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Morning Notes: Senators, Sweden U20, AHL Prospects

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The Ottawa Senators are making sure they won’t be outdone on the trade market, now making the seventh-overall pick in the 2024 NHL Draft available for the right price, per Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Citizen. During an event held for season ticket holders to hear about the team’s off-season plans, Senators’ senior vice president Dave Poulin shared, “We had interest in the (No. 7) pick. Teams will call you and say, ‘Are you interested in moving the pick?’ and you don’t know what that’s going to look like because you don’t know what’s going to be available there. You have to stay very flexible.”

Including the seventh-overall pick in trade talks will bring the Senators more in line with the New Jersey Devils, who began shopping around the 10th-overall pick during the NHL Combine. The two teams headline a long list of teams interested in bringing in new goaltending talent this summer, and should be among the top options for trade bait like Linus Ullmark, Juuse Saros, and John Gibson. Dave Poulin made sure to emphasize Ottawa’s pursuit of a goaltender when speaking with Garrioch, adding that the team wasn’t happy with their goaltending tandem “numerically, statistically, or from an analytics standpoint.” The Senators’ tandem of Joonas Korpisalo and Anton Forsberg combined for a .890 save percentage this season – though their consistency in the lineup allowed Ottawa to rely on just three goalies this season, the fewest they’ve needed to get through a year since the 2019-20 season. But despite good health, the Senators goalies didn’t stand up to the task this year, and the team is once again doomed to spending the summer finding the right option in net.

But despite the interest elsewhere, it doesn’t seem Ottawa is ready to part with Korpisalo just yet. When asked, Poulin offered relief to Korpisalo’s down year, speaking to the difficulty in adjusting to a new team and the lack of defensive stops in front of him, relative to what he had with the Los Angeles Kings. Korpisalo just concluded the first season of a five-year, $20MM contract signed with the Senators last summer. He’ll be the team’s de facto backup should they bring in a new starter, and likely their go-to starter should things stay the same. The off-season event for season ticket holders where this information was conveyed is slated to be a yearly event for the Senators.

Other notes from around the league:

  • Team Sweden has announced the coaching staff that will oversee their U19 and U20 international teams next season. The group is manned by Magnus Hävelid, who has coached Sweden’s international juniors teams since 2017. He’ll be flanked by Gereon Dahlgren, and former NHL defenders Robin Jonsson and Nicklas Grossmann. Both Dahlgren and Jonsson are returning to their posts, while this news marks Grossman’s first time coaching an international squad. The quartet will lead Sweden’s lineups at the World Junior Summer Showcase and World Junior Championship, as well as in team friendlies.
  • The AHL has announced their All-Prospect team, as voted on by the league’s hockey operations department and general managers. The team includes AHL Rookie of the Year Logan Stankoven (DAL), as well as Shane Wright (SEA), Jiri Kulich (BUF), Simon Edvinsson (DET), Brandt Clarke (LAK), and Yaroslav Askarov (NSH). Each player appeared in NHL games this season, though Stankoven has become the first to carve out a daily role – recording 22 points across his first 43 NHL games, combined between the regular season and playoffs. His All-Prospect team peers will look to catch up to him with daily lineup spots next season.

Atlantic Notes: Cooper, Senators, Seger, O’Connell

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Lightning head coach Jon Cooper will have some extra duties coming his way in the near future.  In his latest column for The Athletic (subscription link), Pierre LeBrun reports that Tampa Bay’s bench boss is expected to be named as Canada’s head coach for the upcoming 4 Nations Cup as well as the 2026 Olympics.  LeBrun adds that Hockey Canada considered having a separate head coach for each event but, like the United States with Mike Sullivan, has ultimately settled on having the same one for both.  Cooper has coached internationally at three events in the past.  He was Canada’s head coach at the 2017 Worlds, coached Team North America at the World Cup that same year, and was an assistant for the U.S. at the 2007 Ivan Hlinka Memorial tournament.

More from the Atlantic Division:

  • Speaking at a season ticket holder session, Senators Senior Vice President Dave Poulin indicated that they have fielded trade interest in the seventh-overall selection, per Postmedia’s Bruce Garrioch (Twitter link). Ottawa underachieved considerably this season as instead of pushing for a playoff spot, they were well out of the mix early, resulting in changes both in the front office and behind the bench.  The Sens have to forfeit one of their first-round picks between now and 2026 as part of the punishment for failing to disclose Evgenii Dadonov’s no-trade clause to Vegas in 2021, eventually resulting in a failed trade to Anaheim the following year.  However, with this pick being so early, they wisely decided not to make this the year they lost the selection.
  • The Red Wings’ farm team has added one of the more intriguing remaining college free agents as AHL Grand Rapids announced the signing of Gabriel Seger to a one-year deal. The 24-year-old had a breakout showing in his final collegiate campaign, leading Cornell in scoring with 14 goals and 30 assists in 44 games although it wasn’t enough to land him an NHL deal in recent weeks.
  • Arizona State University associate coach Albie O’Connell is expected to leave the program to pursue an NHL opportunity, relays PHNX Sports’ Craig Morgan (Twitter link). College Hockey News’ Mike McMahon adds (Twitter link) that O’Connell is expected to be hired by the Canadiens.  If that holds true, it will be his second stint with the organization after serving as a college scout for Montreal back in 2022-23 before returning behind an NCAA bench this past season.

West Notes: Wild Draft Plans, Campbell, Klimchuk

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Wild fans gained some insight into their team’s plans at the draft later this month thanks to The Athletic’s Joe Smith, who spoke at length in an interview with director of amateur scouting Judd Brackett in an interview published Wednesday.

Notably, he shouted out general manager Bill Guerin’s willingness to be active on the draft floor, suggesting they’ll try hard to move up from their 13th overall pick if their scouting staff believes it to be the right choice. However, Brackett thinks the likelihood of being able to execute such a move will be extremely difficult this year thanks to the depth of prospects available in the top 15 range. “Teams in those spots are very happy with their choices that they have,” he said.

In regards to who the Wild might take with their No. 13 pick, Brackett didn’t disclose any names specifically. He did, however, have complementary words for U.S. National U18 Team goal-scoring record-breaker Cole Eiserman. He entered the year as a consensus top-three pick but fell down most draft boards to the mid-first round throughout the season, with concerns rising about his play in the defensive zone and his ability to exit his own zone in transition. But he remains the best pure goal-scorer available in the class, with Brackett saying he’s “proven it at every level and continues to do so.”

Other tidbits from the West:

  • Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff listed Kings center Pierre-Luc Dubois as his top buyout candidate this summer but acknowledged that general manager Rob Blake said during his end-of-season media availability that it wasn’t something they were planning on doing. That brings us to the No. 2 candidate on his list – Oilers netminder Jack Campbell, who spent nearly the entire season on assignment to AHL Bakersfield after putting up a .873 SV% in his first five games of the season. He was decent overall in the minors, though, compiling a .918 SV% and three shutouts in 33 games played. There’s likely a path back to NHL minutes for Campbell somewhere, but after falling to third on their depth chart despite boasting a $5MM cap hit, it’s unlikely to be in Edmonton. He has three years left on his deal, so a buyout would leave the Oilers with a cap penalty for the next six seasons ranging from as low as $1.1MM next season to as high as $2.6MM in 2026-27.
  • The Jets’ AHL affiliate, the Manitoba Moose, added Morgan Klimchuk to their coaching staff as an assistant Wednesday. The 2013 first-round pick of the Flames was a top-flight scorer in junior hockey but only managed one NHL appearance before announcing his retirement during the COVID-19 pandemic. Now 29, Klimchuk had spent the past two seasons as an assistant coach for the Western Hockey League’s Victoria Royals.

Snapshots: Merela, Sabres Staff, Krog

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Yesterday, Lightning restricted free agent forward Waltteri Merela signed a one-year deal with SC Bern of the Swiss National League. The Lightning reportedly wanted Merela to return to the organization (as per Eduardo A. Encina of the Tampa Bay Times) but couldn’t offer him the guaranteed money that he could get abroad because of their need to keep salary cap flexibility. The Lightning plan to make Merela a qualifying offer to retain his NHL rights until he is 27.

Other notes from around the league:

  • The Buffalo Sabres have hired Chris Bergeron as a scout, shares Lance Lysowski of the Buffalo News. Bergeron has served as the head coach of Miami (Ohio) University’s men’s hockey team for the last five seasons, posting a cumulative – and dismal – 35-116-16 record with the club. Those results earn Bergeron the title of lowest win percentage in Miami’s history, narrowly beating out Bill Davidge’s 39-111-3 record across four seasons in the late 1980s. Bergeron still has a storied hockey career despite a slow go of things in Miami, Ohio – serving as the head coach of Bowling Green State University for nine seasons and accumulating 43 AHL games, 119 ECHL, and 111 IHL games across a seven-year professional career of his own. Bergeron is expected to, unsurprisingly, serve as Buffalo’s NCAA scout after Jerry Forton was promoted to ‘Director of Amateur Scouting’.
  • Buffalo has also shared that they will be maintaining AHL assistant coaches Vinny Prospal and Nathan Paetsch, shares Lysowski (Twitter link). The duo – both former NHL players – concluded the first year of their coaching careers last season, helping lead the Rochester Americans to a strong 39-23-7 record. With a year under their belts, the novice coaches will now lend their lessons learned to new head coach Mike Leone as he enters the first pro role of his own coaching career.
  • The Vancouver Canucks have hired former NHL center Jason Krog as a skills and development coach for the NHL and AHL rosters (Twitter link). Krog played in four games with Vancouver to end a 202-game career in the NHL that was largely spent with the Anaheim Mighty Ducks. Krog scored 22 goals and 59 games across his career, including a single-season high of 25 points in 2002-03. He flaunted fantastic agility and skill as an undersized pivot in a physical era of the NHL – and will now look to bring those lessons to a young Canucks organization.

Snapshots: Conditional Picks, Tocchet, Thunderbirds

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The final series of the playoffs gets underway tonight with Edmonton taking on Florida.  The events and outcome of the Stanley Cup Final will also affect the draft order in the next three years.  As CapFriendly notes (Twitter link), the following four late-season trades will be finalized based on whoever wins this series:

Ducks/Oilers: The 2025 fifth-round pick that went to Anaheim in the Adam Henrique trade will upgrade to a 2025 4th round pick if Edmonton wins.

Sabres/Panthers: The 2024 seventh-rounder acquired by Buffalo for Kyle Okposo will upgrade to a 2024 fifth-round pick if Florida wins.  (Florida would also incur a $500K cap penalty next season in this scenario as that is payable to Okposo if they win.)

Senators/Panthers: The 2024 fourth-round pick that Ottawa received for Vladimir Tarasenko will become a 2026 third-rounder if Florida wins the series.

Penguins/Panthers: The 2025 seventh-round pick Pittsburgh acquired for Magnus Hellberg will convey if Hellberg plays in two games this round.  Hellberg is on Florida’s active roster as a Black Ace recall but has yet to play this postseason.

Elsewhere around the hockey world:

  • Canucks head coach Rick Tocchet is heading into the final guaranteed season of his contract next season though there is a team option for 2025-26 as well. The bench boss told reporters including Steve Ewen of the Vancouver Province that there have yet to be any discussions about a contract extension, nor is he concerned about that.  Tocchet led Vancouver to a surprising first-place finish in the Pacific Division with 109 points, helping him earn the Jack Adams Award last month.
  • The AHL’s Springfield Thunderbirds (affiliate of the Blues) announced that they’ve hired long-time NHL blueliner Jaroslav Modry and AHL veteran Chad Wiseman as their new assistant coaches. Modry spent the last three seasons coaching in his native Czechia while Wiseman had been coaching with OHL Guelph since 2018-19.  They join NHL veteran Steve Konowalchuk on a new-look coaching staff.

Sabres Name Michael Leone AHL Head Coach

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The Sabres have hired USA Hockey mainstay Michael Leone as the head coach of their AHL affiliate, the Rochester Americans, per a team announcement Thursday. Brad Elliott Schlossman of the Grand Forks Herald was the first to report the hiring yesterday.

Leone succeeds Seth Appert, who’d been the head coach of the Amerks for the past four seasons. He was recently promoted to the NHL bench and will serve as an assistant on Lindy Ruff’s staff as he makes his return to Buffalo.

The 36-year-old Leone had a collegiate and low-level minors career as a player, topping out in the ECHL with the Toledo Walleye in the mid-2010s. After retiring, he immediately began his coaching career as an assistant with the ECHL’s Quad City Mallards for the 2017-18 season.

The Michigan native has quickly risen up the ranks ever since. He jumped to an assistant role with Bowling Green State University the following season before joining USA Hockey in 2019, first as an assistant with their national U-17 team on a squad that boasted Calder Trophy finalist Luke Hughes on its blue line.

He hopped between the U17 and U18 teams over the next few years, also serving as an assistant for the national team at various international tournaments, before moving back to league play in 2022. Tabbed as the GM and head coach of the Green Bay Gamblers of the major junior United States Hockey League, he’s guided them to a 66-41-17 record over the past two seasons.

Leone coached multiple NHL-affiliated prospects with the Gamblers this season, namely Blackhawks 2023 second-round pick Adam Gajan, NHL Utah prospect Julian Lutz, and Lightning 2023 fourth-round pick Jayson Shaugabay.

He’ll now be entrusted with the development of a deep Sabres prospect pool in which almost every player makes a stop in Rochester at some point. Next season’s roster is likely to include 2022 first-round picks Jiri Kulich and Noah Östlund up front, with other first-round picks Isak Rosen and Matthew Savoie being potential options to suit up for the Amerks if they don’t make the NHL roster out of camp.

Snapshots: Warsofsky, Radulov, Utah Branding

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The San Jose Sharks have interviewed a long list of candidates for their vacant head coaching position, including assistant coach Ryan Warsofsky who, per Sheng Peng of San Jose Hockey Now, is now pulling ahead as the favorite for the job. He pulls ahead of a list of interviewees that features Jay Woodcroft, Matt Nieto, Jeff Blashill, Jeff Halpern, and Jeremy Colliton. Warsofsky also interviewed for San Jose’s head coach role in 2022, though he was ultimately hired behind David Quinn.

Warsofsky oversaw San Jose’s defense and penalty kill while serving behind Quinn, serving as the coach behind Erik Karlsson’s 101-point, Norris Trophy-winning season last year. But he was also the coach behind San Jose’s 326 goals allowed this season – the third-most of any team over the last decade.

Warsofsky is just two years into his NHL coaching career – experiencing two of the staunchest extremes he could have – after leading the Chicago Wolves to the 2022 AHL Calder Cup Championship to cap off his three-year tenure as an AHL head coach. Warsofsky’s hire would follow a growing trend of teams finding their coaches internally, with each of Winnipeg, St. Louis, Seattle, and Los Angeles already promoting coaches to the NHL head coach role this off-season. The role in San Jose would be the first NHL head coaching role of Warsofsky’s still very young career.

Other notes from around the league:

  • Long-time Dallas Stars forward Alexander Radulov has signed a one-year contract with the KHL’s Lokomotiv (Twitter link). Radulov has spent the last two seasons with Kazan Ak-Bars, posting a combined 41 goals and 97 points across 120 games. He’s remained productive, even at the age of 37, and will now be set to play with the fourth KHL club of his career – after four seasons with Ufa, four with CSKA Moscow, and two with Kazan. Those seasons add to Radulov’s nine-year career in the NHL, where he totaled 368 points in 524 career games spent with three different clubs. With no signs of slowing down, Radulov will look to vindicate this one-year contract with a strong season and continue his trek to becoming just the 19th KHL player to play beyond 40 years old.
  • NHL Utah is down to six finalists for its permanent name after an initial vote yielded over 500,000 responses. They’ll be called the Utah Blizzards, Utah Hockey Club, Utah Mammoth, Utah Outlaws, Utah Venom or Utah Yeti beginning with the 2025-26 season. They’ll carry temporary Utah Hockey Club branding for their inaugural 2024-25 campaign. Fans can choose between the six finalists using this link.

Minor Transactions: 6/5/24

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While the bulk of signings in the NHL is still at least a month away, activity around the hockey world has picked up in recent weeks.  Here’s a rundown of recent moves with an NHL association.

  • After having his contract terminated by Minnesota last month, winger Vladislav Firstov has returned to the KHL as Torpedo announced they’ve signed him to a one-year deal. The 22-year-old spent most of this season in Russia on loan but once that campaign ended, he suited up in ten games with AHL Iowa, picking up two goals and two assists.  However, he clearly wanted to stay at home for next season, leading to his release by the Wild.
  • The Canadiens’ AHL affiliate in Laval announced they’ve signed forward Israel Mianscum to a two-year contract. The 21-year-old spent his five-year junior career with QMJHL Sherbrooke and was quite productive in his overage year, tallying 35 goals and 52 assists in 61 games, both career bests.  Overall, he had 215 points in 264 major junior contests.
  • The Jets have invited Cornell forward Kyle Penney to their upcoming development camp, reports Mark Divver of the New England Hockey Journal (Twitter link). The 23-year-old is coming off a strong year with the Big Red, one that saw him collect 10 goals and 18 assists along with a plus-30 rating in 35 games.  Penney has one season of college eligibility remaining.
  • The Panthers’ AHL team in Charlotte announced they’ve re-signed defenseman Mitchell Vande Sompel to a two-year deal. The Checkers acquired the 27-year-old at the AHL trade deadline and he was a regular for them down the stretch where he had five points in 16 games.  Vande Sompel was originally a draft pick of the Islanders, spending five years in their system before moving on in 2022.
  • Kings prospect Matthew Mania is on the move in the OHL as Flint announced that they’ve acquired the defenseman as part of a six-player, nine-pick trade. The 19-year-old was a fifth-round pick last year, going 150th overall and is coming off an injury-riddled season that limited him to just 45 games where he had four goals and 19 assists.  Los Angeles has until June 1, 2025 to sign Mania to an entry-level deal or lose his rights.

Afternoon Notes: Jeannot, Parekh, Bourque

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Winger Tanner Jeannot is once again facing trade rumors, as the Tampa Bay Lightning look to clear enough cap space for a serviceable off-season. The team is facing the loss of their franchise player Steven Stamkos with just $5MM in cap space – not nearly enough to afford the services of the future Hall-of-Famer. That could push them to try and move Jeannot’s $2.665MM cap hit, though Eduardo A. Encina of the Tampa Bay Times shares that there’s been no legitimate discussions of a move just yet. Though Encina did speak to the idea being a tantalizing one for the Lightning, with many teams around the league still interested in acquiring Jeannot.

The Lightning acquired Jeannot from the Nashville Predators ahead of the 2023 Trade Deadline, sending the Music City defenseman Callan Foote, the picks that turned into Dylan MacKinnon (2023 third-round, 83rd-overall), Jayson Shaugabay (2023 fourth-round, 115th-overall), and Kevin Bicker (2023 fifth-round, 147th-overall), as well as a second-round pick in 2024 and a first-round pick in 2025 in return. Nashville traded the Shaugabay pick back to Tampa four months later, in exchange for a 2024 fourth-round pick, and moved the Bicker pick to the Detroit Red Wings to move up in the 2023 second-round.

Jeannot scored just four points in his 20 games with Tampa after the trade, though that didn’t dissuade their faith in him, with the Lightning signing Jenanot to a two-year, $5.3MM contract last summer – a deal that avoided the arbitration hearing Jeannot filed for. The rough-and-tumble winger wasn’t able to rekindle his spark on the new deal, though, scoring just 14 points in 55 games this season. He added 75 penalty minutes and a -10 – and tallied just one assist in four postseason games.

There’s still reported interest in Jeannot around the league despite his lacking scoring. Teams like the Calgary Flames have been looped into trade rumors, though Encina emphasized that a trade isn’t likely Plan A. Tampa will need to get a hefty return in any Jeannot trade, if only to hedge their losses from a costly 2023 move.

Other notes from around the league:

  • Saginaw Spirit defenseman Zayne Parekh has won the CHL’s Defenseman of the Year Award, beating out Memorial Cup Finals competition Sam Dickinson. Parekh was dazzling this season, posting a position-leading 33 goals and 96 points in just 66 games this season. He’s just the second OHL defenseman to top 95 points since 2000, joining Ryan Ellis’ 100-point season in 2010-11. But while Ellis was already an NHL draftee, Parekh is headed into his first year of eligibility in the 2024 NHL Draft. He’s seen as one of the top defensemen in the class and should rival a top 10 selection.
  • The Dallas Stars are swapping talented young forwards, with Ty Dellandrea stepping out of the Game 6 lineup in favor of Mavrik Bourque, shares Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman (Twitter link). Bourque won the AHL’s ‘Les Cunningham’ MVP Award this season after posting 26 goals and 77 points in 71 games this season. Bourque formed a dynamic duo with Stars standout Logan Stankoven in the first half of the season. Dallas will look to use that pairing as their X-factor, as they face elimination at the hands of the Edmonton Oilers.

Snapshots: Firkus, McCoshen, Tung

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Seattle Kraken forward prospect Jagger Firkus has won the CHL’s David Branch Player of the Year Award, after posting a Canada-leading 126 points in 63 games with the WHL’s Moose Jaw Warriors. He was the star of a Moose Jaw team rife with NHL talent, including Pittsburgh Penguins prospect Brayden Yager, who took home the league’s ‘Sportsman Player of the Year’ Award. Firkus and Yager were joined by Columbus Blue Jackets prospect Denton Mateychuk in Moose Jaw, forming a dominant team that won the WHL Championship and recently ranked third in the Memorial Cup.

Firkus signed his entry-level contract with Seattle ahead of the Memorial Cup and will now turn his sights towards pushing for the NHL lineup this off-season. The Kraken boast a strong prospect pool, including Shane Wright, Carson Rehkopf, and Jani Nyman – all players who could vie for an NHL opportunity of their own next season. That’ll mean plenty of competition for Firkus as he looks to adjust his aggressive offense to much tougher competition.

Other notes around the league:

  • Former Florida Panthers defenseman Ian McCoshen has signed a one-year contract with the KHL’s Kunlun Red Star (Twitter link). The move continues McCoshen’s tour across international hockey, after bouncing from a 2022 stint in Finland to a 2023 stint in Czechia, where he scored 12 points in 50 games with Liberec Bili Tygri HC. McCoshen is a veteran of just 60 NHL games, scoring seven points, though he did play in 174 games across five seasons in the AHL. He managed a season-high of just 11 points over his AHL career, a number he’s since topped in both Finland and Czechia. He’ll look to do the same in China next season, though the one-year deal could suggest another move coming soon.
  • BCHL goaltender Callum Tung will be attending both the Calgary Flames and Florida Panthers development camps, shares his Alberni Valley Bulldogs (Twitter link). Tung took over the Bulldogs’ starting role this season, posting 22 wins and a .917 save percentage across 38 regular season games. He managed to get even hotter in the postseason, winning 11 of 18 games and setting a .940 save percentage, though Alberni Valley ultimately fell to the Penticton Vees in the BCHL Championship. Tung remains eligible for the 2024 NHL Draft, after going overlooked in 2022 and 2023.  Tung isn’t currently committed to the NCAA either, suggesting he could be ready for a big challenge should he earn it at an NHL development camp.

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