Kemp grows from Yale to NHL contract

Phil Kemp had options, his brother pointed out. Wait it out to the summer, and the Yale senior could’ve become a free agent, eligible to sign with any National Hockey League team he wanted.

“It means a lot to him to represent Yale and the state. He loves Connecticut,” Larken Kemp said. “His big character trait is loyalty. That’s why he didn’t push it to free agency like a lot of college guys do today.”

Phil Kemp signed his entry-level NHL contract with the team that drafted him in 2017, the Edmonton Oilers. The team announced the three-year deal Wednesday morning.

“Our parents gave us enough runway to chase our dreams,” Larken Kemp said.

“At a very, very young age, you could see the joy Phil had in the game of hockey.”

Fulfilling that dream was still bittersweet, though, for the Greenwich native. The Ivy League canceled 202021 winter sports because of the COVID-19 pandemic on Nov. 12, six months to the day after Yale announced that Phil Kemp was to be their men’s hockey captain for this season that wasn’t.

“It was heartbreaking the way it ended,” Kemp said.

“It was heartbreaking for me and my classmates. We felt like we were taking the program to the next level.

“We were champing at the bit for even five games to play together.”

The pandemic hit the Bulldogs directly: The state Department of Public Health connected 19 positive cases to the hockey program. Kemp said he was one of them in October, but he still found a bright take: The team got even tighter.

“I got really lucky. I was asymptomatic, so it wasn’t bad,” he said. “They put us in the quarantine dorms, which was all good: We wanted to protect the community. It ended up being team-bonding.”

He made sure to thank Yale’s coaches, weight-room staff, teammates, everyone who helped him get better over four years in New Haven. He’d worked in particular on his skating, he said.

“I’m obviously not the prettiest skater,” Kemp said, “but I try to get the job done.”

For now he’s training and

skating, but he’s not sure what’s next. It’s unclear when NHL camps might open. The AHL won’t begin until February at the earliest. Now that Kemp is under contract, the Oilers could loan him to a team in Europe to get him playing.

Kemp was the Oilers’ seventh-round draft pick in 2017. Seventh-rounders aren’t always a sure thing: Edmonton used 10 seventhround draft picks from 2005, when the draft contracted from nine rounds to seven, to 2016. Five signed NHL contracts with the team, but five did not. (A couple, including former Quinnipiac standout Kellen Jones, signed minor-league deals with Oilers’ affiliates.)

Larken Kemp said his brother has constantly outperformed people’s expectations, playing an old-school, anything-forthe-team game.

“It speaks a lot for his intangibles,” said Larken Kemp, himself a pro lacrosse player after a threetime All-America stint at Brown; their sister, Elizabeth, rowed for Harvard.

“He’s been in a position of influence in every locker room he’s ever been. Follow the record: He’s worn the

‘C’ (as captain) basically every team he’s ever played for, and he’s played with some ultra-talented guys.”

Phil Kemp played two years with the National Team Development Program before coming to Yale. He and the national team won gold at the 2017 Under-18 World Championship, with a handful of players who have gone on to establish themselves already in the NHL. Two years later, they took silver at the World Junior Championship.

Before that, Kemp had played two years at Brunswick. Bring up that time and you can hear the smile through the phone.

“Some of the best moments in my hockey career were at Brunswick,” Kemp said. “There’s nothing like suiting up with your best buddies, everyone in the locker room, even getting a deli sandwich after.

“Playing at Hartong (Rink), even having your buddies in the crowd: It’s tough to beat. The coaches were unbelievable. There were a lot of characters in the room, too.”