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College Hockey Round-Up: 10/14/21

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In college athletics, with rankings adjusted on a weekly basis, the glow of a National Championship only lasts as long as you keep winning. The UMass Minutemen found that out the hard way, debuting at No. 1 for the first time in program history but just two weeks later now sitting at No. 9. The team was swept in their opening week series with Minnesota State, who has taken the crown after opening at No. 4. UMass then did not play this past week, losing more votes as they were unable to bounce back right away. The Minutemen still sit ahead of Hockey East rival Providence College, who sits at No. 10 despite an NCAA-best 3-0-0 record, but the pressure is now on for UMass to pick up some wins if they want to remain in the top ten.

Recent Results

While (now) No. 1 Minnesota State and No. 9 UMass was far and away the highlight of the first week of college hockey action, there were more than a few other notable match-ups. No. 2 St. Cloud State played the bully role against St. Thomas in their Division I debut, recording 12 goals in game one and a shut out in game two. The star-studded No. 3 Michigan Wolverine won handily against Bowling Green in their opener, behind five points apiece from Owen Power (BUF) and Brendan Brisson (VGK).

Last week, a number of top teams collided in what marked the opening series many programs. It was hard to beat a clash of early favorites, as Minnesota State and St. Cloud State split their weekend series but stayed atop the rankings. No. 4 Minnesota was able to take home two wins easily against Mercyhurst, but No. 5 Minnesota-Duluth had a statement weekend, sweeping No. 20 Bemidji State. No. 6 Boston College and No. 8 Quinnipiac played to a tie, but Quinnipiac picked up a win the next night against No. 18 Northeastern. The surprise of the weekend was a sweep by No. 16 Michigan Tech of Wisconsin by a combined score of 10-3, vaulting the Huskies up the rankings and knocking the Badgers out.

This weekend, all eyes will be on Duluth as the host Bulldogs bring in Minnesota State, Michigan, and Providence for a mini-tournament of top-ten teams. No. 7 North Dakota will be tested by Bemidji State after picking up two easy wins last weekend, while St. Cloud and Minnesota will square off in a battle of undefeated top-five teams. Huskies super-senior goalie David Hrenak (LAK) has started all four games for St. Cloud and has a .961 save percentage and 0.84 GAA, making him quite possibly the most impressive player thus far in the young season and a pro-ready prospect to watch.

An Update On Alaska

Only one team from Alaska is taking part in the 2021-22 season, as Anchorage folded their program this summer leaving only Fairbanks to compete. Luckily, that will revert back next season. Anchorage announced in August that they had raised enough money to meet their fundraising goal for reinstating the team. The Sea Wolves will be back in action next year and are already closing in on a new coach, revealing three finalists late last month.

Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reports that the NHL’s newest club, the Seattle Kraken, had a hand in raising money for Anchorage’s return. In doing so, they have built a strong relationship with the school and fans in the state. Friedman speculates that an outdoor game in Alaska, similar to the Lake Tahoe event last season, could be on the NHL’s slate before too long with the Kraken likely to host.

COVID Still Kicking Around

Though the expectation is that the COVID-19 pandemic will be much better controlled at all levels of hockey this season, the reality is that it is still likely to cause some issues. It didn’t take long for the virus to rear its ugly head at the college level. This weekend’s series between UMass Lowell and LIU has been postponed due to a breakout in the Sharks locker room. The two-game set has been changed to single games in November and February.

While LIU certainly hopes to get healthy in time to avoid further delays, it is the River Hawks who could feel the brunt of this delay. Just outside the top 20 in the initial rankings, Lowell dropped one of its first two games against Arizona State and then was off last week, losing several votes in the process. Another week off won’t help them in the rankings, but the team hopes to be fresh and ready to face Michigan State and Hockey East rival Boston University in their next two series.

Snapshots: Konecny, Rieder, Flames

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Travis Konecny struggled at time last season but is refocused and ready to resume his upward trajectory as a budding star for the Philadelphia Flyers. However, the 2015 first-round pick could have been in a very different spot to being the new campaign. Sportset’s Elliotte Friedman reports that the Flyers received considerable interest in Konecny this off-season and “easily could have traded him”. However, the team felt their best option was instead to hold on to the young winger and hope that he gets back on track. Konecny’s 61 points in 66 games in 2019-20 had him looking like a future cornerstone player, so his regression to 34 points in 50 games last season caught many off guard. Philadelphia staying loyal to their promising forward could be the fuel he needs to bounce back this year.

  • After failing to earn a contract on a PTO, something he has previously done on more than one occasion, veteran forward Tobias Rieder may finally be moving on from the NHL. After seven seasons and nearly 500 games with five different NHL teams, Rieder’s tryout with the Anaheim Ducks could mark the end of his career in North America. John Matisz of The Score reports that Rieder is expected to sign with the SHL’s Vaxjo Lakers. Although it is only a one-year deal for a 28-year-old player, Rieder will likely have to tear it up in Sweden to get yet another look in the NHL.
  • The Calgary Flames have announced a plethora of hockey operations changes. The most notable move is a shift in coaching personnel with long-time assistant coach and former NHLer Martin Gelinas moving into a development coach role and fellow former assistant Ray Edwards taking on a front office position as Director of Player Development. The team has also added Derek Clancey as a pro scout and David Akerblom, Jason Taylor, and Trevor Hanson as area amateur scouts.

Gabriel Landeskog Suspended Two Games

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The Department of Player Safety has handed out the first suspension of the regular season, banning Gabriel Landeskog of the Colorado Avalanche for the next two games. Landeskog delivered a hard check to Chicago Blackhawks forward Kirby Dach in last night’s game. As the accompanying video explains:

It is important to note that Landeskog is in control of this play. Dach is on one knee facing the wall, and is defenseless in this situation. Sliding along the ice with limited ability to evade or brace for contact. Landeskog has enough time to recognize the situation his opponent is in and rather than avoiding contact or minimizing the force of the hit, chooses to drive the vulnerable Dach into the wall with considerable force. It is the combination of the defenseless position Dach is in, the player’s dangerous distance from the boards at the time of contact, and the speed and force of the hit that caused this hit to rise to the level of supplementary discipline. 

Notably, Dach did not suffer a serious injury on the play but Landeskog does have three suspensions on his record already. Though he is no longer considered a repeat offender in terms of salary forfeiture, those suspensions are taken into account when deciding suspension length.

The team was already without Nathan MacKinnon last night, who is still in the COVID protocol after a positive test result. They now may be without both for Saturday night’s match against the St. Louis Blues. Landeskog will also miss next Tuesday’s match against the Washington Capitals.

Latest On Jack Eichel

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It appeared as though there was some momentum toward a Jack Eichel trade a week ago, but things have gone quiet once again on one of the biggest stories in the NHL. With the season underway there is no lack of headlines and narratives to take the attention of hockey fans across the league, but every one of them is still keeping one eye on the Buffalo Sabres and their malcontent star. Today, Emily Kaplan on ESPN’s The Point explained the current situation with regards to Eichel:

Where we stand now is there are five teams still in on Jack Eichel, and those are teams who believe they can fit his they can fit his $10MM salary into their cap situation. Maybe that means moving some contracts or whatever. All of those teams though have agreed Jack Eichel will get the disk replacement surgery that he wants.

If there is a trade in the near future, Eichel still faces a major neck surgery that will keep him out of the NHL for several months. That makes it extremely difficult for any contender to acquire the Sabres former captain, though easier to swallow if it’s soon enough that he could potentially return for the end of the season. The one thing to consider when it comes to cap situations is that Eichel’s contract will be able to be moved to long-term injured reserve, though if he’s back before the playoffs the team would need to have the applicable room to activate him.

There’s also the factor of Buffalo’s cap, which will need money coming back the other way to stay above the lower limit. Sending money the other way seems likely for any team acquiring a long-term $10MM cap hit, though it still makes things more complicated.

Interestingly in these cases, a quiet period often shows up as the talks get more serious and the teams involved don’t want any leaking information to spoil the negotiation. It’s not clear if that’s the case with Eichel, but with five teams still interested and willing to greenlight his preferred surgery, it seems like a resolution of some sort is still possible in the near future.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Emil Bemstrom To Miss 4-6 Weeks

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The Columbus Blue Jackets start their season tonight, but they won’t have Emil Bemstrom on the ice for a while yet. The team announced that the young forward has been placed on injured reserve with a left oblique strain and is expected to miss four to six weeks. Bemstrom suffered the injury at practice on Tuesday.

The 22-year-old forward wasn’t expected to be a key player for the Blue Jackets early this season anyway, but his absence only weakens the depth of a team that already has a very uncertain offensive attack. There is without a doubt talent on the Columbus roster, but how it comes together for a full regular season remains to be seen.

Bemstrom, a fourth-round pick from 2017, saw his stock skyrocket in 2018-19 when he put up 23 goals and 35 points in 47 games as a rookie in the SHL, and when he arrived in North America things seemed right on track. In his first NHL season he scored ten goals and 20 points in 56 games, but managed just five points in 2020-21. With Cole Sillinger playing his way onto the team in training camp, there likely wasn’t room on the opening day lineup for Bemstrom anyway.

The question now becomes how he fights his way onto that lineup in the future. A six-week absence will certainly not help his case, though there will obviously be other injuries throughout the year. Interestingly, Bemstrom is still waiver-exempt, meaning that when he comes back he would not be limited to a minor league conditioning stint, but could get up to full speed with a longer stretch with the Cleveland Monsters.

Washington Capitals Claim Dennis Cholowski

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The Seattle Kraken have lost one of their expansion picks to waivers, as Dennis Cholowski has been claimed by the Washington Capitals according to Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet. To make room on the roster, the team has loaned Beck Malenstyn back to the AHL.

This is exactly the risk that we discussed earlier this summer, as the Kraken had collected almost a dozen defensemen who all required waivers to go to the minor leagues. While they managed to get several through in the preseason, Cholowski is now lost just a few months after being selected from the Detroit Red Wings in the Seattle expansion draft. He did not play for the team in the opener after Jamie Oleksiak was cleared from the COVID protocol at the last minute, and will now head to Washington where it’s nearly as crowded on the back end.

The Capitals used all six of their defensemen last night for at least 16:50, with Justin Schultz being the lowest on that pole but contributing a goal and six shots to the effort. Matt Irwin, who was serving as the team’s seventh defenseman, seems likely to be the odd man out when their newest player arrives. That doesn’t mean the 23-year-old Cholowski is in line for big minutes though, he’ll have to prove that his poor results in Detroit were more because of the team around him than his own shortcomings.

But he’s also a 2016 first-round pick that has over 100 games at the NHL level already, something that’s certainly worth another look for a team that can afford it. Roster spots are thin around the league, but given that Malenstyn can be moved down without issue and Irwin might even clear waivers if needed, the Capitals could take a chance. If they ever want to place Cholowski back on waivers and send him down, the Kraken would have a chance to reclaim him.

Chicago Blackhawks Trying To Trade Andrew Shaw’s Contract

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The Chicago Blackhawks are currently over the salary cap, using the relief pool created from placing Caleb Jones and Andrew Shaw on long-term injured reserve this week. That may not last for long though, as Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff reports that the team is “actively” trying to trade Shaw’s contract. The veteran forward is not expected to play again.

By moving it, as PuckPedia explains on Twitter, the team could get under the cap once Jones is healthy enough to return and start accruing cap space for a potential move later in the season. That was the risk of acquiring high-priced talent like Seth Jones, Marc-Andre Fleury, and Tyler Johnson in the offseason, the team is not currently set up to make a big splash partway through the year if they feel this group is good enough to go on a playoff run (first-game performance notwithstanding).

Seravalli tweets that the Shaw contract, which had a $1MM signing bonus and $1.9MM salary this season, is insured, meaning it likely wouldn’t cost an acquiring team much in actual dollars. A team that is already in LTIR could add it without much trouble, or a team that is nowhere near the ceiling could accept it without putting them in a difficult situation.

The Blackhawks of course will have to use an asset to rid themselves of Shaw’s deal, as other teams have done in the past, but it shouldn’t be too expensive. It very well could even become something of a reverse bidding war, with rebuilding teams offering their services for less and less of a return, just to secure something. Regardless, the Blackhawks obviously don’t want to sit in LTIR relief for the entire season as so many of the other teams around the league are currently doing.

That could have been guessed from the way they already jettisoned Brent Seabrook’s deal, though that contract stretched beyond this season and would have had ramifications down the road. Seabrook was sent to the Tampa Bay Lightning in the offseason–who some would say are the kings of operating in long-term injured reserve–but by taking Johnson’s contract back the Blackhawks actually ended up acquiring a second-round pick in the deal.

Gabriel Landeskog To Have Hearing With Department Of Player Safety

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Just two days into the season and the Department of Player Safety has some work to do. Colorado Avalanche captain Gabriel Landeskog will have a hearing for his hit on Chicago Blackhawks forward Kirby Dach last night.

Partway through the third period, Landeskog delivered a hard check while Dach was already down on one knee, driving him into the boards with quite a bit of force. He received a two-minute boarding penalty for the play, while also taking a roughing penalty for the scrum that occurred with Tyler Johnson immediately afterward.

Dach escaped major injury, which will help Landeskog’s case with the DoPS, but this isn’t the first time he’s been given supplementary discipline. In fact, he has been suspended on several different occasions in the past, for both dangerous hits and cross-checking in particular. Though he won’t be considered a repeat offender in terms of salary forfeiture, the league will include his entire discipline history in deciding how to punish him in this instance.

Ottawa Senators Sign Brady Tkachuk

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The Ottawa Senators held strong in their ask of a long-term contract for Brady Tkachuk, and it appears as though it has paid off. Ottawa has signed their prized RFA to a seven-year, $57.5MM contract. That makes Tkachuk the highest-paid player on the Senators, just eclipsing the $8MM cap hit that Thomas Chabot carries. David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period reports that the deal includes a full no-movement clause in the final three years. The full breakdown is as follows:

  • 2021-22: $4.0MM salary
  • 2022-23: $6.5MM salary
  • 2023-24: $10.5MM salary
  • 2024-25: $10.5MM salary
  • 2025-26: $10.5MM salary
  • 2026-27: $8.5MM salary
  • 2027-28: $7.0MM salary

Senators GM Pierre Dorion released a statement:

This is an exciting day for the Ottawa Senators. Brady possesses a very dynamic skill set and is a prototypical power forward in today’s NHL. He scores goals, he plays physical and exemplifies what it means to be a pro for all players in our organization.

As expected, the deal does not include any signing bonus money, a staple of Dorion’s negotiations. Tkachuk is expected to be in the building tonight for the team when they take on the Toronto Maple Leafs, but will not play, according to Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff.

Compared to the short-term deals that could have taken Tkachuk to unrestricted free agency much quicker, this is a huge win for the Senators. They will pay their star forward a bit more than some of his contemporaries–Andrei Svechnikov signed an eight-year, $62MM deal ($7.75MM AAV)–but will not have to worry about another negotiation for quite some time.

Technically, because the season has already started, Tkachuk’s cap hit for the 2021-22 season will actually be slightly higher, coming in at $8,330,674 according to CapFriendly. That really doesn’t mean much for the Senators, who are nowhere near the cap ceiling. The hit will come down to $8,205,714 for the final six years of the deal, still making Tkachuk the most expensive player on the team.

There is no doubt that the 22-year-old forward is the heartbeat of the Senators, though it is important to remember that this is still a player that has never eclipsed 22 goals or 45 points in a single season. Ottawa very likely paid a premium in this deal because of their history of losing (trading) stars as they approached free agency, something they obviously wanted to avoid in this situation. The team is expecting big things from the young group they’ve assembled, and needed the leader back on the ice to push things in the right direction.

That essentially ends the RFA period for this season, with all of the major players signed. Quite a bit of money was handed out this offseason as things return to normal, even though there is no significant salary cap movement expected until 2025.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Zach Bogosian Out 4-6 Weeks

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The return of Zach Bogosian to Tampa Bay is off to a tough start. After the Lightning lost game one of this season to the Pittsburgh Penguins, Bogosian won’t get another chance to get on the ice for quite some time. The veteran defenseman is out four to six weeks with a lower-body injury, according to team reporter Bryan Burns. The team has recalled Andrej Sustr in his place.

It’s been a very interesting few years for Bogosian, who was a highly-paid member of the Buffalo Sabres as of February 2020. The Sabres decided to waive and then assign Bogosian to the minor leagues, which didn’t sit well with the veteran defenseman, so he decided not to report and forfeited the rest of his $6MM 2019-20 salary. Turned out it was quite the successful move, as after going through a contract termination, Bogosian signed on with the Lightning just in time to help them win the Stanley Cup.

Last season, he ended up with the Toronto Maple Leafs as a Cup-winning veteran that was supposed to bring playoff toughness, but failed to help that team slay their first-round demons. Why chase rings around the league when you can just stay in Tampa? That’s exactly what Bogosian did this offseason, signing a three-year deal with the Lightning with a full no-trade clause.

Now out more than a month, the Lightning will need to find an answer on their third pair that isn’t Bogosian. Cal Foote, the obvious choice, is still working his way back from his own injury and was wearing a red no-contact sweater at practice. So it’s Sustr for the time being, despite the 6’7″ behemoth last playing in the NHL during the 2018-19 season.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

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