Flyers Notes: Vladar, Michkov, Tippett, Zavragin
It’s fair to say that Daniel Vladar’s first season with the Flyers was a success. He became their undisputed number one netminder by the end of the year and helped lead them to a playoff spot that not many would have been realistically expecting, then helped take them to the second round.
When he signed with Philadelphia last summer, he only signed a two-year deal, one that pays him $3.35MM per season. Last summer, the agreement looked like it might carry some risk and now, it’s a bargain. He’ll be in line for much more on his next contract and it appears that the Flyers are ready to give it to him. Speaking with NHL.com’s Adam Kimelman at the Combine, GM Daniel Briere called getting an extension done with the 28-year-old a priority.
Vladar posted a 2.42 GAA with a .906 SV% in a career-high 52 games this season, being called on to shoulder more of the workload than expected due to Samuel Ersson’s struggles. Now, with that performance under his belt, Daily Faceoff’s Anthony DiMarco suggested last month that the organization might be comfortable extending him a five-year deal in the $6MM range. That’s still on the lower end for a starter and one more year like this one would push the price tag higher. On the other hand, after being a backup for most of his career, it would certainly be understandable if Vladar wanted to lock in a guaranteed role and raise now.
It appears another extension-eligible player won’t be receiving one this summer, however. Matvei Michkov will also be eligible to sign in July as he enters the final season of his entry-level contract. However, his sophomore campaign saw his point total dip from 63 to 51 while he was called out for not arriving at training camp with a proper fitness level. Meanwhile, he was scratched twice in the playoffs while only recording one assist in the eight games he played. Accordingly, Briere indicated that they will take a wait-and-see approach with the youngster while suggesting that Michkov seems to prefer the idea of waiting to sign instead of trying to work something out now.
The GM also shared some positive news on the injury front. Winger Owen Tippett missed the second-round series against Carolina due to an internal bleeding issue but Briere noted that everything has been cleared on that front now, setting Tippett up for a full offseason of training. The 27-year-old led the Flyers in goals this season with 28, hitting the 20-goal mark for the fourth straight year.
Meanwhile, there is some news on the prospect front. Goalie prospect Yegor Zavragin is on the move in the KHL as the league announced that the netminder has been traded from SKA St. Petersburg to Metallurg Magnitogorsk. Zavragin split the season between the KHL and VHL and was particularly strong in the latter league, posting a 1.44 GAA and a .949 SV% in 18 appearances. Briere spoke of some of Philadelphia’s goalie prospects needing more development time and that likely applies to the 20-year-old, who could benefit from a full season in the KHL as a result of this swap.
Alexandar Georgiev Terminates KHL Contract, Seeking NHL Return
Earlier this season, Alexandar Georgiev found himself in the minors with Buffalo and decided to ask for his release to sign a two-year deal in the KHL. Now, he has requested and was granted his release from KHL Spartak, per a league announcement. His agent Stanislav Romanov told Hockey News Hub (Twitter link) that Georgiev’s intention is to return to the NHL next season.
There was a time early in his NHL career when Georgiev was viewed as a high-end backup with the potential of being a starter. He ultimately received that opportunity in Colorado and while the first year in 2022-23 went well, things went downhill after that. He was eventually sent to San Jose in the 2024-25 campaign and hit the open market last summer.
But even though he had been a starter in recent years, Georgiev’s struggles ultimately resulted in him having to settle for a one-year, $850K pact with the Sabres just days before training camp started. He ultimately wound up passing through waivers in training camp and then terminated his deal after just two appearances with AHL Rochester.
Georgiev put up respectable numbers with Spartak overall, posting a 2.37 GAA with a .918 SV% in 24 appearances, numbers that were around the middle of the pack for starters. With that in mind, it’d be surprising if his chances of securing an NHL backup job are any better than they were a year ago.
This year’s UFA crop of goaltenders is headlined by veteran Sergei Bobrovsky and Stuart Skinner with the rest of the options being backups in all likelihood. Georgiev will join them now but it wouldn’t be surprising if his market winds up being like last summer’s, one that sees him having to wait for a while before accepting what’s likely to be more of a third-string role.
Morning Notes: Leach, Merkley, Gross
On Sunday, we covered reports indicating that former Boston Bruins and Seattle Kraken assistant coach Jay Leach was a strong candidate for two head coaching vacancies in the AHL: the Hartford Wolf Pack (New York Rangers) and Belleville Senators (Ottawa Senators). Yesterday, David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period reported that “all signs point” to Leach becoming head coach in Hartford, with the official announcement from the team coming soon after.
If he ends up hired by the Rangers to coach their AHL affiliate, Leach, 46, would bring instant credibility to the team’s coaching staff. Leach was previously a head coach in the AHL for the Providence Bruins from 2017-18 through 2020-21, amassing an impressive 136-77-26 record. Most crucially for the Rangers, whose player development at the pro level has come under recent scrutiny (the team moved on from director of player development Jed Ortmeyer last month), Leach has a strong track record of delivering AHL talent to the NHL level. During his time in Providence, he helped develop future NHL players such as Jeremy Lauzon, Trent Frederic, Connor Clifton, Dan Vladar, Jordan Binnington, Matt Grzelcyk, and Urho Vaakanainen.
Other notes from around the hockey world:
- 2015 first-round pick Nick Merkley has decided to leave the KHL’s Shanghai Dragons, signing a one-year contract with Dynamo Moscow. Merkley, 29, last played in North America in the 2021-22 season, a year where he got into nine NHL contests for the San Jose Sharks. Merkley has spent the last four seasons in the KHL, where he has been a productive top-six forward. He led the Dragons in scoring in 2025-26, putting up 24 goals and 45 points.
- Veteran defenseman Jordan Gross, who was formerly a solid depth defenseman in NHL organizations, has signed a two-year KHL contract with Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg. The 31-year-old blueliner is an undrafted player who leveraged a stellar NCAA career at Notre Dame into 25 NHL games across four seasons. Gross is a former Eddie Shore Award winner as the AHL’s defenseman of the year, but has been in the KHL for the past two seasons. This past year, Gross scored eight goals and 35 points in 64 regular-season games for Traktor Chelyabinsk.
Minor Transactions: 06/01/2026
Today has been a busy day in the wider hockey world, in large part due to the fact that KHL contracts expire May 31. That made today effectively the first day of KHL free agency. This was reflected in the handful of KHL prospects signing their ELC’s earlier today, including New Jersey Devils first-rounder Anton Silayev. It also has led to numerous additional player moves.
Here, we’ll recap all of the notable transactions from the wider hockey world, largely focusing on player movement in the top professional leagues of Europe, involving several former NHL players:
- There was a swap of quality young forward talent in the KHL today, as SKA St. Petersburg acquired 23-year-old scorer Vasily Atanasov from Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod in exchange for two-time KHL Rookie of the Month Matvei Polyakov. Depth defenseman Arseny Varlakov also went from Torpedo to SKA in the deal. Polyakov is fresh off a breakout rookie season for SKA, scoring 16 goals and 29 points in 63 games. Atanasov, who is under contract through the 2027-28 season, has been a lineup regular for Torpedo since 2022-23. His best season came in 2023-24, when he scored 19 goals and 49 points in 46 games. In two seasons since, Atanasov has 38 goals and 71 points in 121 games. There have been credible reports in the past that Atanasov was receiving NHL interest, but he elected to remain in the KHL. Now, he’ll continue his KHL career playing for a different franchise.
- 2016 Philadelphia Flyers first-round pick German Rubtsov agreed on a three-year contract extension with the KHL’s Spartak Moscow, the team announced today. Rubtsov, 27, has been with the Spartak organization for the last four years. He was once a prized Flyers prospect but struggled to adapt to the North American professional game and played just three seasons in the Flyers’ system. But while Rubtsov failed to develop into an NHL player for Philadelphia, he has been a developmental success story for Spartak. He was a low-scoring forward playing in the second-tier VHL in 2022-23, and the following year, he scored just 10 points in 51 games as a full-time KHLer in Moscow. But he showed some signs of growth in 2024-25, scoring 13 goals and 25 points for Spartak. Then, he had a breakout 2025-26 season, potting 14 goals and 30 points in 50 KHL games, while winning 51.7% of his draws. His breakout has been rewarded with a new contract extension that will keep Rubtsov in Moscow until the summer of 2029.
- Former Tampa Bay Lightning, Montreal Canadiens, and Calgary Flames defenseman Nikita Nesterov signed a two-year contract extension with CSKA Moscow. Nesterov has been a staple of the CSKA teams of the last half-decade, playing for the team from 2017-18 through 2019-20, and then 2021-22 through this past season. In 2022, he was named CSKA’s captain. While Nesterov’s attempt to return to the NHL with the Flames in 2020 lasted just 38 games, he’s been a quality KHL blueliner in Moscow. He’s a five-time KHL all-star and led his club to back-to-back Gagarin Cup titles in 2022 and 2023.
- After two seasons playing minor-league hockey in North America, 2019 fourth-round pick Case McCarthy has elected to continue his career overseas. McCarthy signed a contract with the Stavanger Oilers, one of the top franchises in the Metal Ligaen, Norway’s professional hockey league. McCarthy’s professional career began in the spring of 2024, when he signed an ATO and two-year AHL contract with the Hartford Wolf Pack. McCarthy was finishing up a five-season career at Boston University, serving as captain as a senior. He played in two games for Hartford that spring, and for the last two seasons he has occupied a place on the AHL/ECHL bubble, getting into 27 AHL contests and 37 games in the third tier. He is likely to get a significant boost in playing time in Norway compared to what he received in his first two years of pro hockey.
- Derek Barach, a consistent 20-goal, 40-point scorer in the KHL, has signed a two-year contract with CSKA Moscow. Barach was a point-per-game college forward during his time at Mercyhurst University, scoring 144 points in 150 career NCAA games. Those performances earned him a shot in the AHL with the Cleveland Monsters, but after scoring 31 points in 93 games across two AHL teams, Barach signed in the Finnish Liiga in the summer of 2021. He found instant success in Europe, scoring 18 goals and 32 points in 56 games for Ässät Pori in the 2021-22 season. He had a successful two-year run in Finland before signing in the KHL for 2023-24, with Vityaz Moscow Region. He has kept up his form from Liiga in the KHL, and has 118 points in 198 career KHL games. This past season, he scored 21 goals and 40 points for Metallurg Magnitogorsk, a season that earned him a deal with CSKA.
- 2020 San Jose Sharks second-round pick Tristen Robins has signed a deal with the SHL’s IF Björklöven, ending his career in the Czech Extraliga after one season. The 24-year-old was a star WHL scorer who showed real promise in his rookie AHL campaign, scoring 17 goals and 38 points in 64 games for the 2022-23 San Jose Barracuda. But Robins struggled to be as productive in each of the following two seasons, paving the way for him to sign with Rytíři Kladno in Czechia last summer. He had a strong 2025-26 season, scoring 18 goals and 35 points in 45 games, and will hope to build on that momentum next season in the SHL.
- Former Montreal Canadiens defenseman Darren Dietz has signed a two-year contract with Sibir Novosibirsk in the KHL. The 32-year-old defenseman spent last season with Dinamo Minsk, where he played in a top-four capacity and scored 23 points in 56 games. While Dietz’s North American career lasted just four years and consisted of 13 games in the NHL and 218 in the AHL, he has been a star for more than a half-decade. Dietz was named the KHL’s best defenseman in his second season in the league, scoring 53 points in 62 games in 2018-19. Since then, he’s racked up honors including KHL all-star and two Gagarin Cup titles.
Devils Sign Anton Silayev
The New Jersey Devils will have one more first-round pick in their system next season. Defenseman Anton Silayev is has signed his entry-level contract following his third season in Russia’s KHL. The news was originally shared by Artur Khairullin of Russian news site Sport-Express. The 6-foot-7 defender was selected 10th-overall in the 2024 NHL Draft. He will be the last of 2024’s top 15 to sign his entry-level contract when he puts pen to paper.
Silayev has had a sure role with the KHL’s Torpedo Novgorod since the 2022-23 season, when he led the team’s junior affiliate to a junior league championship. Even in his age-17 season, Silayev’s size, smooth skating, and stick checks proved tough for opponents to beat. Those advantages earned him a full-time role in the KHL during his draft season in 2023-24. Silayev had ups-and-downs as a KHL rookie. Never the scorer, he racked up only 11 points in 63 regular season games. More glaring were the amount of times that Silayev got turned around by top-tier competition – though his aggression in board battles and ability to move the puck still warranted a top pick come draft day.
Silayev has spent the last two seasons ironing out the gaps from his age-18 season. He climbed to 12 points in 63 games of the 2024-25 season, then joined the Torpedo’s minor-league club for the postseason en route to a league championship. He contributed two points to 17 games of the 2025 VHL playoffs. Surprisingly, Silayev’s routinely-low offense turned downwards this year. He finished the 2025-26 KHL season with just three points in 61 games. Much of that diminished scoring came from Silayev’s struggles to spark the breakout in the same way he had in prior years – casting a shadow over his clear improvements on either end of the ice. Following their elimination from the Gagarin Cup playoffs, Torpedo finished Silayev’s season with a brief assignment to Russia’s junior-league playoffs, where he scored two points in four games while standing as one of only 20 defensemen age-20 or older in the junior postseason.
A down year in Russia will be followed by a major opportunity for one of New Jersey’s top prospects. Silayev will likely step into a top role in the AHL, where his big frame and puck-moving abilities could quickly stand out. He could also be a candidate to break camp with the Devils to begin the 2026-27 season – if the club finds a way to use his unique style and size in a depth role while he finds his stride. Either way, an entry-level contract will give Devils fans another player to watch close once training camp kicks off.
Minor Transactions: Berezkin, Guskov, Hasley
It turns out that Oilers prospect Maxim Berezkin won’t be coming to North America for next season after all. Instead, the KHL announced that the 24-year-old has signed a two-year extension with Lokomotiv Yaroslavl. A fifth-round pick back in 2020, Berezkin had a breakout year in 2024-25 when he posted 15 goals and 27 assists in 66 games, leading to the belief that he could come over and potentially contribute in a bottom-six role in Edmonton. Things didn’t go as well this season, however, as his output dropped to seven goals and 25 helpers in 64 contests. Edmonton will continue to hold Berezkin’s rights but at this point, it’s fair to wonder if he’ll make the jump to North America down the road.
Other minor moves with an NHL connection:
- Wild forward prospect Matvei Guskov has inked a one-year extension with HK Sochi, per a KHL announcement. The 25-year-old was a fifth-round pick in 2019 and played his junior hockey with OHL London but returned home one year later. Guskov had his best showing by far this season, collecting 32 points in 50 games but won’t be coming back to North America at this time. With no transfer agreement in place between the NHL and Russia’s federation, Minnesota will continue to hold Guskov’s rights.
- The Sharks have added some minor-league depth. Their AHL affiliate announced that they’ve signed goaltender Connor Hasley to a one-year deal. The 25-year-old wrapped up his college career with Arizona State, posting a 3.12 GAA and a .907 SV% in 24 games. He then joined ECHL Wichita for four contests to wrap up the season. San Jose liked what they saw in those outings and will now keep Hasley around for a full year.
Minor Transactions: Kahun, Morozov, Iskhakov, Cali
Former NHL winger Dominik Kahun agreed on a mutual contract termination with his former club HC Lausanne of the Swiss National League, ending what was originally a three-year deal with the team. As a free agent, Kahun has elected to return to his native Germany and sign with EHC Red Bull Munich, according to an official announcement from the club on social media.
The move returns Kahun, 30, to the club that launched him to the NHL back in 2018. Kahun was a former star scorer for Munich, spending four seasons with the team from 2014-2018. In those four years, he went from scoring just six points in his debut season when he was fresh out of the German second division to becoming a point-per-game winger. He won three straight titles for Munich in 2016, 2017, and 2018. While he was an instant-impact NHL signing for the Chicago Blackhawks, scoring 13 goals and 37 points as a rookie, Kahun left the NHL for Switzerland after 2020-21. He has been largely stellar in the National League, serving as a point-per-game winger for SC Bern from 2021-2024. Over the last two years, Kahun has struggled more, and his stint with Lausanne was marked by inconsistency as he was great in the playoffs but not very productive in the regular season.
Other notes on player movement from around the hockey world:
- Vegas Golden Knights 2018 second-round pick Ivan Morozov has signed a one-year contract extension with the KHL’s Spartak Moscow. Morozov has spent the last three seasons with Spartak, where he has been one of the team’s most productive players and a two-time All-Star. Morozov scored a career-high 50 points in 2024-25 and managed 33 points in 49 combined regular-season and playoff contests in 2025-26. The 6’1″ center last appeared in North America during the 2022-23 season, when he registered 17 points in 58 games for Vegas’ AHL affiliate, the Henderson Silver Knights.
- Another Russian forward who was selected in the second round of the 2018 NHL draft signed a KHL contract extension: Ruslan Iskhakov. Iskhakov was drafted No. 43 overall by the Islanders in 2018, and signed a two-year extension with Metallurg Magnitogorsk. Iskhakov joined Metallurg last summer from CSKA Moscow, where he was an All-Star in 2024-25. This past season, the 5’7″ forward scored 17 goals and 38 points in 65 regular-season games, and eight points in 15 playoff contests. Iskhakov played two seasons in North America, scoring 101 points in 138 total games for the AHL’s Bridgeport Islanders, and one point in one NHL game for the New York Islanders. Stefen Rosner of The Elmonters wrote today that the “ship has definitely sailed” on Iskhakov’s NHL future with the club.
- 2026 NHL Draft prospect Ryder Cali has committed to play NCAA hockey at Providence College, according to Mark Divver of New England Hockey Journal. Cali, 17, was formerly committed to Harvard University. Cali spent this past season with the North Bay Battalion of the OHL, and it is unclear at this time whether his commitment implies enrollment for 2026-27 or 2027-28, which would impact whether he will play an additional campaign in Ontario. It seems most likely he will spend at least 2026-27 in the OHL before heading to college, but that is not confirmed. Cali is considered a second-round prospect by most major draft outlets, ranked as high as No. 34 (Elite Prospects) and as low as No. 62 (Craig Button, TSN).
Avalanche’s Mikhail Gulyayev Signs Two-Year KHL Extension
Colorado Avalanche 2023 first-round pick Mikhail Gulyayev has signed a two-year, two-way contract extension with the KHL’s Avangard Omsk, according to the league’s official transactions wire.
Gulyayev’s KHL contract was set to expire this summer. This extension confirms that the defenseman will remain in Russia through the 2027-28 season, meaning the earliest he could officially sign with the Avalanche would be for 2028-29, his age-23 campaign.
The Avalanche hold Gulyayev’s rights indefinitely, so there is no pressure to sign him to an entry-level deal before a certain point in order to preserve his exclusive signing rights.
The 21-year-old was selected by the Avalanche No. 31 overall at the 2023 NHL Draft, with a pick they acquired from the Montreal Canadiens as part of the Alex Newhook trade.
At the time, it seemed the Avalanche may have had a steal on their hands with Gulyayev, at least considering where he was ranked entering the draft. He was No. 23 on Bob McKenzie’s list for TSN, and No. 21 overall in the rankings of Scott Wheeler of The Athletic.
Gulyayev split his draft campaign between the KHL, Russia’s top minor league, the VHL, and the top junior league in the MHL. Since then, he has played three campaigns as a regular in the KHL for Omsk.
While he remains ranked as one of the top prospects in the Avalanche system, (No. 3 in the most recent ranking by Wheeler) the pace of his development has concerned some scouts. Wheeler wrote in March that Gulyayev “has struggled to take that next step beyond just being a depth guy” in the KHL. As his ice time fell compared to last season, so did his production. Gulyayev scored 15 points in 2024-25, but had just three in 2025-26.
Wheeler also wrote that Gulyayev “needs to get over to North America” to maximize his development and chances of becoming an impactful NHL player, but that will now not happen for at least two more seasons.
While Avalanche fans are likely also itching to see Gulyayev cross the Atlantic and join their organization in North America, it did not appear to be as pressing of a priority to Gulyayev. He was invited to the team’s development camp last summer, but opted to remain in Russia to prepare for the season, in contrast to fellow KHL prospect Ilya Nabokov, who attended development camp. Nabokov had signed his entry-level deal in May of that year.
Last summer, when Gulyayev was asked by Sergey Demidov of RG.org about his timeline to sign an entry-level deal, the player was non-committal, saying “right now I can’t say anything concrete.”
With the news of the two-year extension, his window to join the Avalanche will be pushed back an additional two seasons. The hope will be that with a level of continuity in Omsk, he can rebound after a difficult 2025-26 season and develop to the point of being NHL-ready by the time his extension expires.
Photos courtesy of Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports
Egor Zamula Expected To Sign In KHL
Columbus Blue Jackets defenseman Egor Zamula‘s signing rights have been traded in the KHL, according to a report from Jonathan Bailey of The Hockey News. CSKA Moskva has acquired Zamula’s rights from Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod in exchange for the signing rights to Boston Bruins forward Georgii Merkulov and the equivalent of $420K in rubles. The trade is a strong indication that Zamula intends to take his professional career to the KHL.
It’s not an unexpected outcome for Zamula. The 26-year-old blueliner began the year with the Philadelphia Flyers, but requested a trade from the organization after he was reassigned to the AHL. After being traded to the Pittsburgh Penguins, Zamula was suspended and later released for failing to report to the AHL’s Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins. Eventually, Zamula landed with the Blue Jackets on a prorated one-year, $1MM contract.
All together, Zamula finished the season with three assists in 33 games with a +6 rating, averaging 13:04 of ice time. Given how his time with the Flyers worked out, and his subsequent lack of playing time in Columbus, it’s not a huge surprise that Zamula is leaving North America to pursue a bigger opportunity.
Additionally, if he were to turn his career around in Russia, Zamula is still young enough that he could return to the NHL in a few years without much pushback. Regardless, that’s putting the cart before the horse.
If he does sign with CSKA, it’ll be the first time Zamula has played in Russia since the 2016-17 campaign. That season, he played for the Metallurg Magnitogorsk’s U17 team, registering three goals and 26 points in 36 games.
Afternoon Notes: Makar, Pickering, Thompson
Ahead of tonight’s pivotal Game 3 in Vegas, Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar told reporters, including Evan Rawal of The Denver Gazette, that “you’ll have to wait and see” if star Cale Makar will be able to play. Bednar remained vague in not naming a starting goaltender either.
The Presidents’ Trophy winners, who lost just 16 regular season games all year and had plenty of breathing room atop the league, didn’t face much adversity all year. Now, somewhat quickly, they’re in a big hole staring at a potential 3-0 series deficit, at the hands of the Golden Knights. The sudden development is largely a result of Makar’s absence, dealing with an upper-body injury from the previous round.
A team built to handle just about any absence up front, obviously the loss of an all-world defenseman has huge implications. Yet Makar’s injury has left an especially evident shortcoming on their powerplay. Missing their quarterback without an adequate second option, they went one-for-five on the man advantage in the series’ first two games on home ice.
With their season on the line, there’s more than enough reason for Makar to suit up, but even if he does under 100%, there’s real questions on what type of workload the 27-year-old is able to bear, averaging one tick shy of 25 minutes a night in his nine playoff games so far.
Elsewhere:
- Penguins top prospect Owen Pickering is day-to-day with a lower-body injury, reported by Tony Androckitis in an article shared on Inside AHL Hockey. Missing a deciding Game 5 in the Atlantic Division Finals, the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins came away with a resounding 8-1 win, vaulting them to the Conference Finals as they await their opponent, either the Cleveland Monsters or the Toronto Marlies. It was impressive work considering that the 2021 first rounder is the “Baby Penguins” top defenseman, skating in 68 games and leading all blueliners with 28 points. Pickering stepped right into the NHL in 2024-25 with 24 games, but since then Pittsburgh has been more focused on his long-term development, as he made just four NHL appearances in 2025-26. His WBS Penguins have the chance to return to the Calder Cup Finals for the first time since 2008, as a franchise who has never taken home the AHL title.
- Tyce Thompson, younger brother of Buffalo star Tage Thompson, has re-signed with Barys Astana of the KHL for another year, the team shared. A fourth round selection of the Devils in 2019, the 6’1” winger played in 11 games with the team, making his mark in the NHL stat book with an assist. Departing the Bridgeport Islanders to go abroad this year, he made a larger offensive impact in Russia with 25 points in 57 games, good for fourth on the club. Notable North American teammates of Thompson include the previous AHL standout Mike Vecchione and former Florida Panther Ian McCoshen.