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Senators Sign Max Guenette To Two-Way Extension

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The Senators announced today that they’ve signed defenseman Max Guenette to a one-year, two-way contract extension. The deal carries a $775K cap hit and NHL salary while paying him $120K in the minors next season.

Guenette, 23, is coming off his third season of professional play in the Sens organization, spent almost entirely with AHL Belleville. The 2019 seventh-round pick is on a strong development track, forcing himself into definitive top-four usage over the past few years. He’s been their top offensive option at the minor-league level from the blue line since 2022-23 and led B-Sens defensemen in scoring this season with seven goals, 27 assists and 34 points in 58 games.

While Guenette struggled in AHL postseason action (one assist, -5 rating in seven games), he’s positioned himself as a top recall option and even a dark horse candidate to crack the Sens’ roster out of training camp in the fall if injuries affect a couple of veterans. The Ancienne Lorette, Quebec, native has seen NHL action sparingly the past two years, totaling a -2 rating in eight games while averaging 13:10 per contest. He’s still looking for his first NHL point.

Guenette was headed for restricted free agency this summer after completing his entry-level contract. While he’s no longer entitled to his $55K signing bonus, his new AHL salary is a step up from the $70K he was making last year.

The right-shot defender will be an RFA again when his extension expires in 2025. He becomes the 32nd player signed to a standard player contract with the Sens next season, still far short of the 50-contract limit.

Senators Interviewed Sam Dickinson At Scouting Combine

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  • Top 2024 NHL Draft defense prospect Sam Dickinson said his pre-draft interview with the Senators was one he was “looking forward” to in an interview with TSN’s Mark Masters. Dickinson told Masters the interview went “really well” and that his preparation for it was a “little more intense” given the chance of the Ontario-born blue liner staying close to home. The 18-year-old racked up 18 goals, 70 points and a +56 rating in 68 games with the OHL’s London Knights this season, leading their defensemen in scoring. He’s the seventh-ranked North American skater in the class by NHL Central Scouting and could very well be available when Ottawa steps up to the podium with the seventh overall pick.

Brian Elliott Expected To Retire, Joins Blues Front Office

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Veteran netminder Brian Elliott appears to be calling it a career after 16 seasons. Blues general manager Doug Armstrong told reporters today that the team has hired Elliott in a goalie development and scouting role, all but confirming that his playing days are over (via Matthew DeFranks of The St. Louis Post-Dispatch).

Elliott last played in the NHL with the Lightning in 2022-23. He was not re-signed by the club and became an unrestricted free agent, not suiting up at all during the 2023-24 campaign.

After being selected by the Senators in the ninth round of the fabled 2003 draft, Elliott embarked on a star-studded stint at the University of Wisconsin. He backstopped the Badgers to the 2006 national championship while being a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award, given to the top player in the NCAA. He turned pro with Ottawa after his college career came to an end, later making his NHL debut in 2007-08.

That was the last we saw of “limited” NHL action for Elliott, who broke onto the Sens’ roster full-time in 2008-09 as part of a rotation with Alex Auld and Martin Gerber. He didn’t earn any Calder Trophy love that year, but he did put up solid numbers with a 16-8-3 record, .902 SV% and 2.77 GAA in 31 showings for Ottawa.

Elliott took over as the Sens’ starter in 2009-10 and continued to hold the role into the 2010-11 campaign, but his level of play dipped. While it didn’t matter much behind the Senators’ underpowered offense of the early 2010s, his .894 SV% that year was far below average for the time. Shortly before the 2011 trade deadline, Ottawa sent him packing to the Avalanche in a one-for-one swap for Craig Anderson, one that would pay off handsomely for the Sens.

Unfortunately for Colorado, Elliott’s stay in Denver was brief. He won just two of his 12 games down the stretch while posting a .891 SV%, leading the club to let him walk as a free agent that offseason.

Armstrong, then in his early days at the helm of the Blues, quickly turned him into one of the best value signings in club history. After signing a one-year, two-way deal, Elliott cracked the Blues’ roster as the backup to Jaroslav Halák. He didn’t stay the backup for long, though. He forced his way into true tandem action with Halák that year thanks to his league-best .940 SV% and 1.56 GAA in 38 appearances, helping the duo take home the Jennings Trophy. Individually, Elliott also finished fifth in Vezina voting, one of two times he’d earn consideration for the award.

Elliott spent the next four years in St. Louis, making 164 starts and 17 relief appearances. He compiled a sparkling 104-46-16 record behind one of the league’s better teams in the mid-2010s, boasting a .925 SV%, 2.01 GAA and 25 shutouts in a Blues uniform. The team made the playoffs each season he was there, including a run to the Western Conference Final in 2016, in which Elliott had a .921 SV% and 2.44 GAA in 18 postseason games.

The Blues had the younger Jake Allen waiting in the wings, though, and deemed Elliott expendable after a solid run. They dealt him to the Flames for a pair of draft picks – one of which became Jordan Kyrou – putting a bow on his time in St. Louis.

Elliott’s lone season in Calgary was the beginning of his decline. He wasn’t bad, but his .910 SV% was only around league-average for the time and was far south of his level of play with the Blues. The Flames let him walk to free agency the following summer, where he signed a three-year deal with the Flyers that yielded similarly mediocre results. In fact, in his seven years of service with Calgary, Philadelphia and Tampa Bay after the Blues traded him away, Elliott only had one above-average season. That came in limited action as a backup to Andrei Vasilevskiy with the Bolts in 2021-22, putting up a .912 SV% and 2.43 GAA in 19 appearances.

After struggling with a .891 SV% in his second and final season in Tampa, though, it wasn’t a surprise to many to see the now 39-year-old Elliott out of the league this season. Now 39, he likely wraps up his career with a 279-167-54 record, 45 shutouts, a 2.57 GAA, and .909 SV% in 543 regular-season games. He also had a 17-26 record and .904 SV% in 48 playoff games.

PHR congratulates Elliott on a lengthy stint at hockey’s top level and wishes him the best as he takes his next steps in the sport.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Senators Expected To Trade Egor Sokolov This Summer

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Over the past few years, Egor Sokolov has been one of Ottawa’s top-performing AHL players but it hasn’t resulted in much of an opportunity to play at the top level.  As a result, while he is expected to receive a qualifying offer later this month, Postmedia’s Bruce Garrioch reports that the expectation is that the Senators will move the winger at some point this summer.

The 24-year-old went undrafted in his first two years of eligibility before a breakout year with QMJHL Cape Breton in 2019-20 boosted his stock to the point where he was picked in the second round in 2020, going 60th overall.  He signed his entry-level contract soon after and has played in Ottawa’s system since then.

This past season, Sokolov played in 71 games with AHL Belleville, recording 21 goals and 25 assists.  However, it was the first time since his rookie year (which was shortened by the pandemic) that he failed to reach the 50-point mark.  As a result, he wasn’t recalled at all during the season after clearing waivers during training camp.

Despite that, Sokolov still has 13 career NHL appearances under his belt having spent time with the big club in both 2021-22 and 2022-23.  Overall, he has a goal and an assist in those games while logging a little more than nine minutes a night on average.

Sokolov will be arbitration-eligible for the first time this summer although with the limited NHL action, it’s unlikely he’d be able to command much more than the minimum salary.  But as a 6’4 winger with a reasonable track record of success in the minors, there should be a team or two interested in taking a longer look at him in a move that would likely amount to a swap of AHL players in need of a change of scenery.

Snapshots: Boucher, McDavid, Kraft Hockeyville

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Former Toronto Maple Leafs assistant coach Guy Boucher was hoping to be much more of a contender in the team’s head coaching search, shares Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman on the 32 Thoughts Podcast. Toronto parted ways with Boucher on Saturday, ending his tenure in Toronto after just one year with the team. Boucher mainly presided over Toronto’s power play, which posted a 23.95 percent success rate this season, down two percent from last year though still a top-10 unit in the league. They lost that special-teams spark in the playoffs, though, scoring on just one of the 21 power plays they received in their first-round loss to the Boston Bruins.

The Leafs were rumored to be interested in a long list of candidates for their head coaching vacancy – including Todd McLellan, Gerard Gallant, and even Rod Brind’Amour prior to his extension in Carolina. Toronto’s assistants were never among the rumored candidates, with the team even overturning Manny Malhotra, who left for an AHL head coaching role and was replaced by Lane Lambert. Boucher may need to follow in Malhotra’s path to the minor league if he’d like another head coaching role, with seemingly no vacancies in the NHL following Ryan Warsofsky’s hire in San Jose. There are currently three head coach vacancies in the AHL – with the Coachella Valley Firebirds, Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, and Hartford Wolf Pack, though the latter could opt to promote interim head coach Steve Smtih

Other notes from around the league:

  • Edmonton Oilers superstar Connor McDavid has broken Wayne Gretzky’s record for assists in a single postseason, now at 32 after recording three assists in Game 4. McDavid and Gretzky are the only two players to record 30 assists in a single postseason, with Gretzky managing the feat in both 1985 and 1988. McDavid is now up to 38 points in 22 playoff games this year, more than any other player in NHL history save for Gretzky and Mario Lemieux – though 38 points still ranks McDavid as just the fifth-highest scoring postseason, with Gretzky breaking 40 points three separate times, including a record-holding 47 points, and Lemieux once scoring 44. Those will be the records that McDavid is chasing as he looks to will Edmonton to a Game 7 Stanley Cup.
  • The Ottawa Senators will host the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2024 Kraft Hockeyville Preseason Game, set to take place in Elliot Lake, Ontario. Elliot Lake will also receive $250K to support arena upgrades and $10K in hockey equipment from the NHLPA Goals and Dreams fund. The matchup will bring Canadian superstars Sidney Crosby and Kris Letang to Northern Ontario, and mark Pittsburgh’s first time playing guest to the Senators since a 2-1 overtime loss in March.

Senators Sign AHL Head Coach David Bell To A Two-Year Extension

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Earlier today, it was noted that the Senators were turning their focus toward getting their AHL coaching staff finalized for next season.  It didn’t take long to get the first piece of the puzzle in place as the team announced (Twitter link) that they’ve signed Belleville head coach David Bell to a two-year contract extension.  His deal was set to expire at the end of the month.

Bell has spent the last five seasons with Belleville.  He started as an assistant coach with them in 2019-20 and was elevated to the interim head coaching role in February 2023.  While they missed the playoffs that season, the interim tag was still lifted, a move that worked out well.  Belleville finished fourth in the North Division this season and then won the opening round of the playoffs over Toronto (their first series win in franchise history) before falling to Cleveland.

Bell has never worked at the NHL level but is certainly experienced behind a bench.  He has ten years of OHL coaching experience under his belt while he had four years of being an AHL assistant before joining Ottawa’s system.  While he’ll have to wait a little longer for his first opportunity at the top level, he now has a bit of stability while looking to build on a strong finish from this past season.

Sens Hoping To Get AHL Coaching Staff Finalized Shortly

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  • With their NHL coaching staff now finalized, the Senators are turning their focus to AHL Belleville, reports Postmedia’s Bruce Garrioch. Head coach David Bell’s contract is set to expire at the end of the month although discussions on a new agreement are now underway.  GM Steve Staios indicated that he hopes to get things finalized for their farm team within the next few days.

Senators Re-Sign Cole Reinhart To Two-Way Deal

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The Senators are keeping depth forward Cole Reinhardt in the organization next season, per a team announcement. It’s a one-year, two-way deal that carries an NHL salary and cap hit of $775K with an AHL salary of $95K.

Reinhardt, 24, was a sixth-round pick of the Sens in 2020 after being passed over in the 2018 and 2019 drafts. The Calgary-born left winger has just one NHL appearance to his name, skating 8:35 against the Predators in a game on April 7, 2022, while recording a shot on goal and taking a minor penalty.

Ottawa has still gotten solid value out of Reinhardt as a late-round selection thus far. He’s grown into a consistent contributor with AHL Belleville, putting up 40 goals and 99 points in 225 games over the last four years. Reinhardt leverages his 6’1″, 207-lb frame to play a heavy game and has displayed good shooting ability in the past, although he was limited to only eight goals in 56 contests this season.

Reinhardt spent his first professional season, 2020-21, on an AHL contract with Belleville before signing his entry-level deal with Ottawa the following offseason. That rookie contract covered his last three seasons of play, making this his first standard contract. He would have become a restricted free agent with arbitration rights had he not extended before July 1.

He earns a minor raise on the $70K AHL salary he earned in the final year of his rookie deal. Reinhardt will be an arbitration-eligible RFA again next summer upon expiry.

Morning Notes: Senators, Sweden U20, AHL Prospects

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The Ottawa Senators are making sure they won’t be outdone on the trade market, now making the seventh-overall pick in the 2024 NHL Draft available for the right price, per Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Citizen. During an event held for season ticket holders to hear about the team’s off-season plans, Senators’ senior vice president Dave Poulin shared, “We had interest in the (No. 7) pick. Teams will call you and say, ‘Are you interested in moving the pick?’ and you don’t know what that’s going to look like because you don’t know what’s going to be available there. You have to stay very flexible.”

Including the seventh-overall pick in trade talks will bring the Senators more in line with the New Jersey Devils, who began shopping around the 10th-overall pick during the NHL Combine. The two teams headline a long list of teams interested in bringing in new goaltending talent this summer, and should be among the top options for trade bait like Linus Ullmark, Juuse Saros, and John Gibson. Dave Poulin made sure to emphasize Ottawa’s pursuit of a goaltender when speaking with Garrioch, adding that the team wasn’t happy with their goaltending tandem “numerically, statistically, or from an analytics standpoint.” The Senators’ tandem of Joonas Korpisalo and Anton Forsberg combined for a .890 save percentage this season – though their consistency in the lineup allowed Ottawa to rely on just three goalies this season, the fewest they’ve needed to get through a year since the 2019-20 season. But despite good health, the Senators goalies didn’t stand up to the task this year, and the team is once again doomed to spending the summer finding the right option in net.

But despite the interest elsewhere, it doesn’t seem Ottawa is ready to part with Korpisalo just yet. When asked, Poulin offered relief to Korpisalo’s down year, speaking to the difficulty in adjusting to a new team and the lack of defensive stops in front of him, relative to what he had with the Los Angeles Kings. Korpisalo just concluded the first season of a five-year, $20MM contract signed with the Senators last summer. He’ll be the team’s de facto backup should they bring in a new starter, and likely their go-to starter should things stay the same. The off-season event for season ticket holders where this information was conveyed is slated to be a yearly event for the Senators.

Other notes from around the league:

  • Team Sweden has announced the coaching staff that will oversee their U19 and U20 international teams next season. The group is manned by Magnus Hävelid, who has coached Sweden’s international juniors teams since 2017. He’ll be flanked by Gereon Dahlgren, and former NHL defenders Robin Jonsson and Nicklas Grossmann. Both Dahlgren and Jonsson are returning to their posts, while this news marks Grossman’s first time coaching an international squad. The quartet will lead Sweden’s lineups at the World Junior Summer Showcase and World Junior Championship, as well as in team friendlies.
  • The AHL has announced their All-Prospect team, as voted on by the league’s hockey operations department and general managers. The team includes AHL Rookie of the Year Logan Stankoven (DAL), as well as Shane Wright (SEA), Jiri Kulich (BUF), Simon Edvinsson (DET), Brandt Clarke (LAK), and Yaroslav Askarov (NSH). Each player appeared in NHL games this season, though Stankoven has become the first to carve out a daily role – recording 22 points across his first 43 NHL games, combined between the regular season and playoffs. His All-Prospect team peers will look to catch up to him with daily lineup spots next season.

Daniel Alfredsson Willing To Wait For Head Coaching Job

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Kevin Kurz of The Athletic is reporting that Philadelphia Flyers forward Sean Couturier had surgery after the season to repair a sports hernia. Couturier had a very eventful 2023-24 season after missing the previous season due to a back issue that required multiple surgeries.

The Flyers reportedly knew about the sports hernia as Couturier played through the ailment for much of the season and it clearly had an impact on his play as the 31-year-old managed just a goal and eight assists in his final 34 games. Couturier was named the Flyers captain back in February and is expected to be back to full health by the time training camp rolls around in September.

In other notes from the Eastern Conference:

  • Bruce Garrioch of Postmedia is reporting that Ottawa Senators assistant coach Daniel Alfredsson wants to put in serious time as an assistant before becoming an NHL head coach. The Senators reportedly talked to their former long-time captain about the head coach position, but Alfredsson told management that he wanted to learn the ropes before taking on the job. Alfredsson will be joined behind the Senators bench by new head coach Travis Green as well as assistants Mike Yeo, Nolan Baumgartner, and Ben Sexton.
  • The Florida Panthers and their ECHL affiliate the Florida Everblades have reportedly ended their affiliation agreement. The agreement between the ECHL and NHL franchises began in 2022-23 and included the AHL’s Charlotte Checkers. While the partnership was short lived it was incredibly successful as the Everblades won the Kelly Cup in both years of the deal, while the Panthers are in their second consecutive Stanley Cup Final. The Everblades have previously been the affiliate for Nashville, Carolina and Tampa Bay and will announce a new affiliation in the coming weeks.

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