Headlines

Go To MLB Trade Rumors
Go To Hoops Rumors

ICEHL

International Notes: Pysyk, Raffl, Leskinen

at CDT | by 1 Comment

Prague’s HC Sparta of the Czech Extraliga announced they’ve brought in former NHL defenseman Mark Pysyk for the 2025-26 campaign. The 33-year-old hasn’t played in the NHL since the 2021-22 campaign with the Sabres, and, although he was slated to play 2022-23 with the Red Wings after signing there in free agency, missed the entirety of that season due to an Achilles injury. He’s been working his way back to consistent playing time since, spending parts of 2023-24 with the Penguins’ and Flames’ farm teams before heading overseas. He spent this year in Finland with Liiga’s SaiPa, recording nine points and a +11 rating in 36 regular-season games before advancing to the championship series, coming up short to KalPa in the final. With Pysyk’s 521 games of NHL experience with the Sabres, Panthers, and Stars in the fold, Prague rejoins him with a couple of recognizable names, including 2018 Stanley Cup champion Michal Kempny and Mammoth reserve list netminder Josef Korenar.

There’s more from the top-level European leagues:

  • Longtime NHL winger Michael Raffl is heading back home to Austria on a one-year deal with EC Salzburg of the ICEHL, per a club announcement. The longtime Flyers depth scorer last suited up in the NHL with Dallas in the 2021-22 campaign. He’s spent the three years since in Switzerland with the National League’s Lausanne HC, serving as captain for the latter two. Injuries have limited him to just 55 total appearances in that time, but he did well in limited action last year (5-9–14 in 16 GP). He’ll now get to play with his older brother Thomas Raffl in his home country. The latter has been with Salzburg since the 2010-11 season and served as captain since 2019.
  • Luleå HF of the Swedish Hockey League announced they’ve agreed to terms with defenseman Otto Leskinen on a two-year deal. A former Canadiens prospect, the Finnish rearguard had spent parts of three of the last four seasons in his home country’s Liiga with Tappara but now moves to the slightly more competitive Swedish circuit for the first time in his career. The 28-year-old got into six NHL games with Montreal over the 2019-20 and 2020-21 campaigns and last appeared in North America with AHL Laval in 2022-23. A smallish lefty with good offensive instincts, he led Tappara’s defense in scoring this year with 38 points in 52 games.

Nick Bonino Re-Signs In IceHL

at CDT | by 2 Comments

Former Pittsburgh Penguins centerman Nick Bonino has re-signed with the IceHL’s HK Olimpija Ljubljana, per Seth Rorabaugh of Tribune-Review Sports. Bonino originally signed with the Slovenian club last November, after being released from his contract with the New York Rangers earlier in the year.

Bonino only appeared in half of the Olimpija Dragons’ season thanks to the mid-season signing. But he still managed a successful season, finishing the year with 17 points in 22 games and the highest point-per-game pace (0.77) on his team. It was a refreshing surge in scoring after he scored just five points in 45 games with the New York Rangers last season. Bonino hasn’t scored more than 20 points since the 2021-22 season, when he tallied 16 goals and 26 points in 80 games with the San Jose Sharks.

One more year in the IceHL will give Bonino a chance to play a full year, and cross the 20 point threshold, with his new club. At 37 years old, it seems unlikely the centerman entertains a return to North American pros at any point. Until he proves that sentiment wrong, Bonino’s NHL career will sit at 159 goals, 199 assists, and 251 penalty minutes in 868 games. He won back-to-back Stanley Cups when he served as the Pittsburgh Penguins’ third-line center from 2015 to 2017.

Overseas Notes: Raanta, Gélinas, Cramarossa

at CDT | by 2 Comments

Longtime NHL netminder Antti Raanta is in talks to join Swedish Hockey League club Linköping HC for 2025-26, Mattias Persson of Hockeynews.se reports. The 35-year-old Finn suited up for Genève-Servette in Switzerland this year after retiring from the NHL, posting a 2.74 GAA and .902 SV% in 24 games. The 2022 Jennings Trophy winner last played with the Hurricanes in 2023-24, a disastrous campaign that saw him land on waivers amid posting a .872 SV% in 24 games behind one of the league’s better defenses.

Here’s more on the international market:

  • Former Avalanche and Devils defenseman Éric Gélinas is staying in Finland with Liiga club Luuko for another season, the team announced. Gélinas, now 33, will suit up for the same team in back-to-back years for the first time since a four-year run with Sweden’s Rögle BK from 2018 to 2022. The 6’4″, 227-lb lefty with a booming slapshot was limited by injury to 21 games with Lukko this season but managed 6-11–17 for his best per-game offensive showing in quite some time. A second-round pick of New Jersey in 2009, Gélinas had 14-41–55 in 189 career NHL games with them and Colorado from 2013 to 2017.
  • Austria’s Vienna Capitals will not be renewing the contract of NHL veteran Joseph Cramarossa, the club announced earlier this week. Cramarossa, 32, signed on with the ICEHL club last offseason after parts of two seasons in Germany and posted 8-15–23 in 32 games. The center last touched NHL ice in 2022-23, suiting up four times for the Wild before they mutually terminated his contract for a mid-season move overseas. He has 5-8–13 in 68 NHL appearances with the Ducks, Canucks, and Wild – 59 of which came in the 2016-17 campaign.

Nick Bonino Signs In The ICEHL

at CDT | by 3 Comments

After Nick Bonino received his release from the Rangers back in February and didn’t sign anywhere in free agency or the opening weeks of the season, it looked like Nick Bonino’s playing career had come to an end.  However, that’s not the case as HK Olimpija Ljubljana of the ICEHL announced on their Instagram page that they’ve signed the veteran for the remainder of the season.

The 36-year-old played in 45 games with New York last season on the fourth line but struggled, recording just one goal and four assists while logging 12:15 per night of playing time.  In late January, the Rangers elected to waive Bonino and after he passed through unclaimed, he decided not to report to AHL Hartford and was put on unconditional waivers in early February, being released after clearing once again.

Bonino has 868 career regular season games in the NHL under his belt over 15 seasons with seven different organizations.  He has 159 goals and 199 assists to his name, a very solid career for a sixth-round pick back in 2007 when he was selected 173rd overall.  It’s unlikely he’ll be adding to those totals at this point of his career but this contract suggests that he’s not ready to hang up his skates just yet.

Snapshots: Pipeline Rankings, Strome, Gaunce

at CDT | by 5 Comments

The big news over the past few days was top goalie prospect Yaroslav Askarov heading to the Sharks in a blockbuster trade and immediately signing a two-year, $4MM extension. The move has massively shifted the prospect pool of both teams, but neither find themselves in the basement of Corey Pronman’s ranking of each team’s current crop of under-23 players for The Athletic.

Predictably, his initial installment of the bottom eight is filled with recent championship contenders. The Lightning are beginning to feel the effects of trading away nearly all of their impact futures for win-now pieces in pursuit of their three straight Stanley Cup Final appearances and back-to-back championships earlier this decade, checking in at No. 32. Their biggest fish is a new addition – center Conor Geekie, acquired from the Utah Hockey Club in the Mikhail Sergachev trade at the draft. But he’s the only player in their system that Pronman feels confident will be a top-nine fixture, although he also feels confident in 2023 second-rounder Ethan Gauthier, 2021 seventh-rounder Niko Huuhtanen, and 2022 first-rounder Isaac Howard to at least be everyday NHLers. But after that, especially on defense, it’s slim pickings for Tampa as they’re still trying to extend their championship window in the post-Steven Stamkos era.

Rounding out the bottom are many other teams who have reached the Cup Final in the past few seasons, namely the Avalanche (No. 31), Oilers (No. 30), and the Golden Knights (No. 27). But some other clubs without any conference championships to claim since the pandemic, such as the Bruins (No. 29), Canucks (No. 28), Islanders (No. 25), and Penguins (No. 26), find themselves with some soul-searching to do without a ton of help coming from inside the house.

Other tidbits from around the NHL to start the week:

  • Players are slowly beginning to roll into their team’s home cities ahead of training camps next month. Capitals forward Dylan Strome is one of them, taking part in informal skates after an offseason of change in Washington (per Sammi Silber of The Hockey News). The 27-year-old enters camp intending to maintain his role as Washington’s first-line center, a job he’ll likely face a challenge for from trade acquisition Pierre-Luc Dubois. Strome has flourished in a top-six role since arriving with the Caps two years ago, setting career-highs last season with 27 goals and 67 points.
  • Defenseman Cameron Gaunce is heading overseas for the first time after a 14-year pro career split between the NHL and the AHL. He signed a one-year contract today with Hungary’s Fehérvár AV19, per a team announcement. The 34-year-old was a second-round pick of the Avalanche all the way back in 2008 and has 37 NHL games under his belt with four different teams, last appearing with the Lightning in 2019-20. The vast majority of his playing time has come in the AHL, where he racked up 51 goals, 255 assists and 306 points in 823 games. The strong two-way left-shot defender spent last season on an AHL contract with the Toronto Marlies after waiting until December to sign, posting eight points in 40 appearances. He now heads to AV19, the lone Hungarian club in Austria’s ICE Hockey League.

Minor Transactions: 01/07/24

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

It’s another busy day across the world of professional hockey, with four NHL games. Outside the NHL, the schedule is jam-packed with contests in the CHL and the various European professional leagues. Just as the schedule is packed with games, the transaction wire has had quite a bit of player movement activity. As always, we’ll keep track of those moves here.

  • The AHL’s Rochester Americans have announced a procedural move that will allow defenseman Nicolas Savoie to pursue educational opportunities rather than continue with the team playing pro hockey. The 21-year-old defenseman is set to play for the University of New Brunswick in the Canadian university hockey circuit, according to CBC Sports’ Ben Steiner. Savoie is an undrafted left-shot blueliner who emerged as a strong QMJHL defenseman for the Quebec Ramparts in 2021-22. He scored at least 44 points in each of his last two seasons playing junior hockey, and took home a Memorial Cup with Quebec to cap off his QMJHL career. He played in 21 ECHL games for the Jacksonville Icemen and three AHL contests in Rochester, and will now head to University before potentially trying his hand at the pro game once again.
  • Former Montreal Canadiens prospect Michael McNiven was released by the ECHL’s Savannah Ghost Pirates today, ending a tenure with the team that began in early December. The former CHL goalie of the year was traded from the Wheeling Nailers to Savannah after posting an .859 save percentage with the Nailers. He didn’t do much better in Savannah (0-3-1 with an .899) and will now have to look elsewhere to continue his career. He does have a strong pro campaign on his resume, though, from 2018-19 when he put up a .902 save percentage in 30 games for the AHL’s Laval Rocket.
  • 29-year-old Ross Olsson’s time with the Worcester Railers has ended after one game played. The six-foot-four forward, who captained the Orlando Solar Bears last season, was released by the ECHL club today. He signed with the team yesterday and played in their loss that same day before now receiving his release. Olsson is currently working in an off-ice role at a nearby school, so he seemingly was signed for fill-in duty for that single game as the Railers were likely in need of a capable player to fill in for that short period. Olsson has been a quality ECHLer in his time in the league, scoring 28 goals and 47 points last season.
  • The ECHL’s Maine Mariners have lost their second-leading scorer, Reid Stefanson, to Europe. The 26-year-old has signed with the ICEHL’s Vienna Capitals, according to a team announcement. Stefanson had a strong first campaign in pro hockey last year, as the UMass-Lowell product scored 22 goals and 47 points. He has 22 points in 22 games so far this season and will now begin his career in Europe in the Austrian capital.
  • The ICEHL’s HC Bolzano have swapped goalies, releasing former NHLer Niklas Svedberg and signing 25-year-old Samuel Harvey. The 34-year-old Svedberg joined Bolzano this past summer but struggled through 24 games with the club, putting up an .895 save percentage. Bolzano is a club with high expectations after losing in the ICEHL’s finals last season, so they’ve turned to Harvey. Harvey played for Bolzano last season and was stellar, posting a .922 in 22 games. He led them in the playoffs as well, which earned him a shot in Liiga with Lukko Rauma. Now after 20 games in Liiga the former QMJHL star has elected to return to Italy where he’ll look to go on another deep playoff run with the Foxes.

This page may be updated throughout the day.

Minor Transactions: 12/18/23

at CDT | by 3 Comments

Just five NHL contests are slated to be played tonight, although among that group of games there are a few with very intriguing storylines attached.

The Pittsburgh Penguins host the Minnesota Wild in what could be Marc-André Fleury’s final trip to PPG Paints Arena as an active player, although Fleury is not starting in the game. Matthew Tkachuk returns to Calgary tonight as the Flames host the Florida Panthers in a game that features quite a few former teammates. And out west in Winnipeg, the Montreal Canadiens take on the Jets in a contest that will always have stakes attached due to the hatred still felt in the Montreal market towards Mark Scheifele. Scheifele’s hit on Jake Evans from the 2021 Stanley Cup playoffs, one that the NHL’s Department of Player Safety called “predatory,” is still fresh in the memory of many Canadiens fans, something that adds extra heat to the relatively rare matchups between the two clubs.

Just as tonight’s schedule is packed with intriguing storylines, player movement across the world of professional hockey has been packed with activity. As always, we’ll keep track of notable player movement here:

  • Former AHL All-Star netminder Kasimir Kaskisuo has been signed to a PTO by the AHL’s Laval Rocket, returning Kaskisuo to the American League after a two-year stint in the SHL. After spending a year as the taxi squad netminder for the Nashville Predators, Kaskisuo left North America to sign with Leksands IF in the SHL. He served as the starter there for 2021-22, posting a .910 save percentage in 46 games. He led Leksands to the SHL’s postseason and played in four Champions Hockey League games, but the following year saw his role as the team’s starter usurped by Lithuanian international Mantas Armalis. Kaskisuo re-enters the AHL at a dire time for the Rocket, who sit 28th in the AHL standings. Laval’s goaltending has been horrific this season, and the team leads the AHL in goals surrendered with 102. The next-worst team has given up 92 goals, and neither of the team’s two goalies (Jakub Dobeš, Strauss Mann) have save percentages above .885. The hope with this signing could be that Kaskisuo, who has a .909 career AHL save percentage, provides some much-needed stability in net for this young Rocket team.
  • In more news related to the Montreal Canadiens, prospect defenseman Petteri Nurmi has signed a one-year contract extension with his current club, HPK in the Finnish Liiga. The 21-year-old left-shot blueliner was drafted 194th overall by the Canadiens at the 2022 draft, and has been a regular for HPK for the last three seasons. He’s scored six points in 30 games this year and is HPK’s number-six defenseman, averaging 17:48 time-on-ice per game. The Canadiens hold the exclusive rights to sign Nurmi to an entry-level contract until June 1st, 2024, and this extension may not impact their decision-making on whether to extend him an offer as they could opt to get Nurmi on an ELC and then loan him back to HPK. As a seventh-rounder who has not yet been signed, though, it’s far from a guarantee that Nurmi receives an entry-level offer from the Canadiens, making the rest of this season an important stretch for the young blueliner.
  • Just one season removed from winning the Slovak Extraliga title, HC Slovan Bratislava currently sits 11th out of 12 teams in the league standings. Their struggles this season have prompted significant player movement in recent days, as this past week has already seen two defensemen and one forward depart the club. Slovan has made a signing to replace one of those two departed defensemen, inking Swedish international Jonas Ahnelöv to a one-year deal. A 36-year-old former Arizona Coyotes third-round pick, Ahnelöv is a left-shot defenseman with a ton of experience. He represented Sweden at the 2018 Winter Olympics and the 2014 IIHF Men’s World Championships. He’s also a veteran of over 500 games in the SHL, one of Europe’s top leagues, and brings leadership value having captained MoDo Hockey in 2014-15. Ahnelöv spent the last four years at Leksands, leading the club to the postseason on three occasions.
  • 23-year-old Finnish-American forward Joonas Oden has signed a one-year contract with Austrian club Pioneers Vorarlberg, a team that competes in the Central European ICEHL. The forward tried his luck at becoming a regular in Liiga and by 2021-22 looked to be successful, as he scored 11 goals and 29 points in 56 games for Ilves Tampere. But after scoring just two points in 14 postseason games for Ilves, Oden struggled the following campaign and eventually moved to SaiPa. He began the year at SaiPa but only scored four points in 14 games. Now he’ll head to the ICEHL, a league that Pioneers has struggled in since joining last season.

This page may be updated throughout the day. 

Minor Transactions: 11/23/23

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

As today is American Thanksgiving and 14 NHL games were played last night, the schedule for high-level hockey in North America is relatively light today.

Although it’s just OHL and QMJHL teams that will play today on this side of the Atlantic, over in Europe things are, as one would expect, quite a bit more active. The entirety of Sweden’s SHL will play today, as will eight teams in Finland’s Liiga and two apiece in the German DEL and Swiss NL. With an eye on today’s games, we’ll keep track of notable player movement throughout the hockey world here.

  • The most active team in pro hockey yesterday may have been the ECHL’s Cincinnati Cyclones, who sit sixth in the ECHL’s Western Conference with a 7-5 record. On November 22nd, the club made two trades and two free agent additions. The first trade was technically made by AHL teams, with the Cyclones-affiliated Hartford Wolf Pack acquiring forward Tim Doherty from the Chicago Wolves, and then loaning Doherty to Cincinnati. Doherty is a 28-year-old scorer who played college hockey at the University of Maine and has broken out as a star ECHLer with the Maine Mariners. He scored 21 goals and 73 points in just 69 games last season, and has eight points through ten games this campaign. He’ll instantly be expected to be a difference-making offensive forward for the Cyclones.
  • The Cyclones didn’t end their offensive additions with Doherty, though, as they also signed winger Lincoln Griffin to a contract. The versatile forward was claimed off of waivers by Cincinnati from the Greenville Swamp Rabbits in 2021, and that decision instantly paid dividends for the club. Griffin scored 21 goals and 46 points in his first 57 games with the club, and then scored 17 goals and 37 points in 2022-23, en route to the ECHL All-Star game. He signed with Slovakia’s HK Nitra for 2023-24, but with just two points in 12 games, Griffin has elected to forgo the rest of the season in Nitra to return to his old stomping grounds in the Queen City.
  • To make room for these forward acquisitions, the Cyclones dealt forward Adam Berg in a trade with the Utah Grizzlies. Berg, 26, is in his second ECHL season after getting into 19 games near the end of 2022-23 with the Cyclones. Berg was signed to Cincinnati after a strong final season playing Canadian university hockey at Brock University, a year where he scored 15 goals and 29 points in 24 games. Berg has just two points in eight games so far this season for Cincinnati, so perhaps this change-of-scenery trade to Utah will help Berg better establish himself in the ECHL. Berg is the second forward the Grizzlies, who have the third-fewest goals scored in the ECHL, have added this week. They also signed former SPHL scorer Aaron Aragon as well.
  • The final addition by the Cyclones from yesterday was on the defensive side of the equation. The team signed blueliner Josh Burnside, returning a fixture from the Cyclones’ 2022-23 squad back to Cincinnati. The left-shot defenseman skated in 61 games for Cincinnati last year, posting 13 points and 42 penalty minutes. The former Mississauga Steelheads top-four defenseman signed in England this past summer, with the EIHL’s Coventry Blaze. He went on to play four games for Coventry before he elected to leave the club and return to the ECHL.
  • Defenseman Adam Holwell, a 2017-18 Memorial Cup and QMJHL champion with the Acadie-Bathurst Titan, has transferred from the EIHL’s Fife Flyers to Erste Liga’s Corona Brașov, a club in Romania. The Canadian blueliner, who posted 141 points in 329 career QMJHL games, began his pro career last season with his hometown Newfoundland Growlers in the ECHL. Holwell wasn’t great there, though, scoring just three points in 18 combined regular season and playoff games. He didn’t return to the ECHL for his first full campaign as a professional, instead signing in Scotland with the EIHL’s Fife Flyers. Holwell only managed one point in eight games for Fife, and has not played since a November 5th loss at the Guildford Flames where he registered a -3 rating. With Fife winning three of four games since Holwell last dressed for the team, a mutual parting of ways appears to have been the best course of action for both player and club. Holwell will now head to Romania, where he’ll look to carve out a regular role for a team currently sitting in the middle of the standings of the Erste Liga, a league comprised of clubs from both Romania and Hungary.
  • HockeyAllsvenskan’s Kalmar HC has signed veteran netminder Christian Engstrand to a one-year contract. The 35-year-old was playing on a short-term contract with the ICEHL’s EC-KAC, and had posted a 6-1-1 record, .939 save percentage, and 1.48 goals-against-average in eight games there. Kalmar is in need of some help in net, as while Jonathan Stålberg has been serviceable as the starter, 19-year-old backup Alexander Hellnemo has shown himself to not quite be ready for such a role. The 35-year-old Engstrand is a quality veteran goalie with some accomplishments on his resume. Most recently, Engstrand led the ICEHL in save percentage and goals-against-average for EC-KAC last season. Earlier in his career, Engstrand had achieved many feats in Swedish pro hockey, such as posting a .935 save percentage in 2012-13 for Linköping HC, posting a .950 save percentage in the Champions Hockey League in 2015-16, and leading Mora IK to promotion from HockeyAllsvenskan to the SHL in 2016-17. While he has not played in Sweden since 2020-21 with HC Vita Hästen, Engstrand is an experienced netminder capable of backstopping Kalmar for their push for SHL promotion.
  • Eero Elo, once a quality goal scorer in the Finnish Liiga, KHL, and both Swiss leagues has signed with EHC Freiburg of the German second-tier DEL2. The 33-year-old former Minnesota Wild prospect spent last season playing second-division hockey in Switzerland for HC Thurgau, scoring 20 goals and 44 points in 53 combined regular season and playoff games. Once a player who scored 26 goals in Liiga, Eero has regressed since those days and has not played in a premier European league on a regular basis since his 2019-20 season split between Liiga’s Lukko Rauma and NL’s SCL Tigers. Freiburg are currently 10th in the DEL2 standings, though they rank second in the division in goals scored. Perhaps adding even more firepower through the addition of Elo is what the club needs to climb the DEL2 table.

This page may be updated throughout the day. 

Minor Transactions: 11/16/23

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

NHL hockey is going international today as the Detroit Red Wings and Ottawa Senators are set to face off in Stockholm, Sweden. All 14 clubs in Sweden’s top professional league, the SHL, play today as well, meaning it’s a hectic day for hockey in the country. Elsewhere in Europe, potential top 2024 draft prospect Konsta Helenius’ Liiga side Jukurit is set to take on JYP, while the current DEL leaders Eisbaren Berlin are taking on the Augsburg Panthers.

Player movement across the hockey world in both minor and foreign leagues mirrors how busy the schedule is, and as always we’ll keep track of notable transactions here.

  • Lucas Lessio, a former NHLer who began what has been an extensive career in European hockey in 2016-17, has left his club HC Bolzano of the ICEHL to sign in the DEL2 with Krefeld Pinguine. Although Krefeld have had a decent 9-7-1 start to the season, they have made a significant add in Lessio. The 30-year-old former Arizona Coyote played for Krefeld for two years from 2020 to 2022, scoring 37 goals and 62 points in 93 games. He was with the club when they suffered relegation from the DEL, and now with this signing, he’ll have the chance to lead them back to the German top flight.
  • Jerome Flaake, a two-time DEL champion and a veteran of over 700 DEL games has been signed by Krefeld alongside Lessio. The 33-year-old Toronto Maple Leafs 2008 fifth-round pick was a star player for the now-defunct Hamburg Freezers, though he never quite reached the same heights again in the DEL. Last season, Flaake helped ERC Ingolstadt reach the DEL finals, and now after scoring just three points in 12 games for Augsburg, he’s headed down a division to help Krefeld with their promotion push.
  • Former Montreal Canadiens prospect Arvid Henrikson has signed with AIK of the Swedish second-tier HockeyAllsvenskan. The big six-foot-five blueliner has spent this season so far with Västerviks IK, playing a total of 16 games. Henrikson hadn’t received more than bottom-pairing minutes for the club since October and has not played at all in over a week. Now he’ll play with AIK, a club he once captained at the U-18 level. It’s a big step up in the standings for Henrikson, who moves from HockeyAllsvenskan’s 13th-ranked club to the team currently third in the standings and looking like a potential promotion candidate.
  • Former Providence College forward Bryan Lemos has decided to leave the EIHL’s Guildford Flames, citing homesickness, to return to the ECHL’s Indy Fuel, the club he played for in 2021-22 and 2022-23. Lemos only managed three points in nine games for Guildford, though he did conclude his time there with a goal in the team’s big 3-1 victory over the reigning champion Belfast Giants. Lemos has had success with the Fuel before, and has scored a total of 25 goals and 67 points in 92 games with the club.
  • Journeyman American blueliner Charlie Dodero has signed with the ICEHL’s HK Olimpija Ljubljana today, adding a sixth country to the list of places he has played in during his career. The former Sudbury Wolves alternate captain spent last season in France’s Ligue Magnus with the Rouen Dragons, helping the club capture a French title and the Champions Hockey League spot that comes alongside it. Before 2022-23, Dodero was a regular face in the Central European ICEHL with two Austrian clubs, the Vienna Capitals and Graz99ers. Dodero last played in North America in 2018-19 with the Idaho Steelheads and has 46 AHL games on his resume, all of them coming with the Syracuse Crunch. Now, Dodero will look to add some edge to their blueline in the Slovenian capital, looking to help a club that is at the moment just a few places ahead of his former ICEHL teams near the bottom of the league’s standings.

This page may be updated throughout the day. 

Minor Transactions: 11/12/23

at CDT | by 1 Comment

The looming presence of the NFL regular season on the sports calendar as well as the European hockey international break means that today’s schedule around the world of hockey is lighter than normal. There are still a few games on the docket, including a contest in the AHL between the Hartford Wolf Pack and Providence Bruins that was the Wolf Pack interim head coach Steve Smith.

Even though today isn’t very busy in terms of game action, the transaction wire remains active as teams around the world add, subtract, and extend players. As always, we’ll keep track of notable moves here.

  • Ottawa Senators 2022 third-round pick Tomas Hamara was traded in the OHL, sent to the Brantford Bulldogs from the Kitchener Rangers in exchange for two draft picks. The 19-year-old defenseman, who has represented Czechia at two IIHF World Junior Championships, has scored just three points in 18 games for Kitchener this season and will look for an uptick in production with the Bulldogs.
  • 25-year-old Norwegian netminder Jonas Arntzen has signed a three-year contract with his current club, Örebro HK of the SHL. Arntzen is currently in his fourth season as the backup to former NHLer Jhonas Enroth with Örebro, and he even played in 13 playoff games last season as Örebro made a run to the SHL Semifinals. This season, he has played five games and posted a .899 save percentage.
  • Journeyman Swedish netminder Robin Rahm has added a seventh country to the list of nations he’s played professional hockey in, signing a one-month contract with Slovenia’s HK Olimpija Ljubljana. The 37-year-old joins the ICEHL side to fill the void left by an injury to starter Lukáš Horák. Rahm has a .901 save percentage in 30 career ICEHL games, all of them from 2018-19 with EC Graz. In addition to that move in net. Ljubljana has also announced that forward Ville Leskinen has had his short-term deal converted to a full-time contract, coming after he scored four goals and five points in 12 games with the club.
  • Czech Extraliga club HC Vítkovice have signed forward Marcel Barinka, 22. The former Halifax Mooseheads forward was in the midst of his fourth season in the DEL, having bounced from Cologne to Berlin to Augsburg and then finally to Iserlohn. Barinka has had success playing internationally with Czechia but has struggled to find the scoresheet at the club level. The hope will be that he can unlock some offense with Vítkovice, who rank 1oth out of 14 clubs in the Czech Extraliga in goals scored.

This page may be updated throughout the day. 

Pro Hockey Rumors is not affiliated with National Hockey League, NHL or NHL.com

scroll to top