Sweden’s SHL, then one season in Finland’s Liiga, before finally debuting in the AHL in 2021.
Moverare split the next four seasons between the NHL and AHL rosters with meager scoring and little spark. Moverare scored two assists in the first 19 games of his NHL career, but required another 40 games to tack on another two points. By the end of the 2024-25 campaign, he had accumulated just 71 points in 163 AHL games and 11 points in 109 NHL games.
He was unable to add to either total last season, going scoreless in his appearances with the Kings.
Moverare has a strong international resume, winning an SHL championship in 2019 and Europe’s Champions Hockey League in 2019 and 2020. He also gathered silver medals at the 2015 Ivan Hlinka Memorial tournament, 2016 World U18 Championships, and 2018 World Junior Championships with Team Sweden. His best play has come overseas – a fact that Moverare will now lean into with a return to Europe.
He joins a Zug club that won back-to-back championships in 2021 and 2022 – but has since struggled to break past the league’s semi-finals. Moverare could support that push as one of only two defenders on the Zug roster with NHL experience, alongside former New York Rangers blue-liner Raphael Diaz.