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Snapshots: Voluntary Opt-Out, Senators, Stepan, Schneider

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The first significant day of the NHL’s new calendar for the upcoming 2021 season is upon us as today is the deadline for NHL players to voluntarily opt-out of the season, according to TSN’s Frank Seravalli.

If a player wants to opt-out of the season, they must provide written notice to the league seven days before training camp starts, which means that the deadline has already passed for the seven non-playoff teams which start their training camps on Thursday. However, the rest of the league has until the end of the day today, if they don’t want to participate in the upcoming season.

Waivers are next, with it beginning Monday for the new season.

  • With many teams struggling to move out salary this year without requiring to include a sweetener to get the deal done, there were quite a few people surprised when the Ottawa Senators took on the contract of Derek Stepan last night and instead of receiving some type of sweetener, sent a second-round pick to Arizona instead. Quite a high price to pay. However, Ottawa Sun’s Bruce Garrioch points out that the move is very Ottawa-like as Stepan might have a $6.5MM cap hit for the upcoming season, but is only due $2MM in salary, as the Coyotes have already paid Stepan a $3MM salary bonus. The Senators have been well known to take on players who have less salary to be paid out than their cap hit. This trade is one of them.
  • Speaking of Stepan, TSN’s Pierre LeBrun notes that there is going to be a bit of a delay for Stepan to report to training camp in Ottawa. Besides the 14-day quarantine that will require him to miss part of training camp, Stepan is also waiting for the pending birth of his child, meaning that the 30-year-old could very well miss the start of the regular season. LeBrun reports, however, that Stepan’s agent, Matt Oates, says that the veteran is excited about joining Ottawa’s team as a team leader and is eager to arrive.
  • The IIHF will have a disciplinary committee hearing regarding the illegal hit to the head by Team Canada’s Braden Schneider vs. Germany’s Jan-Luca Schumacher, according to TSN’s Bob McKenzie. A decision is expected before Canada’s game vs. Slovakia later today. Schneider, a 2020 first-round pick of the New York Rangers, could be suspended, considering the IIHF has a no-tolerance policy on hits to the head. He was issued a game misconduct after the incident. McKenzie adds that Austria’s Philipp Wimmer is also expected to receive a hearing after his hit against USA’s Patrick Moynihan. UPDATE: Schneider received a one-game suspension for the hit, according to the IIHF.

IIHF Provides WJC COVID-19 Update

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The IIHF has provided another update on their COVID-19 testing and for one team, it is not good news. Another German player has tested positive and will remain in quarantine until January 4. Only ten players and eight staff members from Germany were released from quarantine today, joining the six players who had previously been released.

This is catastrophic news for any hope the Germans had of competing in the round-robin, given they’ll now be taking on Finland and Canada with a reduced lineup. As Bob McKenzie of TSN tweets, the team is expected to have just two goalies, five defensemen, and nine forwards available for those two games. Even past that they will not have a full complement, certainly reducing their chance of toppling the hockey giants in the group.

There were no further positive tests among any of the other teams. Games start tomorrow with Switzerland and Slovakia kicking things off before the weakened German squad tries to upset Finland. Team USA’s first game is against the Russians, while Canada will not only get to face Germany without their full group but on a back-to-back as well Saturday evening.

IIHF Provides Update On WJC COVID-19 Testing

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Dec 21: In an update, the IIHF has announced that one additional staff member for the German squad has tested positive and will remain in quarantine until December 30. No new players have tested positive on any of the teams and Sweden–minus the two staff members who tested positive previously–will be allowed to exit quarantine.

Dec 18: The IIHF has provided an update on the COVID-19 testing of World Junior Championship players that have arrived inside the Edmonton bubble for the tournament that is set to start in the coming days. Since the traveling parties entered the bubble, more than 2,000 tests have been conducted. Of those tests, ten came back positive.

The German team has had eight players test positive for COVID-19. The entire team will remain in quarantine until December 24.

The Swedish team has had two staff members test positive for COVID-19. The team will remain in quarantine until December 21.

The release indicates that all other teams will be released from the quarantine period once all test results have been confirmed.

The Germans had dealt with positive tests before traveling to Canada too, with Chicago Blackhawks prospect Lukas Reichel being among those that were not allowed to attend the tournament. Sweden too has known their share of positive results, with almost all of their coaching staff already experiencing it and being removed from the team. These quarantines will obviously mean that several pre-tournament games will no longer be able to happen.

Snapshots: Brassard, Marleau, World Championships

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Derick Brassard is one of quite a few veterans of note that are still without a contract as free agency concludes its sixth week.  He told Le Droit’s Marc Brassard that he turned down some overtures from European teams in the hopes of landing another NHL contract.  The 33-year-old had a good season with the Islanders in 2019-20, recording 10 goals and 22 assists in 66 games despite spending a fair bit of time in their bottom six but that hasn’t helped him land a deal thus far.  Brassard indicated that the Islanders haven’t ruled out the idea of him returning but until they get a contract done with RFA center Mathew Barzal, they’re limited in what else they can do at the moment.

More from around the hockey world:

  • Sharks winger Patrick Marleau sits 45 games shy of the all-time games played record in the NHL and depending on the length of the schedule next year and his health, he should have a chance of beating Gordie Howe’s mark. But if next season isn’t able to get going, the 41-year-old told NBC Bay Area’s Brodie Brazil that he’s already planning ahead to be ready for a 2021-22 campaign.  Marleau saw his numbers dip to career lows in 2019-20 with 11 goals and 11 assists in 66 games between San Jose and Pittsburgh and will likely have a limited role with the Sharks next season, assuming it’s able to be played.
  • After another lengthy list of tournaments being cancelled by the IIHF earlier this week, the World Championships is one of the few still standing but there are changes coming to that one. Ryan Kennedy of The Hockey News reports that one of the venues for the tournament is being changed.  While Riga, Latvia will still host part of the event, the other host venue will be changed from Minsk, Belarus to Moscow, Russia.  Kennedy notes that meetings to finalize the plans are set for next week.

IIHF Releases 2021 World Junior Schedule

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While many international tournaments have already pulled the plug for next season or are expected to, one event that is still going on is the World Juniors at the top division.  (Lower levels aren’t playing and accordingly, there won’t be any promotions and relegations.)  The schedule was released today and can be found here.  It starts one day earlier than usual this time around with three games on the docket for December 25th.  Exhibition games will run from December 20th through the 23rd.

While the event was initially scheduled to take place in Edmonton and Red Deer, those plans have been changed.  Instead, the tournament will be held exclusively in Edmonton within the Edmonton Ice District which housed the NHL in its Return to Play.  The success of that was enough to give tournament organizers confidence that they could safely hold the event in the same environment, albeit without fans.

As a result of not being able to have spectators in attendance, the 2022 event will now be held in Red Deer and Edmonton with an expectation that fans will be able to attend by then.  Meanwhile, Sweden, who was initially expected to host in 2022, will now do so in 2024.

While the tournament taking place in Edmonton could affect the Oilers as they prepare for next season, there has been speculation that the year may not start until mid-January or later although the NHL is still officially targeting January 1st as its return date.  If it is the later of the two, they would have their arena back in time for the season to get underway although their training camp would likely have to take place at a different site.

The other thing to keep an eye on from an NHL scheduling standpoint is if the start is once again pushed back, junior-aged NHL players could, in theory, be made available to participate in this tournament.  While there would be a risk of injury, that same risk exists for anyone that’s assigned on loan to play overseas while awaiting the start of camp and the World Juniors would certainly provide a high level of competition, especially if teams are augmented with players that otherwise wouldn’t be available.  That certainly adds a layer of intrigue although we’re still a couple of months away from that decision being made.

IIHF Announces 2021 World Juniors To Be Held In Bubble

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The IIHF has announced that the 2021 World Junior Championship, originally scheduled to be held in Red Deer and Edmonton, Alberta, will now be a single-venue tournament held in just Edmonton. It will use the “bubble” protocols that the NHL has pioneered for their 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs and will be held without spectators. The tournament schedule will be revised and released at a later date.

Because of the changes to this year’s tournament, the IIHF has also made a swap down the line. The 2022 event will no longer be held in Gothenburg, Sweden, but is now scheduled for the original hosts of Red Deer and Edmonton with spectators. Sweden will now host the 2024 tournament instead.

The governing body has also canceled the lower division 2021 tournaments, meaning there will be no promotion or relegation this year. The relegation round for the World Juniors will no longer take place.

IIHF Sets 2020-21 International Calendar For World Championships

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The IIHF announced that it has set its schedule for the 2020-21 season headlined by the Men’s World Championship.  The start date has been delayed about two weeks longer than usual to May 21st and will run through June 6th in Belarus and Latvia.  The later start should help offset any potential delays to the start of seasons both in North America and Europe due to the ongoing pandemic.

The groups for the tournament will be as follows:

Group A: Russia, Sweden, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Slovakia, Denmark, Belarus, Great Britain
Group B: Canada, Finland, USA, Germany, Latvia, Norway, Italy, Kazakhstan

Meanwhile, the Women’s Worlds will take place in Nova Scotia starting April 7th which was slated to host this year’s event before it was cancelled.  Their groups will be:

Group A: USA, Canada, Finland, Russia, Switzerland
Group B: Japan, Czech Republic, Germany, Denmark, Hungary

The tournament that NHL scouts will undoubtedly want to keep their eye on is the Men’s Under-18 Worlds.  It features many of the top draft-eligible prospects as well as providing a final opportunity for some of the lower or mid-tier players to boost their stock heading into the 2021 draft.  It will kick off in mid-April in Michigan with the following groups:

Group A: Sweden, Canada, Belarus, Latvia, Switzerland
Group B: Russia, USA, Czech Republic, Finland, Germany

Today’s announcement from the IIHF pertained to end-of-year tournaments so the World Juniors was not among the ones that were mentioned.  As things stand, they remain scheduled to start on December 26th although things could certainly change between now and then depending on how things play out with the pandemic and if they are able to play the event in front of spectators.

NHL Announces New Player Transfer Agreements

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The NHL has announced new player transfer agreements today, including one-year extensions with the existing ones. Those include the IIHF Member Federations/Leagues in Austria, Belarus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Latvia, Norway, Slovakia, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

They have also extended the existing CHL Agreement with the Canadian Hockey League (OHL, WHL, QMJHL). This means that nothing will change in regards to players drafted out of the CHL being eligible for AHL play before the age of 20. Corey Pronman of The Athletic (subscription required) recently polled scouts on whether the believed the agreement should be amended; 60% felt it should be, however, any changes will have to wait at least another year.

The biggest news however is the new one-year agreement with the Swiss Ice Hockey Association and Swiss League, something that previously did not exist. This will provide extra opportunities for players in Switzerland to come over to North America, and will slightly tweak the rules for draft picks out of the league.

With these agreements announced, we will likely see a flood of contracts for European players officially filed over the next few days.

IIHF Sets Rankings And Groupings For The 2022 Olympics

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Normally, it would be a little while yet before the next set of IIHF rankings would come out as the World Championships play a big role in those rankings.  However, with those tournaments cancelled, they have gone ahead and announced their end-of-year rankings.  Viewed on their own, it may not seem all that significant but these rankings also set the groupings for the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.  The groupings (and seedings) are as follows:

Group A: Canada (1), USA (6), Germany (7), China (12)
Group B: Russia (2), Czech Republic (5), Switzerland (8), Qualifier 3 (11)
Group C: Finland (3), Sweden (4), Qualifier 1 (9), Qualifier 2 (10)

Rounding out the top-ten in the current rankings are Slovakia (9) and Latvia (10).

The qualifying tournaments to determine the final three spots started last November and are slated to conclude in late August in Slovakia, Latvia, and Norway although that could certainly be moved depending on the state of the ongoing pandemic.  Those groups are:

Group D: Slovakia, Belarus, Austria, Poland
Group E: Latvia, France, Italy, Hungary
Group F: Norway, Denmark, Korea, Slovenia

A final decision on whether or not the NHL will participate in Beijing has not yet been made.

Meanwhile, the rankings were also set on the women’s side and set the brackets for the Olympics.  Their side is done a bit differently with the top teams all in the same group for competitive purposes with each of them getting guaranteed advancement to the medal round.  The Olympic brackets are as follows:

Group A: USA (1), Canada (2), Finland (3), Russia (4), Switzerland (5)
Group B: Japan (6), Qualifier 1 (7), Qualifier 2 (8), Qualifier 3 (9), China (10)

The Czech Republic (7), Germany (8), Sweden (9), and France (10) round out the top-ten in the current rankings.  The first three countries will host the qualifying tournaments which are scheduled for February 2021.

Snapshots: Zub, Suspensions, U17

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With the KHL season and playoffs now over, the pursuit of the best players in the league will begin in earnest for NHL clubs trying to add free agent talent. One of the players drawing the most interest is Artyom Zub, who Darren Dreger of TSN reports has narrowed his options to just two teams. The Ottawa Senators, one of the teams chasing Zub the longest, is one of them.

The 24-year old defenseman has played the last four seasons with SKA St. Petersburg, one of the KHL’s powerhouse organizations. He broke out offensively this season with 13 goals and 22 points, though Igor Eronko of Sport-Express points out that he doesn’t see the powerplay and is normally more of a defensive option. For a more thorough scouting report, Scott Wheeler and Hailey Salvian of The Athletic (subscription required) recently broke down some of Zub’s tape.

  • Zub’s not the only KHL player with his name in the news today, as Kirill Dyakov was one of three to receive a suspension from the IIHF. Dyakov currently plays for Admiral Vladivostok but will receive a 15-month suspension from IIHF competition after testing positive for cocaine. Michael Budd and Vladislav Nikiforov also received 24- and 15-month suspensions respectively.
  • USA Hockey has announced its U17 roster for the 2020-21 season, a group that is expected to have a strong NHL draft presence down the road. There are some familiar hockey names among them, including Marek Hejduk—son of Colorado Avalanche legend Milan Hejduk.

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