Islanders head coach Jack Capuano and GM Garth Snow plan to meet regarding finding some playing time for goaltender Jean-Francois Berube, reports NHL.com’s Brian Compton (Twitter link). Berube has been with the Isles all season but has yet to appear in a single game.
This is the second straight year he has been in this situation as a third string goalie after he was claimed off of waivers back in October of 2015. Clearly the team thinks highly enough of him to keep him around but with Jaroslav Halak and Thomas Greiss both ahead of him on the depth chart, finding playing time for him has been a challenge; he made only seven NHL appearances last year. It’s clear that New York believes Berube would be claimed if he were to be made available via the waiver wire once again.
The Islanders have put Halak on the trade block but have yet to find a suitable return for him while Greiss is a pending unrestricted free agent. As a result, it seems quite plausible that they may want to protect Berube in next June’s expansion draft in which case they will likely stick with three goalies for the rest of the season which means that Berube will be in limbo for a while longer, even if they do get him into a game or two sooner than later.
[Related: Islanders Depth Chart]
More from the Metropolitan:
- Rangers GM Jeff Gorton is riding quite the hot streak when it comes to his acquisitions since the offseason, suggests Newsday’s Steve Zipay. Of their eight pickups, only Nathan Gerbe (who was brought in to battle for one of the final couple of forwards spots) hasn’t panned out. Considering his contract was mutually terminated last month, there were no real repercussions from that signing either. Meanwhile, players like Mika Zibanejad, Michael Grabner (who is among the league leaders in scoring), Brandon Pirri, Nick Holden, and rookie Jimmy Vesey are all playing key roles for New York and in all but Zibanejad’s case, were brought in via free agency or for a nominal price.
- Flyers defenseman Michael Del Zotto will return to the lineup tonight, notes CSN Philly’s Tim Panaccio. He has been a healthy scratch for the past three games after head coach Dave Hakstol wasn’t pleased with his defensive play. He’s expected to take the place of Brandon Manning, who is believed to have a concussion. Philadelphia is also making some lineup changes up front, moving Michael Raffl onto the front line with Brayden Schenn dropping down into a checking role.
- Washington has re-assigned left winger Paul Carey to Hershey of the AHL, the team announced. He has played in just one game with the Caps so far this season but has 14 points (5-9-14) in 16 minor league contests. The Capitals are off until Thursday so they’ll free up a bit of cap space by sending him down for a few days.
It’s a sad shocker Canucks Gm, trader Jim didn’t sign the young gun pirri. He got traded to the ducks for a 7th rounder(!!) last year. I was hopping they’d pick him up, seeing how it could have solve the constant rumbles of acquiring a 20 goal scorer.
I can’t believe Pirri didn’t generate more interest on the trade market last year or on the free agent market. He scored at a near 40 goal pace in 2014-15 and though that pace likely wasn’t sustainable over a full year, his Shooting % wasn’t outrageous(15.4%) which means 25 goals shouldn’t be out of the question.