Edmonton Oilers Looking For Defense
The Edmonton Oilers can score, everyone knew that. Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl rank first and second respectively in league scoring, each well ahead of third-place Tage Thompson. Even Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Zach Hyman are among the league’s best, sitting tied for 13th and 20th in points. The thing they can’t do is keep the puck out of their net.
Last night was a great example. After getting out to a 3-1 lead over the St. Louis Blues halfway through the third period, the ice tilted and the Oilers defense couldn’t handle it. First Robert Thomas, then Vladimir Tarasenko – shorthanded – scored to bring the Blues back and force overtime. A shootout loss and another blown point for Edmonton, who sit fourth in the Pacific Division after 31 games with a 17-13-1 record.
It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, then, when Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic reports that the Oilers have already been doing some due diligence on defensemen that might be available this season. LeBrun lists John Klingberg and Joel Edmundson among the names that the team has already looked into, though those two in particular offer very different skill sets.
The interesting part of any Oilers trade speculation though, is how their cap situation will be affected. The team currently has some wiggle room but that is provided by Evander Kane‘s placement on long-term injured reserve. When he is ready to return, it would seriously complicate things. Adding a difference-making defenseman would be difficult in that scenario, even with salary retention from a rebuilding club.
That reality will only fuel the Jesse Puljujarvi speculation that continues to suggest this will be his last season with Edmonton. If the team is going to cut bait in the summer, they might as well do it a bit early to clear some cap room.
Either way, the Oilers can’t keep letting games slip through their fingers if they want to be a serious contender in the Western Conference. With Philip Broberg not yet ready to elevate the defense corps, they’ll have to look elsewhere for an answer on the back end.
Snapshots: O’Reilly, Edmundson, Schmidt
While the Toronto Maple Leafs have been among the NHL’s most successful regular-season teams for the past half-decade, playoff success has eluded them. One player who had similarly spent an extended period without any playoff success is Ryan O’Reilly, who spent nearly his first decade in the NHL without making it to the second round. In 2019, though, O’Reilly bucked that career trend, leading the St. Louis Blues to a Stanley Cup victory and winning the Conn Smythe Trophy along the way.
The Maple Leafs want to do the same this spring, and it seems that they view O’Reilly as someone who can help them get there. Per Pierre LeBrun in The Athletic’s first 2022-23 trade board, Toronto has “talked about O’Reilly internally,” debating the prospect of acquiring him from the Blues. (subscription link) While O’Reilly’s scoring numbers have slowed down, Toronto could add him to a center corps that already boasts Auston Matthews and John Tavares, forming what would be likely the best trio of centers in the NHL. He remains a player with a sterling reputation as a playoff performer, and as a pending unrestricted free agent acquiring him would pose no long-term financial complications.
For some other notes from across the NHL:
- The Montreal Canadiens have been better than expected this season, as they were the NHL’s worst team last year but have hovered around the .500 mark so far in 2022-23. Despite that, the team is still anticipated to engage other teams as a seller in next year’s trade market, and one of the players reportedly garnering interest from other teams is defenseman Joel Edmundson. On TSN’s Insider Trading segment, LeBrun reported that the Edmonton Oilers had interest in adding Edmundson, a 2019 Stanley Cup champion who has taken an important leadership role on a young Canadiens team.
- The Winnipeg Jets announced tonight that defenseman Nate Schmidt has suffered an upper-body injury, and will not return to their game against the Nashville Predators. Schmidt appeared to suffer the injury after a high hit from Predators forward Tanner Jeannot. The loss of Schmidt costs the Jets one of their top-four defensemen, as he has skated in over 20 minutes per night, including time on the second units of both special teams phases.
Dallas Stars Acquire Oskari Laaksonen
We have a trade to announce. The Dallas Stars have acquired defensive prospect Oskari Laaksonen from the Buffalo Sabres in exchange for another blueliner, Joseph Cecconi. Both teams have officially announced the deal.
Laaksonen, 23, was a third-round pick of the Sabres at the 2017 draft, getting selected 89th overall. He spent three full seasons as a regular defenseman for Ilves Tampere in the Finnish Liiga, before splitting 2020-21 between the Lahti Pelicans and the Rochester Americans.
In Rochester Laaksonen started off very well, scoring 17 points in his first 28 games. In his first full season, which was last year, he had a healthy 34 points in 71 games, good for second-most among Rochester defensemen. He scored those points, though, in somewhat of a sheltered role, and this season Laaksonen has just two points in ten games played.
Close to the end of last season, it seemed the cracks were starting to show in Laaksonen’s standing in Rochester. In a story covering the blueliner’s situation from last spring, the Times Herald’s Bill Hoppe noted that the Americans were sending a “not-so-subtle” message to Laaksonen that he needed to make his game more balanced in order to remain in their plans.
Despite his solid production, Laaksonen sat out the first eight games of the Americans’ Calder Cup playoff run, and after a particularly painful 6-5 triple-overtime loss to the Laval Rocket, Americans coach Seth Appert had the following to say about Laaksonen’s game:
His defensive game has to continue to improve, his commitment to defending and playing with the physical style. He’s never going to be a physical defenseman, but in North America, you have to physically engage to defend.
Those comments indicate that Laaksonen was heading into this year on thin ice in Rochester, and after 23 games (he played in just ten of them) it seems that the team decided Laaksonen needed a change of scenery.
He’ll head to the AHL’s Texas Stars in return for Cecconi, a 25-year-old native of Youngstown, New York, which is just over 30 miles away from Buffalo.
Cecconi was a fifth-round choice of the Stars at the 2015 draft. He had a four-year collegiate career at the University of Michigan before he made the leap to the pro game. For the past four years, Cecconi has been a regular contributor in Texas, mostly in a bottom-pairing capacity.
In his comments on Laaksonen, Appert noted a need to “physically engage” in order to survive on a North American blueline. In acquiring Cecconi, Sabres management has provided their AHL bench boss with a defenseman who is far better suited to play the sort of violent, physical game that the AHL can be known for. Cecconi stands six-foot-three, 215 pounds, and registered 52 penalty minutes last year.
In addition to his physical strengths, Cecconi plays on the second unit of Texas’ AHL-best penalty kill, which is running at an 88.2% rate. By trading for him, not only has Rochester gotten the more physical defenseman they seem to have desired, but they also have attempted to address their weak penalty kill, which is currently killing penalties at just a 70.6% rate.
While this is a deal that is unlikely to be of major consequence to both the Stars and the Sabres, it should make a meaningful difference for both clubs’ AHL affiliates as well as the involved players.
Colorado Avalanche Recall Jonas Johansson
The Colorado Avalanche have announced that goaltender Jonas Johansson has been recalled from the team’s AHL affiliate, the Colorado Eagles.
The move comes after Avalanche backup netminder Pavel Francouz secured his team a 3-2 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers last night. As no corresponding move was announced regarding the Avalanche’s goalies, this recall adds a third name to Colorado’s situation in the crease.
The 27-year-old Johansson earns this recall on the back of his impressive AHL performance so far this season. Through 12 games Johansson has a .929 save percentage and 2.10 goals-against-average.
Over the past two seasons Johansson’s career has had quite the journey. He was traded to the Avalanche from the Buffalo Sabres in 2021, when the Avalanche were in desperate need of a goalie. The team surrendered a sixth-round pick to acquire him, and then lost him on waivers to the Florida Panthers in December of that year.
After a two-game stint in Florida that included a disastrous start against the Montreal Canadiens in their final game of the regular season, where he surrendered ten goals, Johansson hit unrestricted free agency this past summer.
He was signed to a one-year, $750k deal with a hefty $350k AHL salary, with the idea of him playing in a tandem in the AHL with Justus Annunen.
That idea was nearly blown up after the Arizona Coyotes claimed Johansson off of waivers in late September, but nearly two weeks later the Avalanche were able to re-acquire him after he was waived by Arizona.
It’s unclear at this moment if this recall is motivated by any injury developments to either Francouz or Alexandar Georgiev.
New York Islanders Place Adam Pelech On Injured Reserve
The New York Islanders have announced that they have placed defenseman Adam Pelech on injured reserve. Per their announcement, the move is retroactive to December 6th, meaning it’s possible that Pelech misses just one more game.
The move also allows the Islanders to activate Kyle Palmieri off of injured reserve for tomorrow’s game, if they so choose. Palmieri has been out with an upper-body injury.
Pelech is among the most important defensemen on the Islanders’ roster. The 28-year-old veteran is typically partnered with Ryan Pulock, and that pairing forms the duo that eats the most minutes for the Islanders at five-on-five.
In addition to his value at even strength, Pelech, who is an acclaimed shutdown defenseman, spends nearly three minutes per night killing penalties for the Islanders. His success in his own end has helped the uber-talented Ilya Sorokin grow into one of the league’s top netminders.
Pelech’s overall value to coach Lane Lambert and the Islanders’ suffocating defensive structure cannot be overstated, meaning if the Islanders wish to remain in a playoff spot they’ll have to hope that Pelech’s stay on injured reserve is brief.
Pelech suffered this injury after the back of his head slammed into the boards during practice. That’s obviously a scary injury to sustain, so first and foremost getting Pelech’s personal health in order has to be the priority.
But given just how important he is to all of the Islanders’ plans this season, it’s likely that the folks on Long Island will be hoping his return to the ice comes sooner rather than later.
Los Angeles Kings Sign Trevor Moore To Five-Year Extension
The Los Angeles Kings have reached an agreement on a contract extension with forward Trevor Moore. Per a team announcement, Moore has signed a five-year, $4.2MM AAV contract that will expire in the summer of 2028.
Moore, 27, is a local product, hailing from Thousand Oaks, California, which is around 40 miles away from Crypto.com Arena, the home of the Kings.
Before he was in Toronto, Moore was an undrafted prospect who became a college hockey star at the University of Denver. In three seasons at Denver Moore played in 121 games, scoring 120 points.
Moore had been at Toronto Maple Leafs development camp as an unsigned prospect, and chose to sign his entry-level deal with the Maple Leafs in 2016.
After three years of solid production in the AHL for the Toronto Marlies, the Maple Leafs began to provide Moore with NHL opportunities, but his NCAA and AHL production would not consistently translate to NHL numbers. In Moore’s 52 NHL games with Toronto, he scored just 13 points.
He was traded to Los Angeles in the Jack Campbell / Kyle Clifford deal and has established himself as a two-way winger on the Kings. Finding an excellent fit on a line with Phillip Danault and Viktor Arvidsson, Moore flew past his career-high totals last season. In 81 games he scored 17 goals and 48 points, and also added five points in the Kings’ seven-game playoff series against the Edmonton Oilers.
Moore has 18 points in 32 games so far this season, which is a 46-point pace. That, combined with Moore’s versatility, work ethic, and defensive ability (he plays on the Kings’ penalty kill) led the negotiation to this price point on a long-term deal.
The contract will expire when Moore is 33 years old, meaning there isn’t a major age-related downside risk to this contract. Given Moore’s all-around ability and fit with Danault, this is the sort of contract that is more than fair for both Moore and the Kings.
Picture courtesy of USA Today Sports Images
Minor Transactions: 12/15/22
It’ll be a busy night on the NHL schedule tonight as 24 of the league’s 32 clubs will do battle. Among the many contests are a few games that look like they’ll be especially entertaining, such as the New York Rangers taking on the Toronto Maple Leafs and the red-hot Pittsburgh Penguins going up against a Florida Panthers squad looking to spark some sustained positive momentum. As we keep track of this flurry of action tonight, we’ll also track notable transactions in minor leagues and foreign leagues. Those moves can be found here:
- 2016 Rangers sixth-round pick Tyler Wall signed a one-year AHL contract with the Hershey Bears, the top affiliate of the Washington Capitals, today. While Wall, 24, couldn’t quite carve out a consistent role in the Rangers organization after a successful four-year collegiate career at UMass-Lowell, he now has an AHL contract in hand and the rest of the season to put some quality starts on his resume for the ECHL’s South Carolina Stingrays.
- Quinton Howden, a 2010 first-round pick of the Florida Panthers, was released from his tryout contract with Jukurit, a team in the Finnish Liiga. Howden scored just one point in ten games for Jukurit despite playing middle-six minutes and getting a chance on their power play. Howden, 30, scored 18 points in 45 games last season for Cologne in the German DEL and will look for a contract with another club to continue his pro career.
- J.D. Dudek, a 2014 fourth-round draft pick of the New Jersey Devils, signed a one-year contract with the Coventry Blaze, a team in the Elite Ice Hockey League, the United Kingdom’s top pro hockey league. The 26-year-old went overseas this summer after two seasons in the ECHL, signing with Tranas AIF in the third tier of Swedish hockey. The former Boston College Eagle had eight points in 14 games in Sweden and will look to keep that solid scoring up as he joins a new league.
- Nando Eggenberger, a former NHL draft prospect who three times represented his native Switzerland at the World Junior Championships, signed a two-year contract with Swiss club HC Ambri-Piotta. The deal will begin next season, as Eggenberger will finish out 2022-23 with his current club, Rapperswil-Jona Lakers. The former Oshawa General has seven points in 29 games so far this season.
- Another Swiss club announced the signing of a young forward to a two-year contract beginning next season: the ZSC Lions. Per their announcement, they signed forward Yannick Zehnder, currently of EV Zug, to a two-year, 2023-2025 contract. Zehnder is a Swiss champion who has six points in 27 games so far this season.
- Talented veteran defenseman Nick Bailen saw his KHL rights change hands today, with Spartak Moscow acquiring them from Traktor Chelyabinsk in exchange for 27-year-old blueliner Alexander Bryntsev. While Bailen, 33, is currently playing for Cologne in the DEL, he has 367 KHL games on his resume, including a brilliant 2021-22 season where he scored 42 points in 49 games. If Bailen makes the choice to return to the KHL, it seems now he’ll have to do so in Moscow.
- Veteran KHL depth defenseman Ruslan Ibatullin had his contract with KHL side Admiral Vladivostok terminated today. The 28-year-old had set a career-high in KHL games played this season, getting into 34 contests in Vladivostok. In need of a new contract, it’s likely that Ibatullin will return to playing in the second-tier VHL, the league where he has spent the bulk of his professional career.
Logan Brown Sent To AHL On Conditioning Loan
The St. Louis Blues may get Logan Brown back relatively soon, as the big forward was sent to the AHL on a conditioning loan today. It can last up to two weeks, allowing him to return to game shape.
Brown, 24, has missed 18 games with an upper-body injury, the second stretch he’s missed since training camp. Limited to just five appearances so far in 2022-23, he has been held scoreless.
Standing 6’6″ with the draft pedigree of an 11th-overall pick, there’s still hope that Brown can take his success in the minor leagues and translate it to the highest level. In 19 games with the Springfield Thunderbirds last season, he scored 17 points. That takes his overall minor league numbers to 96 points in 113 games, showing just how effective he can be in the right situation.
With general managers all over the league likely watching Tage Thompson‘s success and believing (rather naively) they can recreate it with other big, skilled forwards, Brown will probably get plenty of opportunities moving forward. His one-year, $750K contract will leave him a restricted free agent at the end of the year.
Tony DeAngelo Away Due To Personal Reasons; Flyers Recall Olle Lycksell
The Philadelphia Flyers have announced that Tony DeAngelo has been given a non-roster designation due to personal reasons, meaning he won’t be available to the team for now. The team has recalled Olle Lycksell from the AHL to take his roster spot.
DeAngelo, 27, last played for the Flyers on December 7, and then was held out of the lineup when Cam York was recalled. The team made it clear at that point that DeAngelo was a healthy scratch, though a couple of days later, it was revealed that he flew home to deal with a family matter. With the non-roster designation, the team can recall an extra player to fill out the roster.
Lycksell, 23, made his NHL debut at the start of the season after an impressive training camp but was quickly sent down to polish his game further in the minor leagues. The young forward is in his first year in North America but that hasn’t slowed him down. In 16 games with the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, Lycksell has five goals and 16 points, continuing his breakout performance from the Swedish ranks.
A sixth-round pick in 2017, there’s no limit to the energy that Lycksell brings to every shift. While there are still many questions about whether he’ll be able to produce offensively at the NHL level, he’s done everything he could to show he deserves a chance.
Injury Notes: Rielly, Ehlers, Rodrigues
Toronto Maple Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe told reporters including Luke Fox of Sportsnet that Morgan Rielly‘s return to the ice is “imminent,” though a return to game action is still quite a ways down the road. The veteran defenseman was ruled out in late November with an MCL sprain and placed on long-term injured reserve, which will hold him out through at least December 17.
In his absence, Toronto has actually had incredible defensive results, with Mark Giordano and Rasmus Sandin stepping into the vacated minutes on the left side. When he is able to return, it’s not clear exactly who will come out of the lineup, given Conor Timmins‘ recent stretch of strong play as well. The Maple Leafs, who are expected to be without Jake Muzzin all year, suddenly seem to have quite a bit of defensive depth.
- The Winnipeg Jets are in a similar situation with their forward group, which is scoring plenty without the services of Nikolaj Ehlers. The team has put up at least five goals in seven of their last ten games, with Mark Scheifele now up to 18 tallies on the year. Ehlers, who is working his way back from sports hernia surgery, was on the ice yesterday and could potentially return in two to three weeks, according to Scott Billeck of the Winnipeg Sun. The 26-year-old forward had three points in his first two games of the season before going under the knife.
- Evan Rodrigues, who hasn’t played since November 23, is “ready to go” for tonight’s Colorado Avalanche game. The Avalanche have struggled with injuries throughout the year but are starting to get healthy again and have won two in a row. Rodrigues, who was brought in on a one-year deal in the offseason, had six goals and nine points in 18 games before getting forced out of the lineup.