The 2024 offseason is nearly at its end and many teams are looking ahead toward training camp. A few teams have unfinished business to attend to but most heavy lifting is completed across the league. Training camp and preseason contests give the team a first glance at new talent and also bring along the strenuous process of trimming the team down to a 23-man roster before opening night in October. This will not be an exhaustive list by any stretch of the imagination but a few notable training camp battles have already developed after a lengthy summer.
Carolina Hurricanes
The Hurricanes have sustained one of the most successful stretches outside a Stanley Cup title in organizational history. The team has made the playoffs for six straight seasons and has regularly boasted one of the deeper lineups in the league over that stretch. Unfortunately, the team lost valuable talent in Jake Guentzel, Teuvo Teravainen, Brett Pesce, and Brady Skjei this summer, leading many to believe this team has taken a noticeable step backward this offseason. The team filled in their blue line adequately with Sean Walker and Shayne Gostisbehere on low-cost deals but there is still a glaring hole on the team’s second line.
Martin Necas could slot into a center or right-wing role on the second line. The possession-heavy Hurricane offense makes him a better option on the wing due to poor faceoff percentage throughout his career. That leaves Carolina to choose from Jesperi Kotkaniemi, Jack Drury, Jack Roslovic, or Jordan Staal to middle the team’s second-line with another question mark at left wing. This battle will mainly come down to prospects Bradly Nadeau and Jackson Blake as many of the other wingers on the team are better-positioned in bottom-six roles. Neither have the upper hand at the outset as both showed off promising talent in the NCAA last season at the University of Maine and the University of North Dakota, respectively, and it will be an interesting battle to see play out in a few weeks.
Detroit Red Wings
The Red Wings are headed into year six of the ’Yzerplan’ and have yet to return to the Stanley Cup playoffs. The organization came close last year as they tied with the Washington Capitals in points for the last wild card spot in the Eastern Conference only to miss out due to the first tiebreaker. Poised to make headlines this summer in the hopes of icing a playoff-caliber roster in a tough Atlantic Division — the Red Wings fell flat. Their biggest moves of the summer were retaining forward Patrick Kane on a one-year deal, signing Vladimir Tarasenko to a two-year pact, and signing goaltender Cam Talbot to complete their goaltending trio.
Detroit seemingly already has a full roster heading into training camp in a few weeks. Simon Edvinsson, Albert Johansson, Carter Mazur, and Nate Danielson are poised to challenge for a full-time spot in the lineup which could lead the Red Wings to some difficult choices in October. The team will eventually have to begin graduating their glut of prospects to the NHL level but most of them are blocked by the numerous acquisitions general manager Steve Yzerman has made over the last few years. Don’t be surprised if Detroit becomes an active trade candidate before the season opens to make room for some of their prospects.
Minnesota Wild
The Minnesota Wild are set to open the 2024-25 NHL season with two-and-a-half goalies on the roster to the surprise of many. After the team extended uber-popular goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury to a one-year deal in mid-April the going notion was that the Wild would pursue a trade of Filip Gustavsson over the summer to open up a spot for top prospect Jesper Wallstedt. It shouldn’t be a make-or-break season for Wallstedt if the Wild keep him down in the minors for another year but he has little left to prove at the AHL level.
Gustavsson could still be a viable trade candidate throughout the season with a manageable $3.75MM cap hit for the next two years. It’s still difficult to view Minnesota not capitalizing on an active goaltending trade market this summer as anything other than a misstep. Wallstedt is a naturally good goaltending prospect already and the Wild have a unique opportunity to have him learn under one of the game’s all-time best in Fleury. It would be a surprise to see Minnesota move on from Gustavsson at this point in the offseason. Wallstedt could certainly play himself into a third-string position for Minnesota this season which could create quite the rotation between the pipes.
Montreal Canadiens
As the Canadiens look to rebound from a multi-year retooling effort the team has created quite a glut of potential on the blue line. Defensemen Mike Matheson and Kaiden Guhle already strike as long-term options on the back end but the team will need to piece together a defensive core with seven different options. It would be wise for Montreal to enter training camp with a very open mind for the defensive core outside of Matheson and Guhle.
This reasonably leaves five other spots available which will be filled out by prospects Lane Hutson, Logan Mailloux, and David Reinbacher with David Savard, Arber Xhekaj, Jayden Struble, and Justin Barron left to pick from. All the options individually offer their unique skill set to the Canadiens’ blue line but they are another potentially active trade candidate heading into the season.
Pittsburgh Penguins
On the opposite side of the coin compared to the Canadiens; the Penguins will need to thin out their group of forwards heading into the regular season. Pittsburgh’s roster breakdown shows 14 forwards on the active roster with Emil Bemstrom and Jesse Puljujarvi in the minors according to PuckPedia. Rutger McGroarty and Drew O’Connor should be the main camp battle to who plays on the wing next to Sidney Crosby but the team’s bottom-six appears too saturated.
It should be a multi-tiered training camp battle as each player to pick from plays a different style of hockey. Depending on whether the Penguins want more scoring in the bottom-six or a more defensive-minded approach it will ultimately chart the trajectory of several players. Bemstrom, Puljujarvi, Lars Eller, Noel Acciari, Anthony Beauvillier, and Valtteri Puustinen all represent the notable talent who will compete for these spots once training camp begins in a few weeks.
St. Louis Blues
The Blues were originally thought to be a team looking to thin out their defensive core this offseason. The team instead brought in Ryan Suter, Philip Broberg, and Pierre-Olivier Joseph while only moving on from Marco Scandella. The team may be without defenseman Torey Krug for the entire regular season which opens up a spot on the left side of the defense but the team will ultimately have to cut the roster.
The choice will become less complicated if the team is without Krug for the regular season as the only battle of training camp will come down to Suter and Joseph as the team’s seventh defenseman. A roster spot hangs on the availability of Krug for the 2024-25 NHL season which makes for an interesting camp battle between several members of the Blues’ defensive core.
Minnesota has two goalies and a half?
Laughable the names that follow “notable talent” in regard to the Pens options on their 3rd and 4th lines. Some have no say in the fact due to lack of NHL ice time, but it’s going to be another frustrating year for sure in comparison to the days of Staal, Bonino, etc on the third line.