March 9: Gogolev has cleared unconditional waivers and will see his contract terminated.
March 8: It seems as though Pavel Gogolev won’t be with the Chicago Blackhawks organization for very long. The young forward is on unconditional waivers today, according to Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet, for the purpose of a contract termination.
Gogolev, 23, was included in the recent Jake McCabe trade with the Toronto Maple Leafs, coming over along with Joey Anderson. His inclusion was mostly about contract slots for Toronto but there was at least some hope that Gogolev could make the jump to the AHL in the Chicago organization.
After two games (and one goal) with the Rockford IceHogs, it appears as though he’s headed back overseas. A contract termination will leave him an unrestricted free agent, able to sign somewhere else to continue his hockey career.
While an overseas assignment is a usual outcome in these situations, it’s not like Gogolev is new to North America. The Russian forward came to Canada a decade ago to play hockey at various academies, before being the eighth overall pick in the 2016 OHL draft.
After a professional career that has been spent mostly in the ECHL, he’ll now have to catch on somewhere else to keep his hockey journey moving forward.
This is a Giant blow to Chicago’s rebuilding effort. Now they will have to start over.
This move makes little sense… He scored a crucial goal for the Hogs in just his second game and yet, here we are.
Black guys matter
He probably asked for it to sign somewhere…makes sense to me.
Pavel, we barely knew thee.