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Bruins Notes: Rask, Clifton, Bychkov

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The NHL is officially going to the Olympics. So what does that mean for the NHL’s top unsigned free agent? Tuukka Rask has made it clear that he will only play for the Boston Bruins (and his teammates expect just that later this season), but the star goalie has said nothing about the 2022 Winter Olympic Games. The Olympic break will take place from February 3-22 and Rask must sign with Boston by the trade deadline, expected to be March 21, in order to be eligible for the postseason. Will he use the Winter Games as a warmup? As noted by The Athletic staff in their Olympics roster projections, if Rask wants a spot on Team Finland, it is his. For one, the team not as deep as they have been in the past, with the goaltenders projected to be Nashville’s Juuse Saros, Carolina’s Antti Raanta, and Chicago’s Kevin Lankinen. More of a factor though is that Rask’s numbers on the international stage are nothing short of stunning, with a .938 save percentage and 1.73 GAA in the 2014 Olympics and a .920 save percentage and 2.02 GAA in the 2016 World Cup. Add in his elite career NHL numbers and even at 34 and returning from injury he would be at worst the No. 2 for Finland. There is obviously some risk to Rask and the Bruins that he could re-injure himself while playing in the Olympics. However, the upside is that it will get him back into game shape without costing Boston. Once Rask is signed, there won’t be much time for him to get back up to speed unless the team opts to carry three goalies for a while. It will be interesting to see how the situation plays out and if the aging veteran is as determined to represent his country once more as he is to return to Boston for another run.

  • Better now than in-season, but Bruins defenseman Connor Clifton received the difficult news that he has tested positive for COVID-19, reports The Boston Globe’s Matt Dougherty. To make matters worse, the young blue liner is currently on his honeymoon. The Bruins have not commented on the situation and Clifton himself has not issued any follow-up. It is unclear if Clifton is vaccinated or not or if he is symptomatic at this time. The Bruins have not yet announced the start date for training camp, but with their preseason debut scheduled for September 26, it can’t be too far away. If Clifton has indeed contract the virus, he has a matter of weeks to recover and clear the NHL’s COVID Protocol or he will at least miss the start of camp. That could be critical for a player who is expected to compete for a starting role this fall.
  • Prospect defenseman Roman Bychkov has proven that he can produce at the junior level in Russia with 43 points and a +47 rating over the past three seasons in the MHL. However, his KHL club Lokomotiv Yaroslavl has yet to give him a chance in the big leagues. That will change this season. The KHL’s Amur Khabarovsk has announced that they have acquired Bychkov on loan for 2021-22. A perennial bottom dweller in the KHL, there is no reason to believe that Khabarovsk will not give the 20-year-old an opportunity to show what he can do against elite competition. The Bruins will be paying attention as well. Since he was selected in the fifth round in 2019, Bychkov has already outshined his draft slot with his play in Russia and at the World Junior Championship. Boston would like to see him take that next step as they evaluate whether to bring him over to North America.

Olle Lycksell Loaned To Sweden

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It’s back to Sweden for young forward Olle Lycksell, who has been loaned back to Vaxjo of the SHL for the 2021-22 campaign. Lycksell signed his two-year entry-level contract with the Flyers in May and will burn the first year regardless of where he plays.

Now 21, Lycksell was actually a sixth-round pick of the Flyers back in 2017 and would have seen his exclusive draft rights expire if he didn’t sign before June this year. The undersized forward has done well enough in his three-plus years at the SHL level that he was worth a contract slot though, especially after a promising 2020-21 campaign with Farjestad BK. He matched his goal and point totals–nine and 21 respectively–from the year prior, but did it in just 46 games this time. That progression is encouraging, though he’s obviously not ready for the NHL at this point.

This is a flier by the Flyers, hoping that Lycksell finds a way to overcome his size weakness and show he can put up big numbers in his fifth professional season. Though there could potentially be a place for him in Philadelphia’s bottom-six because of his positional versatility, the scoring ability will have to be there if he’s not bringing any size or physicality. With excellent hands and puck skills, perhaps he breaks out this year and really shows he can be a dominant offensive player in the SHL, but until that happens, an NHL roster spot is still a distant thought.

Washington Capitals Loan Damien Riat To Lausanne HC

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After just one season in North America, Damien Riat is headed back to Switzerland. The Washington Capitals have loaned the winger to Lausanne HC for the 2021-22 campaign after he spent this year with the Hershey Bears. The release does specify that he will be eligible to return to North America at the end of his National League season, though it’s unclear really where his future in the Capitals organization lies.

Riat, 24, was a fourth-round pick of the Capitals back in 2016, but didn’t sign until 2020 when his draft rights were about to expire. The two-year entry-level contract he signed then covers the 2021-22 season, but Riat will be a restricted free agent next summer. The team can retain his rights with a qualifying offer, but one has to wonder if a permanent return to Switzerland is coming.

The young forward scored just three goals and nine points in 33 games for Hershey this year, joining them once the AHL got started. In the early part of the season he was playing for Geneve Servette in Switzerland, where he found much more success, tallying 18 points in 20 games. That National League success is nothing new for Riat, who has six seasons under his belt at the highest level back home.

We’ll have to wait and see if there is a path to the NHL for Riat and whether he returns at all after his overseas season is concluded, but he won’t be helping Hershey in the early part of the year.

Snapshots: Coyotes, Carey, Johansson

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The Arizona Coyotes have interviewed a long list of head coaching candidates so far in their search to replace Rick Tocchet. Craig Morgan of AZ Coyotes Insider tweets that Syracuse Crunch coach Benoit Groulx has spoken to Arizona about the position and lists Mike Van Ryn, Todd Nelson, Jay Leach, and Andre Tourigny as others.

Last week, Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic said on TSN radio that he believes the Coyotes will go with a first-time NHL head coach, which this list obviously suggests. Groulx, 53, has been behind the bench for Syracuse the last four season and signed a new deal with the organization earlier this season. That likely wouldn’t stop him from taking an NHL job, but shows how much the Lightning value him in the minors.

  • Paul Carey is on his way overseas, signing with Djurgardens IF for the 2021-22 season. The minor league veteran served as captain for the Providence Bruins this season, scoring 14 points in 22 games. The 32-year-old has 100 NHL games under his belt including one during the 2019-20 season, but those days are likely behind him at this point in his long professional career.
  • The Detroit Red Wings have loaned Albert Johansson to the SHL, giving him a chance to continue developing in Sweden. The 20-year-old defenseman scored 19 points in 44 games last season, his second full year with Farjestads. Selected 60th overall in 2019, he signed his entry-level deal last summer but it slid this season. That won’t be the case next year, meaning he will be scheduled for restricted free agency in 2024.

Hurricanes Loan Vasili Ponomaryov To Spartak Of The KHL

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Back in October, Carolina signed prospect forward Vasili Ponomaryov to a three-year, entry-level contract.  At the time, it was expected that he’d return to Shawinigan of the QMJHL next season before turning pro in 2022.  Instead, Spartak of the KHL announced today that they’ve added the winger to their roster for the 2021-22 campaign, signing him to a contract that runs through April 2022.

The 19-year-old was a second-round pick (53rd overall) last year following his first season with the Cataractes that saw him impress with 18 goals and 31 assists in 57 games in his first taste of hockey in North America.  While that league had some starts and stops this season, the QMJHL was able to get through a shortened season where he managed 10 goals and 28 helpers in just 33 games while picking up four points in five playoff contests.

Staying with Shawinigan certainly would have made sense but now Ponomaryov will have an opportunity to get his feet wet at the professional level and play closer to home for a year as well.  His contract slid this season since he didn’t see any NHL action and will do so again in 2021-22 for the same reason for Carolina will still have him signed for three years if he returns to North America for the 2022-23 campaign with AHL Chicago.

Red Wings Loan Filip Larsson To Sweden

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Filip Larsson’s international hockey journey will continue for another year.  HV71 of Sweden’s Allsvenskan announced that they’ve added the goaltender on loan from the Red Wings for the 2021-22 season and have signed him to a one-year contract.

This season, the 22-year-old started on a loan to Almtuna in Sweden’s second-tier league before transferring to Frederikshavn in Denmark in January.  His numbers in both leagues weren’t particularly strong as he managed just a .883 SV% in Sweden and a .889 mark in Denmark, numbers that don’t inspire much confidence in his NHL potential.

Larsson was a sixth-round pick of Detroit back in 2016 (167th overall) out of Djurgarden’s junior system in Sweden.  He came to North America in 2017, spending one year in the USHL before moving to the NCAA level with Denver the following season.  Somewhat surprisingly, he left the school after just his freshman year to sign with the Red Wings, a decision that looks like a mistake in hindsight.  He struggled in his lone season in their system in 2019-20 which was split between the AHL and ECHL, helping to prompt the loans for this year.

Larsson is entering the final year of his entry-level contract in 2021-22 and the fact that he has been loaned back home already coupled with his recent struggles suggests that it’s quite unlikely that Detroit will be tendering him a qualifying offer in 2022.

Toronto Maple Leafs Sign Pontus Holmberg

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The SHL playoff MVP has an NHL deal. Pontus Holmberg has signed a two-year entry-level contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs. The deal will kick in for next season, but Holmberg will be loaned back to Vaxjo in Sweden for 2021-22.

Holmberg, 22, was a sixth-round pick by the Maple Leafs in 2018 after he had played just two games at the SHL level. Just a few years later he was raising the championship trophy over his head after posting 14 points in 14 postseason games with Vaxjo. Playoff MVP, league champion, and Swedish forward of the year, it’s been quite a ride for Holmberg this season.

The next step will be taking that playoff dominance and bringing it on a consistent basis in the regular season. Holmberg had just nine goals and 23 points in 45 games during the regular season, well behind other prospects on his team like Jack Drury. If he is ever going to make an impact for the Maple Leafs, he’ll need to bring that offensive presence night in and night out.

Still, for Toronto, signing whatever prospects you can is key at this point. The team went out early again in this year’s playoffs despite loading up at the deadline and now have just three selections (2nd, 5th, and 6th rounders) in the upcoming draft.

Nashville Predators Sign Juuso Parssinen

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June 1: The Predators have officially announced the deal, confirming the three-year, entry-level contract.

May 29: The Nashville Predators have reportedly come to terms with an upstart forward prospect. Contract resources CapFriendly and PuckPedia both reports that the club and 20-year-old forward prospect Juuso Parssinen have agreed to the required three-year entry-level contract beginning in 2021-22 and carrying a $850,833 cap hit. The alleged contract breakdown is as follows:

  • 2021-22: $750K base salary + $92.5K signing bonus and $82.5K games played bonus
  • 2022-23: $750K base salary + $92.5K signing bonus and $82.5K games played bonus
  • 2022-23: $775K base salary + $92.5K signing bonus and $57.5K games played bonus

Parssinen has improved by leaps and bounds since being selected by the Predators in the seventh round of the 2019 NHL Draft. Picked 210th overall, Parssinen was just eight selections away from going undrafted altogether. However, Nashville has to be glad they used a late-round flier on the Finnish product. Parssinen had played only seven games in the Liiga, Finland’s top pro level, and had recorded just one point when he was selected by the Predators. The following season, that production climbed to 12 points in 31 Liiga games, while Parssinen also enjoyed his best per-game scoring season at the U-20 junior level. And this season? The young center played exclusively in the Liiga to the tune of a whopping 42 points in 55 games, good enough for second on TPS in scoring and even earning him an alternate captain role despite his young age. He also added four points in seven games for Team Finland at the World Junior Championship, holding is own playing with and against elite NHL prospects.

While Parssinen’s scoring progression in Finland is enough to get Predators fans’ attention, they may not want to get too excited. Although Parssinen is now officially under contract, he also just signed a two-year extension with TPS back in February. That could mean that the promising young pivot remains overseas on loan for at least one, if not two years. However, when Parssinen does finally arrive in Nashville he will be that much more polished a player. At about 6’3″ and 200 pounds, there is also little concern about him adjusting to the bigger, stronger, more aggressive North American game.

If a late seventh-round pick with net front presence and leadership ability drafted out of Scandinavia who surprises with his impressive European production sounds familiar to Predators fans, it should. In many ways, Parssinen’s path to this point mirrors that of former Nashville star Patric Hornqvist, the 230th pick in 2005 out of Sweden’s Djurgardens IF. If Parssinen has the chance to even come close to making the impact on the organization that Hornvist did, perhaps it isn’t too early for fans to get excited.

Minor Transactions: 05/27/21

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The Stanley Cup Playoffs are front and center right now, especially with Round Two now on the schedule, but there still continue to be some meaningful moves made elsewhere around the hockey world. Here are some of those recent notable minor transactions:

  • After a mutual termination of his contract was completed earlier this month, former Boston Bruins prospect Pavel Shen has found his new team; well, a new, old team. After playing with the KHL’s HK Sochi on loan to begin the 2020-21 season, Shen has opted to return to the club on a more permanent basis. Sochi has signed Shen to a one-year deal for next season. Where his career takes him after that remains unknown. Shen flashed good two-way ability in his pair of seasons with AHL Providence and seemed like he was on his way to becoming a solid depth option – a good value for a 2018 seventh-round pick. However, if Boston felt he had long-term NHL upside they would not have terminated his contract so easily. Shen seems destined to spend his career at home in Russia, but continued development could put him back on NHL radars.
  • After a 15-year pro career, including eight seasons in the NHL with six different teams, Andrew Ebbett has decided to hang up his skates. However, he won’t be leaving the game behind just yet. Swiss club SC Bern, where Ebbett spent five seasons following his NHL career, has announced that they have hired the veteran as their “sports director” i.e. general manager. Ebbett brings plenty of experience, including a number of years in the NLA, to the position. He also expanded his knowledge of the European game while playing his final season this year with EHC Munich of the German DEL. A versatile, two-way player and locker room presence throughout his career, Ebbett is well suited to lead the club.
  • In an uncommon move for today’s day and age, U.S. National Team Development Program forward Liam Gilmartin has decided to switch development paths and join the OHL’s London Knights next season. Gilmartin, a 2021 NHL Draft product, was expected to follow the collegiate path like nearly all USNTDP products, having committed to Providence College. Instead, he will forego his NCAA eligibility and join the major junior ranks. A big winger with high-end stick skills, Gilmartin is expected to be drafted as early as the late second round in July after finishing among the top-six scoring forwards for the U-18 team this year. How this development decision impacts his draft stock remains to be seen.
  • The USHL held their Phase I Draft for all 2005 players on Wednesday and the more intriguing Phase II Draft for all other uncommitted prospects on Thursday. While there were many players selected in both drafts with familiar names to past NHL players and executives alike, some of the most interesting picks were those that seem hardly likely to pan out. Presumptive 2022 and 2023 NHL Draft first overall picks, Shane Wright and Connor Bedard respectively, were each selected in the later rounds of the Phase II draft. While neither seems like to abandon their current teams – Wright with the OHL’s Kingston Frontenacs and Bedard with the WHL’s Regina Pats – this year saw a number of Canadian major junior players jump to the USHL with their own leagues on hold. The Chicago Steel (Wright) and Dubuque Fighting Saints (Bedard) would certainly be excited if their late-round waivers panned out somehow. For a full list of USHL Draft selections, follow this link.

Minors Notes: Heartlanders, McKinnon, Senn

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One of the ECHL’s 2021-22 expansion teams is now official. The team slated to play in Coralville, Iowa beginning next season will officially be called the Iowa Heartlanders, the league announced today. The team debuted a buck logo that also implies a gold, black, and gray color scheme. The Heartlanders, on obvious nod to their Iowa locale, will also use the local wild prairie rose as a secondary logo. While Iowa finally has a name and logo, their yet-to-be-named expansion companions in Trois-Rivieres, Quebec have the all-important NHL affiliation, having linked up with the Montreal Canadiens. Iowa has yet to strike a deal of their own, however the obvious link would be to the Minnesota Wild, whose AHL affiliate also plays in the state. The Wild were affiliated with the Allen Americans this past season, but there has been no word on whether that relationship will continue or if Minnesota will instead recruit the newfound Heartlanders.

  • Ian McKinnon made quite a name for himself in just a short time in the AHL this season and has now been rewarded. On loan from the Jacksonville Ice Men to the Providence Bruins for ten games this year, McKinnon racked up a whopping 81 penalty minutes. It was enough to finish third in the league in total PIM while obviously taking the PIM per game crown. McKinnon was a physical force and unafraid to drop the gloves, but also contributed three points in those ten games as well, including his first AHL goal in the Bruins’ division title-clinching season finale win. It was enough to earn him an AHL deal for next year, as the Providence Bruins have announced a one-year pact. The junior-level journeyman has finally found his stride in the pros and the Bruins are looking forward to seeing what he can do moving forward with some experience now under his belt.
  • One player who may not be as thrilled about playing in the minors is New Jersey Devils goaltender Gilles Senn. A restricted free agent this summer, the 25-year-old played exclusively with AHL Binghamton this season – and poorly at that – after seeing NHL action last year and doesn’t seem to be happy with that career progression. Word out of Senn’s native Switzerland is that the netminder is “on the market.” The GM of National League squad HC Davos, Marc Gianola, claims that his off-season plans to make a change in goal shifted when he heard that Senn could be available. Senn played six seasons with Davos prior to making the jump to North America and could be eyeing a return, especially with the GM publicly acknowledging his interest. However, if Senn does choose to return to Switzerland, there will be no shortage of interest. Is that enough to convince him to abandon his NHL pursuits? A decision will be made one way or another shortly with the off-season coming up quickly.

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