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CHL Trade Roundup: Sale, Toure, Sobolev, Thornton

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The CHL Trade Deadline is set to hit on Wednesday and there have been several big moves made already that have involved NHL prospects.  Several more have happened today; here’s a rundown of those moves.

  • Kraken prospect Eduard Sale has been acquired by OHL Kitchener along with blueliner Olivier Savard in exchange for forward Kyle Morey, defenseman Blair Scott, and eight draft picks, reports Sportsnet’s Jeff Marek (Twitter link). Sale was the 23rd pick back in June and is in his first season in North America where he has struggled a bit, notching just 20 points in 25 games with the Colts.  He was more of a factor for Czechia at the World Juniors, picking up seven points in as many contests.
  • A Senators blueliner is on the move as Windsor picked up Djibril Toure from Sudbury for a pair of draft picks. The 20-year-old signed with Ottawa as an undrafted free agent back in September.  Toure, who stands 6’7, has been a shutdown defenseman at the OHL level but still has 12 points in 24 appearances this season.
  • While Brantford was selling with yesterday’s Jorian Donovan trade, they also added to their roster, acquiring Canadiens blueline prospect Danill Sobolev for forward Masen Wray and defenseman Callum Cheynowski. Sobolev was a fifth-round pick by Montreal in 2021 (142nd overall) and has been a shutdown defender in his three junior seasons.  He’ll be too old for junior hockey next season and it remains to be seen if Montreal will look to find a place for him in their system.
  • Coyotes goaltender Anson Thornton’s junior rights have been moved from OHL Barrie to Niagara for a conditional draft choice. The 20-year-old signed as an undrafted free agent with Arizona 2021 but has missed most of the year with an injury, being limited to just four appearances with AHL Tucson where he has a save percentage of just .849.

Evening Notes: Campbell, Okposo, Beck, Donovan

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The Edmonton Oilers are planning to shop around goaltender Jack Campbell as the trade deadline approaches, general manager Ken Holland tells The Athletic’s Pierre LeBrun. But LeBrun doesn’t think there will be many suitors for Campbell’s $5MM cap hit ahead of the deadline, speculating that the team will instead have to wait until the summer to decide what to do with the netminder – whether that’s a buyout or trade.

Campbell’s time in Edmonton has certainly not gone as expected. The 31-year-old is in his second team with the club, after signing a five-year, $25MM contract with the club. He lost the starter job to Calder Trophy finalist Stuart Skinner last season, setting a 21-9-4 record and .888 save percentage through 36 games with the team. But he was only allowed five games with the Oilers this year, putting up a meager .873 save percentage before being placed on waivers and sent to the minor leagues. He’s since made 11 appearances with the AHL’s Bakersfield Condors, setting a 5-6-0 record and .893 save percentage.

Campbell was a productive goaltender in the two years he spent playing significant time for the Toronto Maple Leafs earlier in his career but hasn’t looked the same since moving across Canada. His status will be one of the Oilers’ biggest questions to answer this summer.

More notes from around the league:

  • Buffalo Sabres captain Kyle Okposo returned to the team’s practices on Monday, working his way back from a lower-body injury that’s held him out of the team’s last two games. Okposo is still designated as day-to-day but is nearing a return. He’s managed 14 points in 38 games this season – his 17th NHL season.
  • Polarizing Montreal Canadiens prospect Owen Beck has had his rights traded in the OHL, moving from the Peterborough Petes to the Saginaw Spirit. Saginaw sent Aiden Young and three draft picks the other way. Beck has managed 30 points in 25 points with Peterborough this season, adding one goal in five games at the World Juniors. He went 33rd overall to the Canadiens in the 2022 NHL Draft.
  • The Ottawa Senators also had a prospect moved to Saginaw, as the Spirit acquired defenseman Jorian Donovan from the Brantford Bulldogs. Saginaw sent eight draft picks the other way, including two second-round picks and four third-round picks. Donovan has 28 points in 34 OHL games this season and also attended the World Juniors, though he went scoreless in all five Team Canada games. He was a fifth-round selection in 2022.

CHL Roundup: Luneau, Kressler, Vilmanis, Bloom, Peddle

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Trade deadlines are drawing near for all three of the Canadian Hockey League sub-outfits: the OHL, QMHJL and WHL. That’s resulted in some notable moves surrounding NHL-affiliated players in recent days, including the WHL’s Wenatchee Wild shipping out their superstar duo of Sabres prospect Matthew Savoie (2022, ninth overall) and Coyotes prospect Conor Geekie (2022, 11th overall) to the Moose Jaw Warriors and Swift Current Broncos, respectively. There’s been a handful of other notable moves, too, though, which we’ll outline here:

  • After winning the Emile Bouchard Trophy for the QMJHL’s Defenseman of the Year last season, Ducks prospect Tristan Luneau has played sparingly in 2023-24 despite making the NHL roster out of camp. He’s appeared in just seven games with the Ducks – still yet to burn the first year of his entry-level contract almost halfway through the season. Luneau’s also played six games with AHL San Diego on a conditioning stint and has been on loan to Team Canada for the recently wrapped-up 2024 IIHF World Junior Championship. However, a viral infection sidelined Luneau for the whole tournament, and he has yet to be recalled from his loan. That’s led to some speculation that the Ducks may return him to junior hockey when he’s healed from his infection, fuelled further today by the Victoriaville Tigres acquiring his rights from the Gatineau Olympiques for a conditional fifth-round pick in the 2024 QMJHL Draft. The 53rd overall pick in the 2022 NHL Entry Draft had a banner year with Gatineau last season, leading the league in assists (63) and points (83) by a defenseman in 65 games while notching a +49 rating.
  • 21-year-old Maple Leafs center prospect Braeden Kressler is on the move in the OHL, heading from the Flint Firebirds to the Ottawa 67’s to close out his overage season. Kressler was not picked up in the 2021 NHL Draft after the OHL suspended operations that season due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but he earned a training camp invite with Toronto later that summer which resulted in an entry-level contract. Kressler had a disappointing post-draft season marred by injury with just 16 points in 28 games during the 2021-22 campaign, but he’s since rebounded to put up over a point per game in Flint since the beginning of last season while serving as an alternate captain. Thus far in 2023-24, Kressler has 15 goals and 37 points in 33 games, good enough to tie for the Firebirds’ lead in scoring.
  • Shortly after repping Latvia at the World Juniors, Panthers forward prospect Sandis Vilmanis is heading from the OHL’s Sarnia Sting to the North Bay Battalion. The Panthers’ 2022 fifth-round pick is still 19 years old and just rattled off four points in five games for Latvia at the WJC, making himself just one of two players on the roster to score twice. Only four out of 20 OHL teams do not make the playoffs – Sarnia is in position to be one of those teams, making sense that they’d sell off one of their better players to a North Bay team that’s fourth in the league’s Eastern Conference. Vilmanis’ 28 points through 30 games are third on the Sting in scoring.
  • The Canucks have loaned out left-wing prospect Josh Bloom back to juniors after he began the year in the minors, and the 20-year-old subsequently signed an OHL Scholarship and Development Agreement with the Saginaw Spirit. Bloom spent parts of four seasons in Saginaw from 2019 to 2023 before he was dealt to North Bay early last season, where he proceeded to rack up 25 goals and 55 points in 49 games while being a major factor on the penalty kill. Bloom, initially a third-round pick of the Sabres in 2021 whose NHL rights were traded to Vancouver last February, had just one assist in 14 games with AHL Abbotsford and two assists in eight games with ECHL Kalamazoo.
  • The Blue Jackets made Nova Scotia-born center Tyler Peddle the last pick of the 2023 NHL Draft nearly six months ago. He’s now been traded from the QMJHL’s Drummondville Voltigeurs to the Saint John Sea Dogs as he looks to jumpstart a highly discouraging post-draft campaign. Peddle, 18, notched 24 goals and 41 points in 64 games for Drummondville last season en route to his draft selection. This year, his scoring pace has decreased by almost 50% to just 14 points in 38 combined games between Drummondville and Saint John, the latter of whom he’s already played for once after the trade went through earlier this week. Peddle has not scored a goal in his last ten games and, if he can’t quickly get back on the scoresheet, is looking like a strong candidate to re-enter the NHL draft in 2025 and not earn an entry-level deal from Columbus in that time.

Central Notes: Mrazek, Drouin, Kirkland, Thornton

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Even with a handful of teams believed to be looking for goalie help, the market for Blackhawks netminder Petr Mrazek isn’t likely to be too strong.  As a result, Mark Lazerus of The Athletic feels (subscription link) it might be more likely that Chicago winds up extending the netminder over dealing him for what’s likely to be a limited return.  The 31-year-old has put up a .903 SV% in 25 games this season, a very respectable number on a team that’s in a battle for the bottom of the standings once again.  He currently carries a cap hit of $3.8MM and while it’s unlikely an extension would come in at that amount, keeping him around on a short-term extension to allow Drew Commesso to have a bit more time to develop with AHL Rockford would make some sense, especially if the trade market isn’t likely to yield much in return.

Elsewhere in the Central:

  • After a rough start with his new team, Avalanche winger Jonathan Drouin has settled in nicely and is in the middle of a strong stretch where he has 17 points in his last 22 games. To that end, Evan Rawal of Colorado Hockey Now evaluates the feasibility of trying to sign the 28-year-old to a contract extension.  Drouin is playing on a deal worth $825K this season, opting for a short-term agreement in the hopes of establishing a better market next summer.  His performance is worth a fair bit more than that but with Colorado’s cap situation, they’ll still be capped at a lower-cost offer.  That said, if Drouin wants some stability and to stay in a good situation, he could be amenable to the possibility of re-signing now.
  • The shuffling of Justin Kirkland continues. After being sent back down yesterday, the Coyotes announced (Twitter link) that the winger has been recalled from AHL Tucson.  It’s his third recall in the last two weeks although he has yet to make an appearance yet with Arizona.  Meanwhile, the 27-year-old has been productive with the Roadrunners, recording 13 points in 12 games so far.
  • Still with Arizona, while not yet announced by the Coyotes, the team has loaned goaltender Anson Thornton back to OHL Barrie, notes Colts color commentator Gene Pereira. The 20-year-old signed as an undrafted free agent with Arizona back in 2021 but has been injured for most of the season, being limited to just four appearances with Tucson where he has a save percentage of just .849.  With the CHL trade deadline coming next week, he may find himself on the move at that level in the coming days.

Metropolitan Notes: Joseph, Nedeljkovic, Ruff, Del Bel Belluz

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While it had been believed that defenseman Pierre-Olivier Joseph has been a frequent healthy scratch lately, it turns out that isn’t exactly the case.  Head coach Mike Sullivan told reporters including Dave Molinari of Pittsburgh Hockey Now that he’d have liked to reinsert the blueliner in their lineup tonight against Carolina but Joseph is dealing with a lower-body injury.  It’s an issue that he has been dealing with for a little while which helps explain why he hasn’t played over the last couple of weeks.  The 24-year-old has played in five games so far this season, picking up an assist while averaging a little over 13 minutes a night.

More from the Metropolitan:

  • Still with the Penguins, Mark Divver of the New England Hockey Journal reports (Twitter link) that Alex Nedeljkovic has been recalled from his LTIR conditioning stint. The 27-year-old is working his way back from a lower-body injury and stopped 17 of 19 shots in a victory on Friday night.  Nedeljkovic also scored an empty-netter in that game, making him the first goalie in AHL history to have scored two career goals.
  • While Lindy Ruff has done well behind the bench in New Jersey, he nearly didn’t get the opportunity to coach there. Ryan Novozinsky of The Star-Ledger notes that Ruff was not on GM Tom Fitzgerald’s original shortlist of eight candidates to take over the head coach position back in 2020 but one of Fitzgerald’s friends encouraged him to interview Ruff.  The Devils set a franchise record for points last season, helping earn him a multi-year contract extension last month.
  • The OHL rights to Blue Jackets prospect Luca Del Bel Belluz have been acquired by Saginaw, per a team release. The 20-year-old is in his first professional season with AHL Cleveland and has fared well in his limited action so far, collecting two goals and three assists in six games.  Saginaw is hosting the Memorial Cup this year and if Columbus decides that they want Del Bel Belluz to go back and get top-line minutes, they’ll be sending him to a team that’s loading up for what should be a long playoff run.

West Notes: Ducks, Dionicio, Hall, Akey

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It has been a tough year for Ducks center Trevor Zegras and defenseman Jamie Drysdale.  Contract discussions rolled into training camp and both have struggled when healthy so far.  Head coach Greg Cronin told reporters including Derek Lee of The Sporting Tribune (Twitter link) that while he doesn’t know the nature of their respective lower-body injuries, the recovery on each of them is quite tricky and the team will need to be patient while waiting for them to return.  Zegras has missed a little more than a week so far and has struggled offensively with just two points in his first dozen games.  Meanwhile, Drysdale last played more than a month ago and has suited up just twice so far after being limited to just eight games last season due to a torn labrum.

More from the Western Conference:

  • Still with Anaheim, Ducks prospect Rodwin Dionicio is on the move in the OHL as his now-former team in Windsor announced that they traded the defenseman to Saginaw. The 19-year-old was a fifth-round pick back in June (129th overall) following an impressive 50-point year.  Dionicio is off to an even better start so far this season, collecting 20 points in his first 16 games while recording an assist in his debut tonight.  Anaheim has until June 1, 2025 to sign the blueliner to an entry-level deal.
  • Blackhawks winger Taylor Hall is listed as a game-time decision for tomorrow’s game against Nashville, relays Ben Pope of the Chicago Sun-Times (Twitter link). It has been an injury-riddled first season in Chicago for the 32-year-old who has had shoulder trouble sideline him twice while this most recent undisclosed injury has cost him a little over a week so far.  When he has been healthy, Hall has tallied two goals and two assists in eight games.
  • Oilers prospect Beau Akey is set to undergo surgery and will miss the remainder of the season, reports Oilers Nation’s Robin Brownlee (Twitter link). The 18-year-old was a second-round selection in June (56th overall) and had a strong training camp, helping him land an entry-level contract before being returned to OHL Barrie.  With the Colts this season, Akey has nine points in 14 games but after dislocating his shoulder, he won’t be getting any more in 2023-24.

Minor Transactions: 11/12/23

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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. 

Senators Notes: Brannstrom, GM Search, Defensive Depth, Hamara

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The Senators will welcome back another blueliner tonight as head coach D.J. Smith confirmed to TSN 1200 (Twitter link) that Erik Brannstrom will play against Calgary.  The 24-year-old sustained a concussion on a hard hit from Islanders winger Cal Clutterbuck two weeks ago and was stretchered off the ice, resulting in him missing the last five games.  Brannstrom was off to a slow start offensively as he had been held off the scoresheet in his first seven appearances but with the team dressing three rookies earlier in the week, getting him and Artem Zub (who returned last game) back certainly will give them a boost.

More from Ottawa:

  • The team has not yet started reaching out to other teams for permission to interview potential GM candidates, reports Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic. At this point, President of Hockey Operations and interim GM Steve Staios has an idea of who they’d like to reach out to but clearly, this is not a vacancy that is going to be filled in the immediate future.  Teams are sometimes hesitant about granting permission to speak to another club in-season so it’s possible that Staios could hold both titles for a little while.
  • Prior to losing his GM role, Pierre Dorion had been exploring the trade market for defensive depth, reports Postmedia’s Bruce Garrioch. Ottawa’s preference this season was to keep their young blueliners in AHL Belleville where they could play heavy minutes but, again, their recent rash of injuries saw them dressing three rookies with the big club earlier this week.  For the time being, Thomas Chabot’s LTIR placement has given them some extra flexibility on the cap so it wouldn’t be shocking if Staios picked up where Dorion left off on that front.
  • Prospects Tomas Hamara is on the move as OHL Brantford announced that they’ve acquired the defenseman from Kitchener in exchange for a pair of draft picks. The 19-year-old was a third-round pick back in 2022 (87th overall) out of Tappara’s system in Finland.  This season, Hamara has three assists in 18 games.  His new team is owned by new Sens owner Michael Andlauer.

Montreal Canadiens Recall Joel Armia, Assign Filip Mešár To OHL

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The Montreal Canadiens have announced two roster moves: veteran forward Joel Armia has been recalled from the team’s AHL affiliate, the Laval Rocket, and 2022 first-round pick Filip Mešár has been assigned to the OHL’s Kitchener Rangers.

With second-line center Kirby Dach now confirmed to be out for the rest of the season, the Canadiens had a need for an extra forward on their NHL roster. The player they have chosen to fill Dach’s spot is the veteran Armia, 30.

The owner of a $3.4MM cap hit through next season, Armia has had three consecutive difficult seasons in Montreal.

The six-foot-three, 216-pound former top prospect has at times been an impact player in Montreal (such as in 2019-20 when he scored 16 goals and 30 points in just 58 games) but his consistency has been sorely lacking.

With training camp battles for forward spots highly competitive in the Canadiens’ preseason, Armia failed to secure a role on the team’s season-opening roster and was sent to Laval after clearing waivers.

An opportunity to play a top-line role and reset his game in the minors seems to have been the right call for Armia, who has scored four goals and five points in four AHL games this season.

Now back on the Canadiens’ NHL roster, Armia is likely to receive fourth-line winger duty with either him or Michael Pezzetta sitting in the press box as the team’s spare forward.

As for Mešár, the 2022 26th overall pick heads back to Kitchener after failing to earn a regular role on a Rocket team flush with quality scoring-line winger options. He did score his first career AHL point in yesterday’s win over the Rochester Americans, but was playing as a fourth-line right-winger next to Riley McKay and Jan Myšák.

The Canadiens seem to believe that the best path forward for Mešár’s development is to play a major role in the OHL rather than a limited role in the AHL.

Mešár’s underwhelming debut season in the OHL last year (he scored 51 points in 52 games) indicates that he still has some unfinished business in that league, so the hope will be that he’ll have a highly productive (if not dominant) final season playing junior hockey.

Since two Laval forwards are now leaving the team’s lineup, these departures could pave the way for Canadiens prospect Jared Davidson to play an increased role for the Rocket. The 21-year-old 2022 fifth-round pick had an impressive training camp and preseason but has fallen victim to the numbers game in Laval and played just one game so far for the team.

With Armia and Mešár no longer in the picture and fellow prospect Emil Heineman out with an injury, the roadblocks to Davidson receiving a regular role in the AHL could now be cleared.

Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Minor Transactions: 10/4/23

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With play overseas in several leagues already underway and AHL camps just getting going, there continue to be plenty of signings across the hockey world.  We run through some of the NHL-related ones here.

  • UFA center Nate Schnarr has signed a one-year deal with Pelicans in Finland, per a team release.  The 24-year-old started the season in Montreal’s system before being moved at the trade deadline to Los Angeles but was non-tendered this summer after putting up just nine points in 45 AHL contests.  He had attended training camp this year with Columbus but was cut late month.
  • Another player who was cut by the Blue Jackets in camp is also heading overseas, defenseman Nicolas Meloche. Salavat Yulaev of the KHL announced that they’ve inked the 26-year-old to a one-year deal.  Meloche played 50 NHL contests with San Jose in 2021-22 but cleared waivers early in camp last year with Calgary, resulting in him spending all of last season at the AHL level where he had 21 points in 64 games.
  • Former NHL blueliner Yohann Auvitu is on the move again as he has inked a one-year deal plus an option with Vitkovice in Czechia, per a club release. The 34-year-old saw time at the NHL level with both Edmonton and New Jersey but has moved around frequently since then, spending time in Russia, Sweden, Finland, and Switzerland.
  • Kings prospect Kaleb Lawrence is on the move in the OHL as Ottawa announced that they’ve acquired the 20-year-old forward from Owen Sound. Standing 6’7, Lawrence was a seventh-round pick in 2022 (215th overall) after a season in which he played just two games.  Last year, he was much healthier, putting up 37 points in 50 games with the Attack.  Los Angeles has until June 1, 2024, to sign Lawrence to an entry-level deal so there will be some extra pressure on him as he enters his overage year.
  • Anaheim’s AHL affiliate in San Diego announced the signing of Ben King to a one-year deal. The 21-year-old was a fourth-round pick by the Ducks in 2022 (107th overall) but has exhausted his WHL eligibility.  After putting up 105 points in 2021-22, King’s production dipped to just 35 points in 30 games last season with Red Deer.  Anaheim has until June 1, 2024, to ink him to an NHL contract.

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