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The Final Four’s ‘Black Aces’

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During the regular season, NHL teams are limited to having 23 players on their roster (barring injuries). Once the playoffs start, those restrictions cease to exist.

’Black Aces’ are players who are on their team’s roster, but aren’t in the lineup. Here’s a look at the current list of ’Black Aces’:

Anaheim Ducks
D Kevin Bieksa (lower-body injury sustained in Game 1 vs Edmonton)
C Sam Carrick (healthy scratch)
D Simon Despres (has not played since October with concussion issues)
R Patrick Eaves (lower-body injury sustained in Game 3 vs Edmonton)
G Jhonas Enroth (health scratch)
D Korbinian Holzer (healthy scratch)
R Nic Kerdiles (healthy scratch)
R Logan Shaw (lower-body injury sustained in Game 5 vs Edmonton)
D Clayton Stoner (health scratch after being injured for six months)

Nashville Predators
D Anthony Bitetto (healthy scratch)
L Kevin Fiala (out for season with broken femur sustained in Game 1 vs St. Louis)
C Vernon Fiddler (healthy scratch)
D Petter Granberg (health scratch)
D Brad Hunt (healthy scratch)
R P.A. Parenteau (healthy scratch)
C Colton Sissons (healthy scratch)

Ottawa Senators
D Mark Borowiecki (lower-body injury)
C Chris DiDomenico (healthy scratch)
D Andreas Englund (healthy scratch)
G Andrew Hammond (healthy scratch)
D Ben Harpur (healthy scratch)
D Jyrki Jokipakka (healthy scratch)
L Chris Kelly (healthy scratch)
R Chris Neil (healthy scratch)
G Matt O’Connor (healthy scratch)
L Viktor Stalberg (lower-body injury sustained in Game 1 vs Pittsburgh)
C Colin White (healthy scratch)

Pittsburgh Penguins
R Josh Archibald (healthy scratch)
D Trevor Daley (lower-body injury)
R Patric Hornqvist (day-t0-day with upper-body injury)
G Tristan Jarry (healthy scratch)
D Kris Letang (done for season after undergoing neck surgery)
D Justin Schultz (day-t0-day with upper-body injury)
D Mark Streit (healthy scratch)
C Oskar Sundqvist (healthy scratch)
R Bryan Rust (day-t0-day with upper-body injury)

NHL Announces Finalists For GM Of The Year

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The NHL continues to unveil award finalists ahead of this June’s NHL Awards in Vegas. Today: the General Manager of the Year.

Edmonton’s Peter Chiarelli, Nashville’s David Poile, and Ottawa’s Pierre Dorion are the three finalists. All three men lead their team’s to great seasons, and solid playoff runs, with Nashville and Ottawa currently in their respective Conference Finals.

Chiarelli made a blockbuster trade last June, trading Taylor Hall for Adam Larsson. He also signed Kris Russell and Matt Benning to finally stabilize the Oilers’ defense. Previous Chiarelli acquisition Cam Talbot started 73 games and was likely the best Oiler not named Connor McDavid. The Oilers improved to 103 points, and finished second in the Pacific Division. However, not all of Chiarelli’s decisions worked out: backup Jonas Gustavsson allowed 17 goals in seven appearances before hitting the waiver wire, and trade deadline acquisition David Desharnais scored just three goals and eight points in 31 games between the stretch drive and playoffs.

Poile has been involved in some major trades over the last few seasons, and perhaps none were bigger than the P.K. Subban for Shea Weber blockbuster last June. Our Seth Lawrence recently took a look at the win-win trades that Poile has made while building his Conference finalist. Besides Subban-for-Weber, Poile also traded Seth Jones for number one center Ryan Johansen and acquired sniper James Neal for Patric Hornqvist. Poile is the only GM in Predator’s history; he took the helm of the team in 1998. He has been nominated four times for the GM of the Year Award.

While Poile has been GM for 19 years, Dorion has only been at the helm of the Senators for 13 months. His biggest move was the Mika Zibanejad-for-Derick Brassard trade last summer. He’s also brought in Mike Condon, Alexandre Burrows, Viktor Stalberg, and Tommy Wingels as his team posted 98 points and their first Conference Finals berth since 2007.

Pittsburgh’s Jim Rutherford is the current holder of the award.

Takeaways From Peter Chiarelli’s Year-End Press Conference

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The fact that the Oilers will be without top-four defenseman Andrej Sekera for a decent chunk of next season wasn’t the only notable bit of news that  came from GM Peter Chiarelli’s year-end press conference on Tuesday.

He also discussed his summer plans for the team, and no, he doesn’t see another Taylor Hall-for-Adam Larsson type blockbuster. Chiarelli did say that he was open to the idea of trading down in the upcoming Entry Draft; the team has the 22nd overall pick, no second, and two third-round picks in the first 93 picks. Because this draft is seen as weaker than previous years, Chiarelli said acquiring a second-round pick isn’t a necessity but that if a trade came up, he’d consider moving down from #22 to acquire more picks.

Also on the trade front, Chiarelli called the widespread criticism of Jordan Eberle and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins’s playoffs unfair. Trade speculation has run wild around those two, especially Eberle, but Chiarelli pumped the breaks on the suggestion that they need to be dumped at any cost. He praised Eberle’s improvement along the boards, and talked about the lack of confidence that the sniper suffered from. Eberle took 208 shots, which is the most he’s taken so far in his seven-year career, but shot at just a nine per cent rate, considerably down from his previous career-average of 14 per cent. Had he shot at that rate, he’d have scored 29 goals instead of 20. Chiarelli stressed that the team will be “careful about how [they] evaluate him.”

As far as Nugent-Hopkins, the general manager stressed the team-wide need of improving in the face-off circle. Chiarelli said that he gave Nugent-Hopkins “homework” for the summer. While Chiarelli kept a positive tone publicly, with both men on the trading block it would have been a poor decision to criticize them. With questions remaining about what position Leon Draisaitl will ultimately play and the acquisition of David Desharnais not being overly successful, Chiarelli will likely be looking to give Todd McLellan some more options in the face-off circle.

The main priority for Edmonton is signing their two best forwards to new contracts. Draisaitl is an RFA this summer, and Connor McDavid will be eligible to extend his deal on July 1. Chiarelli called McDavid priority one and Draisaitl priority two of this summer. All other free agents, like rugged winger and playoff cult hero Zack Kassian and controversial defenseman Kris Russell will have to wait until Chiarelli knows what sort of numbers he’s dealing with. The two men combined for about $6.4MM in cap space this past season (entry-level contracts plus bonuses), but will account for as much as $20MM by next season.

As far as the potential of a rival team offer sheeting Draisaitl, Chiarelli isn’t worried about that. Last week, I wrote about why offer sheets are so rare, and Chiarelli mentioned one of the stated reasons. The Oilers have the cap space to match any offer sheet to Draisaitl, so the only reason another team would submit an offer is to jack up the price. It’s highly unlikely that a team would go out of their way to try hurt another team’s cap situation because of the negative affect it would have on that GM’s reputation.

Had Sekera not been injured, the Oilers defense might not have had any changes on opening night. Oscar Klefbom is developing into a good top-pairing defenseman, Larsson had a strong first season, Darnell Nurse and Matt Benning have made strides together, and Chiarelli expressed interest in re-signing Russell and Eric Gryba. Chiarelli admitted the team doesn’t have a championship defense (yet). He pointed to Nashville and Anaheim, saying that “it would be nice to have a D at that level.”

Russell is loved by old-school hockey people, and considered highly overrated by people with a mind for advanced stats. While Russell blocks a ton of shots (213 in 68 games), he bleeds possession and hasn’t had a positive CF% Rel. (scoring chances when he’s on the ice compared to off the ice) since 2012 when he was in Columbus. He also scored just one goal this season despite playing the third-most minutes of all skaters. However, the injury to Sekera could motivate the Oilers to sign Russell to help fill the void. As mentioned above, Chiarelli will wait until he knows what McDavid and Draisaitl will cost before making any considerable signing, even if it means waiting until after July 1.

Chiarelli said the team blew his expectations out of the water, finishing with 103 points and getting to Game 7 of the second round. This summer will be about locking up key pieces and letting the young roster develop next season.

Islanders Notes: de Haan, Buchberger, Kovalchuk

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Though Elliotte Friedman’s latest “30 Thoughts” column is packed full with interesting information, the most eye opening news might have to do with the New York Islanders. Friedman thinks that the Detroit Red Wings may come calling for Calvin de Haan before the expansion draft, after his excellent World Championship tournament.

de Haan is at risk of being exposed in the expansion draft, as the Islanders currently have to protect Johnny Boychuk due to his no-movement clause.  With Nick Leddy, Travis Hamonic, Thomas Hickey and Ryan Pulock all eligible for selection as well, de Haan will have a hard time earning a protection slot. The Islanders also don’t have a ton of money to offer de Haan as he becomes a restricted free agent, because of the negotiations that are coming down the pipe in the summer of 2018 for the Islanders—not only is John Tavares a free agent but Josh Bailey, Brock Nelson, Ryan Strome, Shane Prince and Alan Quine are all due up.

  • Not only will Luke Richardson join the Islanders’ coaching staff, but Kelly Buchberger will as well. Buchberger was an assistant with the Edmonton Oilers between 2008-14, and has been seen recently with Weight watching WHL games. Buchberger and Weight of course were teammates with the Oilers for nearly a decade.
  • Friedman also touches on one of the hottest-button topics in hockey right now, Ilya Kovalchuk’s potential return. He notes that since Kovalchuk seems to want to play for the Rangers, perhaps he could be swayed to play for the other New York team instead. The Islanders do have a pretty enticing spot open riding shotgun with Tavares, but for the same reason listed above would have trouble giving him anything more than a short term deal. Though the Islanders do have some money hitting LTIR when the season starts in Mikhail Grabovski, that $5MM hurts their cap situation during the summer. It’ll take a lot of work to work Kovalchuk into the current salary structure, but if they were to find a way they’d immediately have one of the most dangerous lines in the league.

Toronto Maple Leafs Sign Calle Rosen, Andreas Borgman

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After a report earlier today that Andreas Borgman was coming to the NHL, the Toronto Maple Leafs have announced they have signed both him and countryman Calle Rosen to two-year entry-level contracts. Rosen had been linked to the Maple Leafs for almost a month now, with reports surfacing that he would sign with the team before long. Mike Babcock told Darren Dreger of TSN just a few days ago that the team would announce some signings soon.

Rosen, 23, is the more experienced of the two and has played the last two seasons for Vaxjo in the Swedish Hockey League. His two-way game is considered ready for at least a part-time role in the NHL, and he will have a chance to break camp with the Maple Leafs on the third-pairing. Both Matt Hunwick and Roman Polak are unrestricted free agents after spending the majority of the season in that role.

Left-handed but capable on both sides of the ice, Rosen is a solid skater that joins the rush and can move the puck effectively out of traffic in his own end. While it’s not a lock that he’ll make much of an impact at the NHL level he provides a depth option that can be inserted right away if need be.

Borgman on the other hand is a little further away at just 21-years old. His path likely begins in the AHL for the Toronto Marlies, where he’ll try to repeat the breakout performance from this season. Named the SHL’s Rookie of the Year, Borgman made the jump from the Allsvenskan quite well and even improved his game further in the postseason. His ceiling likely lands as a depth option as well, but it’s a little less certain at this point.

The Maple Leafs needed depth on the blueline, after going much of the year without injury and still seemingly not having much consistency. While Rosen and Borgman don’t provide the elite right-handed defender they’d like, they do add some options to the system other than prospects Travis Dermott and Andrew Nielsen.

Vegas Golden Knights Announce Chicago Wolves As AHL Affiliate

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The NHL’s newest team has announced their AHL affiliate for the 2017-18 season.  As expected, the Vegas Golden Knights have signed a multi-year partnership with the Chicago Wolves to work as their affiliate. The club wanted to wait until the Wolves season had finished, as it did on Saturday at the hands of the Grand Rapids Griffins. The Wolves made it back to the playoffs under the leadership of former Philadelphia Flyers head coach Craig Berube. The team has previously been the affiliate of the Atlanta Thrashers and Vancouver Canucks, winning two Calder Cups (2002, 2008) along the way.

Chicago has been the affiliate of the St. Louis Blues since 2013, and despite expectations that the two franchises would share the team this season, it won’t be exactly an even split. The Blues have not extended their agreement, but will “associate with the Vegas Golden Knights and supply players to the Golden Knights’ AHL affiliate next season.” Vegas will have full control of Wolves, including staffing decisions.

The Wolves actually play in Rosemont just outside of Chicago, but remain much closer geographically to the Blues than the Golden Knights. As teams try to get their AHL affiliates closer and closer, the Wolves don’t offer much long-term stability for the expansion franchise. Despite the current multi-year deal, a move to somewhere closer to Vegas seems inevitable down the road. There is no word on where the Blues’ next affiliate will be, but it won’t come until 2018-19 at the earliest.

As of this moment, the Golden Knights don’t have any players ticketed for the AHL as just Reid Duke and Vadim Shipachyov are under contract. That will change soon enough though, as the team selects 30 players in the expansion draft and another crop in the entry draft. Duke is likely to spend this year in the minors, as are several of the young options the team has in the expansion draft.

Snapshots: Blues, Wilson, All-Star Game

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The St. Louis Blues cleared house today, firing coaches Ray Bennett, Steve Thomas, Rick Wilson and Ty Conklin. The quartet had hugely varying experience levels, from Wilson’s 27 seasons as an NHL assistant to Thomas’ three. Conklin may be the most surprising though, as he was part of the team—along with assistant GM Martin Brodeur—to turn around Jake Allen’s season after goaltending coach Jim Corsi was fired. Allen’s second-half turnaround continued into the playoffs and helped the Blues make a splash, recording an amazing .935 save percentage in the postseason.

Brodeur is also not returning as the team’s goalie coach, but is heading up a search for a new one. Many would have presumed that Conklin would have been a front-runner given his familiarity with Allen, but apparently they will go in another direction. Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet tweets that both Craig Berube and Darryl Sydor are “good bets” to move up from the Chicago Wolves and take places in the St. Louis coaching staff next season.

  • On Wilson, Friedman believes that he may immediately head to Dallas to reunite with Ken Hitchcock a long-time friend and coaching associate. Wilson was behind the Stars bench going all the way back to the Minnesota North Stars days, and was present for Hitchcock’s entire first run with the team. They won a Stanley Cup together in 1999.
  • The lack of an announcement for next year’s All-Star Game had people wondering if the league was holding out a sliver of possibility of still heading to the Olympics, but it seems as though the announcement will come soon on the host city. After Friedman broke that it may be heading to the southeast this morning, Joe Smith of the Tampa Bay Times reports that the Lightning are the likely candidates. Though it’s “not a done deal yet” Smith writes that Tampa obviously has the capacity to host big events. The city has held several huge sporting events over the years including Super Bowls and Frozen Four tournaments. If the All-Star festivities are announced with the full schedule, it likely means any ray of hope that the league will head to the Olympics is finished. Once plans are set in motion for the city, it would be near-impossible to go back on.

Ralph Krueger Latest To Be Linked To Buffalo Sabres’ Coaching Search

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While the Buffalo Sabres have their new GM in Jason Botterill, the team will take a slow methodical approach to signing a coach. Botterill said recently that he will check out every option, and an interesting name has popped up via Pierre LeBrun of TSN. Ralph Krueger, the former Edmonton Oilers head coach and current chairman of the Southampton Football Club in England is apparently on Botterill’s list of names he’d like to speak with about the job.

Krueger left hockey in 2014 to take on a role in the Premiership, but has been linked to several head coaching vacancies around the NHL in the past year including Vegas and Vancouver. There is clearly a respect for him among the league’s players, as shown during his stint as the head coach of Team Europe this fall at the World Cup. The players spoke out passionately about him as a coach and a man, making many wonder why he hadn’t returned to the NHL already. Krueger has always maintained that he’s focused on his soccer team for the time being though did admit to some “interesting chats.”

Buffalo will turn over every stone for their next head coach, and LeBrun is clear to point out that Krueger may still not even be available for the team. But his return would likely be a welcome one for the team who is looking for someone to the Sabres into something more than just a bunch of great potential. Botterill said he’d like to have a coach in place by the Entry Draft, which takes place just over a month from now.

KHL Notes: Downsizing, Kuznetsov, Kempe

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In a new report from Slava Malamud, the KHL is considering closing the doors on five franchises this summer and reducing its league size to 24. The league has wild competition issues, with the top teams sometimes spending up to 800% more than the poorest teams according to Malamud. This comes right as the KHL itself released a statement about how “further improvement in the financial stability of the KHL” was reached this season.

Malamud lists Novokuznetsk, Ugra, Avtomobilist and Slovan as possibilities for contraction, while noting that Medvescak has already closed its doors. If these teams aren’t familiar to you, you’re not alone as many of them have basically been development and feeder teams for the richer and more successful franchises. Malamud also admits that Sochi is in trouble, though will likely avoid the foreclosure sign for now. As James Mirtle of The Athletic points out, perhaps this instability will make NHL players a bit more hesitant to try the KHL in the coming years.

  • One player who will be tied over the coming months to the KHL is Evgeny Kuznetsov, who becomes a restricted free agent on July 1st. As Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet writes in his latest article, Kuznetsov was very forward when discussing with Craig Custance of ESPN the long negotiation countryman Nikita Kucherov had to go through last summer: “If I would be in [Kucherov’s] position, I would be signed in the KHL for sure. I would sign and say, ’Bye.’ I would buy a beach house and a couple Rolls-Royces.” That outlook may come to the forefront as Washington has trouble fitting in all their current restricted free agents. In addition to Kuznetsov, the Capitals will need to work out contracts with Dmitry Orlov, Andre Burakovsky, Brett Connolly and Nate Schmidt this summer with Philipp Grubauer also on the table should he not be selected in the expansion draft.
  • 28-year old Mario Kempe has signed a one-year two-way deal with the Arizona Coyotes. The team did not release the financials. The older brother of Los Angeles Kings’ first-round pick Adrian Kempe, the Swedish forward has been playing in the KHL for the past three seasons. The winger had 34 points in 56 games this season and has been a consistent goal threat for his entire professional career. While he doesn’t have the upside that Adrian possesses, it would be another depth player to surround the young core Arizona is building, and it likely comes at very little cost.

Andrej Sekera Out 6-9 Months With Torn ACL

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In a huge turn of events for the Edmonton Oilers, the team announced that Andrej Sekera will undergo knee surgery to repair a torn ACL and is looking at a 6-9 month recovery. The defenseman injured the knee against Anaheim, presumably when he left game 5 in the first period.

While the Oilers had several defensemen take solid steps forward in their development, the team still relied heavily on Sekera this season in all situations. The 30-year old defender played over 21 minutes a night and skated on both the powerplay and penalty kill. Sekera is also the team’s highest-paid defender, and has four years left on a deal that pays him $5.5MM per season.

Six months would put Sekera coming back in mid-November, but nine would take the majority of the season away from the defenseman. The Oilers will need to rely even more on Oscar Klefbom and need another step forward for Darnell Nurse and perhaps even Griffin Reinhart. It will also be interesting to see if this increases the chance that Kris Russell is back with the team, after recently stating his hope to stay in Edmonton next season.

Russell had to settle for just a one-year deal last summer after teams pulled away from his weak analytical numbers. After another season where he posted modest point totals, huge blocked shot numbers and bad possession statistics, Russell will likely be in a similar situation with a limited market. Edmonton may have just become his biggest suitor, as they’ll have minutes to go around at least to start the year.

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