Kings Activate Drew Doughty From LTIR
12:25 p.m.: Doughty is indeed off LTIR, per a team announced. As expected, Helenius was reassigned to AHL Ontario in a corresponding transaction.
10:15 a.m.: The Kings will have star defenseman Drew Doughty in the lineup for the first time this season when they face the Panthers on Wednesday, David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period reports. He’ll come off long-term injured reserve after missing just over four months with an ankle fracture sustained in preseason action.
Los Angeles is short about $84K in cap space to remove Doughty from LTIR, but they also have a full active roster. Opening up a roster space by assigning a player to AHL Ontario will also open the necessary cap space for his activation.
Doughty remains the anchor of the Kings’ blue line, even as he kicks off his age-35 season. The four-time Norris Trophy finalist is coming off a resurgent 2023-24 campaign in which he scored 15 goals, the second-highest total of his 16-season career, and secured a second straight 50-point year for the first time. Doughty also remained the Kings’ average ice time leader by a wide margin last season with 25:48, and he ranked second on the club with 142 blocks and seventh with 109 hits.
That made many believe Doughty’s long-term absence would spell doom for L.A.’s season, especially after they lost No. 2 righty Matt Roy to the Capitals in free agency. Not only are the Kings squarely in the playoff picture, but they’re on pace for 101 points and rank second in the league in goals against despite poor goaltending from backup David Rittich, who’s started 20 of their 47 games.
As expected, no one single player has filled in for Doughty. His absence has been shouldered by committee. 2021 eighth-overall pick Brandt Clarke emerged as their top offensive option in the interim with 24 points in 47 games, while Vladislav Gavrikov shifted to his off-side to replace Doughty alongside Michael Anderson on the top pair. While he’s got just a fraction of Doughty’s offensive upside, the 6’3″ Gavrikov has averaged a career-high 23:56 per game with strong defensive numbers. His 96 blocks lead the team, and his pairing with Anderson has controlled 56.2% of expected goals, per MoneyPuck.
The Kings are already carrying eight defensemen on their active roster, so one of them is likely destined for waivers. That won’t open up space quickly enough to activate Doughty for tonight’s game, though, so the waiver-exempt Clarke (or, more likely, depth center Samuel Helenius) will be sent down today to give the Kings time to do some roster shuffling.
Doughty returns with six games to go until the 4 Nations Face-Off, enough time to put himself in consideration to replace Alex Pietrangelo on Team Canada’s roster after the Golden Knight withdrew from the tournament over the weekend. He still has two years after this one left on his eight-year, $88MM mega-deal he signed with the Kings in 2018.
Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.
Nico Hischier Downgraded To Week-To-Week
Devils captain Nico Hischier‘s injury status has been downgraded to week-to-week, head coach Sheldon Keefe told reporters Wednesday (including Gabriel Trevino of NJ.com). He has not played since sustaining an upper-body injury on a crosscheck from Canadiens captain Nick Suzuki last Saturday.
Keefe initially called Hischier day-to-day following the injury, which held him out of Monday’s loss to the Flyers. However, he left the team’s road trip to return to New Jersey to visit with team doctors for further evaluation. Evidently, it wasn’t positive news for the Swiss centerman, who will now miss another three games at minimum.
Past the halfway point of the season, Hischier leads the team in goals with 24 and has added 19 assists for 43 points in 51 games. He’s putting up career-highs in shooting percentage (17%) and average ice time (20:21), as well as winning 55.5% of his draws and logging a career-high 55.5 CF% at even strength. It’s been a dominant two-way campaign from the 2023 Selke Trophy finalist, one that could put him back in that conversation, assuming his absence doesn’t stretch out for too much longer.
It’s a difficult blow for the Devils, who are 4-5-3 since New Year’s and are already without starting goaltender Jacob Markström until around the trade deadline due to a sprained MCL. They’ve called to 28-18-6, decidedly third in the Metropolitan Division behind the Capitals and Hurricanes, and are now being chased by the red-hot Blue Jackets who are seven points back with two games in hand.
23-year-old Dawson Mercer shifts to center in Hischier’s absence with Erik Haula also on the shelf. The 2020 first-rounder has 23 points in 52 games, up only slightly from last year’s offensive pace.
Wild Recall Ben Jones
Forward Ben Jones has been recalled by the Wild again Wednesday, per Michael Russo of The Athletic. He’d been with their AHL affiliate in Iowa for the past two weeks after clearing waivers. He’s now once again on the active roster, which still has one open spot, after spending nearly two months there earlier this season amid a rash of forward injuries.
Today’s recall is the corresponding transaction for yesterday’s roster moves that saw superstar winger Kirill Kaprizov land back on injured reserve and defenseman Jonas Brodin move from IR to LTIR. Kaprizov’s IR placement came following news that he will undergo lower-body surgery later this week to address a lingering muscular issue, keeping him out of the lineup for the next four to six weeks.
Jones, 25, has played 26 games with the big club this season without recording a point. He posted a minus-three rating in his most extended NHL action to date, averaging a minimal 8:23 per game and controlling just 39.7% of shot attempts at even strength. He’s been much more productive on the farm, where he has 14 points (5 G, 9 A) in 20 games for Iowa.
Jones entered the season with only two NHL games under his belt, both coming with the Golden Knights in the 2021-22 season. He was a seventh-round pick of Vegas’ inaugural 2017 draft class, scoring 64 points in 140 games for their AHL affiliates in Chicago and Henderson before being non-tendered and landing with the Flames in free agency. The Ontario native spent two seasons with AHL Calgary before landing in the Wild organization this summer, posting 97 points (38 G, 59 A) with a +34 rating in 143 games.
The Wild, who have not had a healthy lineup since Nov. 10, will likely have Jones sit as a healthy extra for Wednesday’s game against the Maple Leafs. They no longer have Kaprizov or Marcus Johansson available, but the recent activation of Jakub Lauko and the recall of winger prospect Liam Ohgren gives them 12 healthy options to dress at forward outside of Jones, at least for now. Jones signed a two-year, two-way deal over the summer, so he won’t be hitting free agency again until 2026.
Sabres To Reassign Nicolas Aubé-Kubel
Jan. 28: Aubé-Kubel cleared waivers, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports. The Sabres announced they’ve recalled forward Tyson Kozak from Rochester in a corresponding move.
Jan. 27: The Buffalo Sabres placed winger Nicolas Aubé-Kubel on waivers Monday, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports. He’ll head to AHL Rochester tomorrow if he clears.
This roster move marks the fourth time in his seven-year NHL career that Aubé-Kubel has been placed on the waiver wire. He was claimed by the Colorado Avalanche from the Philadelphia Flyers in 2021, claimed by the Washington Capitals from the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2022, and went through unscathed at the beginning of last season. Granted, all those waiver claims came when Aubé-Kubel was making significantly less.
He signed the richest contract of his career this past summer with the Sabres. Buffalo gave Aubé-Kubel a one-year, $1.5MM contract in the hopes he would help reimagine the bottom six of their forward group. Unfortunately, Aubé-Kubel is amidst the least productive season of his career registering a measly one goal and one assist in 19 games with the Sabres.
Still, Aubé-Kubel lost a few games at the beginning of the season due to a lower-body injury which could help explain his decrease in productivity. He’s continued to be a very physical forward in Buffalo and is managing the third-highest CorsiFor% of his career at even strength with a 52.0% mark albeit in limited action.
Some less physical teams such as the Edmonton Oilers, Dallas Stars, Tampa Bay Lightning, Carolina Hurricanes, and Capitals could use a player with Aubé-Kubel’s expertise. However, given his relatively high salary for a player destined for a lower-tier role, it would be unsurprising to see Aubé-Kubel go unclaimed over the next 24 hours.
Kirill Kaprizov To Undergo Lower-Body Surgery, Out Minimum Four Weeks
1:34 p.m.: The Wild moved Kaprizov to IR to open up a roster spot, per a team announcement. They also shifted Brodin from IR to LTIR retroactive to Jan. 7 to open up the cap space for a forward recall, ruling him out of the team’s next two games at minimum.
10:35 a.m.: Wild star winger Kirill Kaprizov missed Tuesday’s practice and will undergo surgery to address his nagging lower-body injury, according to Michael Russo and Joe Smith of The Athletic. Russo and Smith report the surgery, which would address what’s believed to be a muscular issue in his groin and is scheduled for Friday, carries an expected recovery time of six weeks. General manager Bill Guerin handed down an official week-to-week designation with a minimum four-week window, per Jessi Pierce of NHL.com.
The loss of Kaprizov is less devastating than when he missed 12 games over the past month-plus, with most of his absence set to fall while the NHL schedule stops for the 4 Nations Face-Off. They still have six games left before the break, though, and their best player will join top shutdown defenseman Jonas Brodin and middle-six winger Marcus Johansson on injured reserve for that stretch. While the ageless Mats Zuccarello and breakout center Marco Rossi still form two-thirds of a formidable top line, there’s simply no replacement for Kaprizov as the Wild desperately try to hold onto their top-three spot in the Central Division heading into the break.
While second-line winger Matt Boldy is a top-line player in most markets and would likely do well with a bump in ice time, the 27-year-old Kaprizov has solidified himself as a top-three winger in the league this season. In 37 games, the 5’10” lefty has tallied 23 goals and 29 assists for 52 points with a +19 rating. His 1.41 points per game are fifth in the league, and tops among left-wingers, not a level of production Boldy or the other few high-upside offensive options in the organization can aim to touch.
Boldy slid into Kaprizov’s minutes during his previous absence, doing well offensively but causing the line’s two-way dominance to falter. He posted five goals and six assists for 11 points over the 12-game span, but the Boldy-Rossi-Zuccarello trio has conceded 3.61 expected goals against per 60 minutes compared to just 2.38 xGA/60 with Kaprizov on that line, per MoneyPuck. With Johansson also missing from the top nine, 2022 first-round pick Liam Ohgren is likely to get an extended run in increased minutes. It’s a shot in the dark, though – Ohgren has just two points in 13 NHL showings this season, both assists against the Avalanche on Jan. 20.
Kaprizov will be back shortly after the trade deadline if he undergoes surgery this week and the six-week recovery window holds true. That won’t allow Minnesota to keep Kaprizov’s cap hit on long-term injured reserve for the remainder of the regular season, but it should allow them additional options for short-term flexibility as they look to add to their roster. They’ve been linked to Islanders pending UFA pivot Brock Nelson, and The Fourth Period reports they’ve at least demonstrated loose interest in Canucks stars J.T. Miller and Elias Pettersson. But they currently project to have just $200K in deadline space, requiring them to move out salary in any deal they make, plus asking for maximum retention on the other end.
Canucks Recall Aatu Räty
The Canucks have recalled center Aatu Räty from AHL Abbotsford, per a team announcement. Vancouver had an open roster spot after sending down defenseman Mark Friedman over the weekend, so no corresponding transaction is required.
Räty, 22, is amid his second season of NHL action, spending his brief career with the Islanders and Canucks. The 2021 second-round pick was sent to Vancouver in the 2023 Bo Horvat trade, recording four goals and three assists for seven points across 35 games with the two clubs.
Räty ranks as the Canucks’ fourth-best prospect in Scott Wheeler of The Athletic’s most recent rankings, and for good reason. In addition to his most extended run in the NHL earlier this season, skating in 20 games over the first two months of the campaign, he’s developing a strong minor-league track record that includes 23 points (8 G, 15 A) in 23 games played for Abbotsford in 2024-25. The natural center has also remained down the middle for nearly all of his NHL call-ups instead of being shifted to the wing, a testament to his two-way instincts.
The Canucks have a crowded group of NHL/AHL tweeners and a banged-up forward group with Dakota Joshua and Kiefer Sherwood on the shelf, so it’s not a shock to see them give Räty another chance. Whether he enters the lineup tomorrow against the Predators remains to be seen, though, as they still have 13 healthy forwards available.
Flames Recall Tyson Barrie, Adam Klapka
The Flames announced Tuesday they’ve recalled forward Adam Klapka from AHL Calgary and reinstated defenseman Tyson Barrie from his conditioning loan. They only had one open active roster spot, but that’s all they needed since Barrie still counted against the limit during his short-lived demotion.
Barrie could have stayed in the minors for up to 10 more days on his conditioning stint, but he once again finds himself available to dress in an NHL contest. That hasn’t happened since Nov. 12, though, the reason behind his first AHL action in 11 years. The offensive-minded veteran scored once and added a pair of assists in two appearances for the Wranglers over the weekend.
After signing Barrie to a one-year, $1.25MM deal following a successful PTO during training camp, Calgary has only played him in nine of their 48 games this season. The 33-year-old posted a goal and an assist with a minus-two rating while averaging a career-low 15:20 per game. He’ll now return to a battle for minutes with depth defenders Jake Bean, Joel Hanley, Daniil Miromanov, and Brayden Pachal – a battle he’s clearly lost thus far.
The hulking 24-year-old Klapka comes up to replace upstart Rory Kerins as a fourth-line option after the latter was demoted yesterday. The 6’7″ Czech forward skated in six games for Calgary over the first two months of the campaign, going without a point but recording 20 hits in 8:29 of average ice time. He ranks among the AHL club’s point-per-game leaders this season with 25 through 29 appearances, though.
Predators Reassign Kieffer Bellows, Recall Kevin Gravel
The Predators reassigned left-winger Kieffer Bellows to AHL Milwaukee on Tuesday and used his roster spot to summon defenseman Kevin Gravel from the minors, per a team announcement. Their active roster remains at 22 players, with the open spot expected to be filled by winger Luke Evangelista coming off injured reserve in the next few days.
Bellows, 26, did not suit up for Nashville in their seven games since recalling him on Jan. 11. He suited up in four straight NHL seasons from 2019-20 to 2022-23 but has been out of the league for over a year and a half. The former first-round pick ranked as one of the organization’s top prospects for a few years but never adjusted well to the pro game.
Over his seven-year pro career, he’s seen far more AHL action than NHL action, playing in 220 minor-league games compared to 95 NHL contests. He’s produced at a decent 0.60 points-per-game rate in the AHL, where he has 76 goals and 55 assists, but that’s dropped to 0.29 across his NHL promotions.
Bellows has had a rocky past few years in particular. Nashville is his fourth organization since the beginning of the 2022-23 campaign, during which he headed from the Isles to the Flyers on waivers. He did not land an NHL contract for 2023-24 after being non-tendered by Philly, settling for a minor-league pact with the AHL’s Toronto Marlies, but landed a two-way deal with the Preds for 2024-25 after breaking out for 27 goals and 49 points in 52 games.
The Minnesota native has continued to produce well while on assignment to Milwaukee. He leads the team with 12 goals through 31 games and ranks fifth with 22 points. However, he’ll have to wait until his next recall to get another crack at NHL minutes.
With Evangelista’s return imminent, his chances at playing time were set to get even slimmer in the coming days. The 22-year-old right winger has missed the last seven games with a lower-body injury but has been spotted in practice recently without a no-contact designation, suggesting he’ll come off IR before the 4 Nations Face-Off next month.
Meanwhile, Gravel replaces Spencer Stastney, who the team sent to Milwaukee over the weekend, as the Preds’ extra defenseman. Nashville has recalled the 32-year-old lefty twice already this season, resulting in a trio of appearances during which he has an assist and a plus-two rating. The 6’4″, 205-lb Michigan native has averaged 18:19 per game – the most of his NHL stints since debuting in the 2015-16 season – and controlled 45.9% of shot attempts at even strength.
While a stay-at-home defender first and foremost, Gravel’s 12 points in 35 AHL games also leads Milwaukee defensemen in scoring this season. He has another year left on the two-way extension he signed in January of last year and won’t be a UFA until 2026.
Ryan Lindgren Wants To Stay With Rangers Past Trade Deadline
If he has things his way, Rangers pending UFA defenseman Ryan Lindgren will remain in New York past the March 7 trade deadline, he told Larry Brooks of the New York Post on Monday (subscription required).
Lindgren, whose stay-at-home play has been hampered by injuries over the past few seasons, spent nearly a month as a restricted free agent last summer before coming to terms on a one-year, $4.5MM deal three days before his scheduled arbitration hearing. Since the deal walked him to unrestricted free agency in 2025, most assumed this would be Lindgren’s last season in Manhattan, either because he’d be traded at the deadline or let loose on the open market.
His play this season hasn’t done much to change that assumption in the public eye. The soon-to-be 27-year-old missed the first five games of the season with an upper-body injury and has since embarked on a rocky campaign, posting overall negative possession impacts for the second season in a row.
He’s still spent most of his time on the Blueshirts’ top pairing with Adam Fox and is averaging nearly 20 minutes per game. However, the difference in Fox’s play away from Lindgren is jarring. The Fox-Lindgren pairing has controlled 49.7% of expected goals together through nearly 500 minutes, while Fox has controlled a league-leading 67.1% of expected goals in nearly 300 minutes with K’Andre Miller on his left side. Most of that difference is accounted for by Miller’s offensive prowess, but the Miller-Fox pairing also allows 0.7 fewer xG per 60 minutes than the Lindgren-Fox duo.
Of course, Lindgren continues to do what he does best – block shots. His 86 are tied with Braden Schneider for the team lead. It hasn’t translated into great shutdown results at 5-on-5, though, especially when paired with his lack of offensive upside.
His role moving forward got muddied when the Rangers signed righty William Borgen to a five-year, $20.5MM extension over the weekend. Borgen is a more direct and economical Jacob Trouba replacement after New York traded him to the Ducks earlier this year. However, he still eats into their cap space for next season and will likely mean the Rangers look to spend Lindgren’s cash on a different style of player – potentially a forward upgrade.
Lindgren has posted better results in the past few weeks, namely six assists and a plus-three rating in 13 games since New Year’s. But his rapidly increasing injury history and inconsistent play over the last two seasons make it understandable that his name pops up in trade speculation, even as the Rangers look to rebound and secure a playoff spot following a harrowing 4-15-0 record in their last 19 games of the 2024 calendar year.
“I just try and block it out,” Lindgren said about that speculation. “I don’t like hearing or seeing my name included in these rumors but I know where I am with my contract and I get it, I’m just trying to do my best, focus on hockey, with what the team needs and try and enjoy it.”
Lindgren didn’t comment on any potential extension talks with the Rangers, but did reaffirm he wanted to see out the season in New York. While drafted by the Bruins in the second round in 2016, he was traded to the Rangers in 2018 in the Rick Nash deal before making his NHL debut. He’s skated in all of his 377 career NHL games as a Ranger, posting 12 goals, 80 assists, 92 points, and a +99 rating while averaging just over 19 minutes per game.
Capitals Sign Logan Thompson To Six-Year Extension
3:03 p.m: Washington has made the signing official per a team announcement.
1:30 p.m: The Capitals are close to a multi-year extension with pending UFA netminder Logan Thompson, Kevin Weekes of ESPN reports Monday. It’s a six-year commitment with a price tag of $5.85MM per season, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet adds, working out to a total value of $35.1MM.
PuckPedia provided the breakdown of the contract as follows:
- Year 1: $2MM salary + $5MM signing bonus – 15-team no-trade clause
- Year 2: $4.85MM salary + $2MM signing bonus – 15-team no-trade clause
- Year 3: $1.5MM salary + $5MM signing bonus – 15-team no-trade clause
- Year 4: $3.5MM salary + $2MM signing bonus – 10-team no-trade clause
- Year 5: $3MM salary + $2MM signing bonus – 10-team no-trade clause
- Year 6: $2.25MM salary + $2MM signing bonus – 10-team no-trade clause
It’s a sizable commitment to the breakout 27-year-old, who’s quickly ramping up his case for his first career Vezina Trophy nomination. He’s broken away from Washington’s plan to alternate him and Charlie Lindgren between the pipes nightly, erupting for a .925 SV% and 2.09 GAA in 27 appearances with a near-spotless 22-2-3 record. Thompson earned seven straight starts earlier this month, allowing just eight goals on 179 shots.
Despite the tandem workload, Thompson has been among the Capitals’ most valuable players and ranks second in the league in goals saved above expected with 26.8, only slightly trailing Vezina favorite Connor Hellebuyck‘s 27.5 mark, per MoneyPuck. It’s night and day compared to what Darcy Kuemper gave the Caps last year in a similar role, making the Washington front office’s decision to send him to Los Angeles for Pierre-Luc Dubois and give up a pair of third-rounders to snag Thompson from the Golden Knights one of the best of the summer.
As expected, the extension amounts to a stratospheric raise for Thompson, who will now earn more than twice per season than the entire value of his previous contract. He signed a team-friendly three-year, $2.3MM commitment with Vegas in January 2022 when he was beginning to emerge as an NHL option. During that time, he’s been arguably the most underpaid player in the league with a 68-29-11 record, .915 SV%, 2.53 GAA, and five shutouts in 110 games for the Knights and Caps over the life of the deal.
The raise is still jarring for a netminder who’s only started more than 40 games once in his career, but Thompson has already solidified his third consecutive 20-win season and will start north of 40 again this year, barring injury. Among the 29 goalies who have played more than 100 games since the beginning of the 2022-23 campaign, that .915 SV% ranks third – higher than clear-cut stars like Andrei Vasilevskiy, Ilya Sorokin, Igor Shesterkin, and Juuse Saros.
He’s now Washington’s present and future between the pipes as they look to end Alex Ovechkin‘s career on a high note and keep the momentum going after he inevitably breaks the league’s all-time goals record. If he stays healthy, he should get the chance to also head into the playoffs as his team’s undisputed starter for the first time in his career.
Thompson’s deal runs through the 2030-31 campaign, after which he’ll be a UFA at age 34. The Caps now have $69.375MM tied up in 15 players for next season, not including pending UFAs Lindgren and top-four defenseman Jakob Chychrun. His $5.85MM cap hit will rank 15th among netminders next season as things stand.
Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.