The first season overseas for Ryan Spooner was quite a productive one. The 28-year old forward recorded 37 points in 43 games for Dinamo Minsk of the KHL, leading the team in scoring despite playing far fewer games than many of his teammates. That led to some questioning whether the former NHL center would return to North America, even though he would have to wait until November for 2020-21 training camp. For now, it seems as though Spooner will be staying overseas.
HC Dinamo announced today that Spooner has signed a new one-year contract, meaning he’ll get another crack at leading them to the Gagarin Cup playoffs.
A veteran of more than 300 NHL games, Spooner was actually quite an effective player at one point for the Boston Bruins. The talented offensive forward recorded 49 points for the team in 2015-16, many coming on the powerplay as David Pastrnak was still just getting his feet wet in the NHL. While his tenure in Boston wasn’t entirely positive, he showed he could at least hold his own if given the opportunity.
Eventually, those opportunities started slipping away and Spooner was shipped to New York and then Edmonton, before eventually being traded to the Vancouver Canucks and bought out. It was certainly an unceremonious end to his NHL career, one that you could imagine he would want to change with another crack in North America at some point. That may be, but he’ll be in the KHL for at least one more season.