Jared Bednar Held From Morning Skate With COVID Testing “Irregularity”
3:30pm: After further testing, Bednar has been cleared to coach tonight according to Baugh.
12:10pm: The Colorado Avalanche are trying to fight off elimination at the hands of the Vegas Golden Knights this evening, but they may have to do it without their head coach. Jared Bednar is absent from the morning skate thanks to “irregularity in his COVID-19 test results” the team tells Peter Baugh of The Athletic.
In terms of players, everyone that took part in the last game is at the morning skate, save for J.T. Compher, who had missed previous practices are he nurses an injury. Hopefully, that means that none of the roster has been affected by the testing and there will be no one held out of tonight’s game. If Bednar’s irregularity is not resolved, the team could potentially reach out to someone like Greg Cronin, head coach of the Colorado Eagles to help assistants Ray Bennett and Nolan Pratt.
This is certainly not an ideal situation for the Avalanche, who have lost three games in a row after going up 2-0 in the series against the Golden Knights. Mark Stone was the overtime hero on Tuesday night, scoring the winner and also helping shut down the Nathan MacKinnon line. After scoring 13 points in the first six games of the playoffs, MacKinnon has been held pointless in each of the last three.
Calgary Flames Hire Kirk Muller, Cail MacLean
The Calgary Flames have added an experienced name to the bench for next season, hiring Kirk Muller as an associate coach. Cail MacLean, who served as head coach of the Stockton Heat for the past three seasons, will also be joining the Flames as an assistant. Muller was let go earlier this season by the Montreal Canadiens when the team parted ways with Claude Julien, but didn’t take long to find his next NHL stop. Ray Edwards and Martin Gelinas will not be returning as assistant coaches but are not leaving the organization. Instead, they’ll transfer to the player development department for the Flames.
Muller, 55, has a long history in the NHL, going back to his selection second overall by the New Jersey Devils in 1984. He played parts of 19 seasons in the NHL, suiting up for 1,349 regular season games and taking home the Stanley Cup in 1993. As a coach, he joined the Canadiens for the first time in 2006 before taking a head coaching job with the Carolina Hurricanes in 2011. He went exactly .500 during his three-year tenure with the Hurricanes, before going to St. Louis and then back to Montreal. Though he doesn’t have a ton of head coaching experience, the Flames may well see him as a replacement for Darryl Sutter in a few years.
MacLean meanwhile is getting his first taste of the NHL at age-44 but is an up-and-coming head coaching prospect in his own right. The former minor league player has been in charge of ECHL and AHL teams previously, taking the slow necessary steps to establish himself as a future NHL head coach. During his time with the Heat, they posted a 72-65-16 record.
The two men will join a coaching staff that also includes assistant coach Ryan Huska (who was the Stockton coach prior to MacLean), goaltending coach Jason LaBarbera, and video coach Jamie Pringle.
Latest On Jack Eichel
The Buffalo Sabres and Jack Eichel appear to be headed toward a split, even though things have quieted down since the team’s year-end media availability. At that point, Eichel was telling reporters that there was a “disconnect” between his camp and GM Kevyn Adams‘ front office regarding his neck injury and it seemed like he already had one foot out the door. Well, that may still be the case, as Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet spoke to WGR 550 in Buffalo today and explained:
That’s the poker game we’re playing right now. Other teams are saying ‘you’ve got an unhappy player who doesn’t want to come back’ and the Sabres I really think at the end of the day want to move on. They don’t want him back, they want to move on. The teams are going to play Buffalo’s “desperation” at that. The Sabres have to play a game that says ‘okay, you guys can play that game, but somebody is going to get him. If you play it too cool or you play us too hardline, it won’t be you.’
Friedman also noted that some teams are even calling him to see what he knows about Eichel’s injury, given how little information the Sabres have released publicly to this point. The neck injury is a huge sticking point in the trade market, given the uncertainty over whether he will still require surgery and miss part of next season.
Of course, there is also the factor of a long-term contract that carries a cap hit of $10MM. That’s not an easy deal to swallow for any team, even if they can technically fit it at the moment. If Eichel can’t return to the player that scored 36 goals and 78 points in 2019-20, his contract quickly becomes an anchor. A trade will require a team that believes that he can get back to that level, and has the assets the Sabres will want in return. Even if Buffalo wants to move on, Adams will need to maximize the return as much as he can for a player who was seen as a franchise icon to this point.
2021 Hart Trophy Finalists Announced
It’s time for the big one. The NHL has announced the finalists for the Hart Trophy, given annually to the “player judged most valuable to his team.” Last year’s winner, Leon Draisaitl, also took home the Ted Lindsay and the Art Ross in an impressive trifecta.
This year’s finalists are Connor McDavid of the Edmonton Oilers, Auston Matthews of the Toronto Maple Leafs, and Nathan MacKinnon of the Colorado Avalanche.
McDavid could complete the same trifecta his teammate did a year ago, after completing one of the most impressive regular seasons in recent history. The Oilers captain scored 105 points in 56 games, a scoring rate that put him in rare company. Since 1980-81, 40 years ago, only Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux, Steve Yzerman, Bernie Nicholls, and Adam Oates have finished with a higher point/game rate over a full season. Each of the last three names on that list only did it once, and each were just barely ahead of the best offensive player in today’s game. There was absolutely no doubt that McDavid would be a finalist for the third time in his career. He previously took home the Hart in 2016-17, his sophomore year.
Matthews is a first-time finalist after winning the Rocket Richard trophy as the league’s top goal scorer. Amazingly, he had an eight-goal lead over second-place McDavid despite playing in four fewer games. Matthews was a scoring marvel this season, totaling 41 in 52 games for the Maple Leafs continuing to develop his strong defensive game. He was actually tied for fifth in points, but still 39 behind McDavid’s 105.
MacKinnon, the oldest of the three at age-25, is a Hart finalist for the third time in his career. Always a bridesmaid though, the Avalanche star has finished second in his first two runs at the award. Unfortunately–for MacKinnon and hockey fans–he played in just 48 games this season so his point total of 65 put him in the eighth spot league-wide. On a per-game basis though he trailed only McDavid, Draisaitl, and New York Rangers forward Artemi Panarin. Even if MacKinnon becomes a runner-up again, it would be hard to find someone who disagreed with his placement as one of the very best players in the entire world.
Offseason Checklist: Arizona Coyotes
The offseason has arrived with roughly half of the league finished up after missing the playoffs and several more having been eliminated. It’s time to examine what those teams need to accomplish over the coming months. Next up is a look at Arizona.
2020-21 was not a great year for Arizona. After making the playoffs last year through the bubble, they were hoping to make it two straight postseason appearances. However, the same issues crept up as a lack of scoring proved costly. Not surprisingly, GM Bill Armstrong is in for a very busy summer. Here’s a look at some of the things the Coyotes should be looking to do.
Hire A Head Coach
The Coyotes have one of the four head coaching vacancies around the league after they decided to let go of Rick Tocchet after four seasons with the team. In that stretch, they only finished in the top half of their division once while finishing no higher than 21st in goals scored. Arizona is more of a budget team than one that will spend to the cap and it wouldn’t be surprising to see that be the case for their coaches as well. That would seemingly take them out of the mix for most of the veteran coaches so it wouldn’t be surprising to see another first-time hire when they make their selection.
Rebuild The Back End
Arizona has had a capable veteran defense corps over the past several years but the time for change has arrived. Alex Goligoski, Niklas Hjalmarsson, and Jason Demers are all set to become unrestricted free agents this summer, freeing up over $14MM in cap space in the process. (Jordan Oesterle is also a UFA but his expiring cap hit of $1.4MM is a lot lower than the others and he could be brought back for a similar amount.) While there are cases to bring Goligoski and Hjalmarsson back out of the trio, it would need to be at a much lower price tag.
This is going to be an interesting situation to follow. If those veterans don’t return, Armstrong will need to bring in some proven replacements in a UFA market that doesn’t have a lot of them. Of course, they can also leverage their cap space (bolstered by Marian Hossa’s contract finally expiring) to pick up a replacement in a trade. Regardless, it looks like it will be a new-look blueline in 2021-22.
That said, the bigger question is how much they want to spend on the back end. The Coyotes are consistently towards the bottom of the league in goals scored and this represents an opportunity to redistribute some of their money on defense up front in an effort to add a top-six forward or two. Replacing the veterans with similarly-priced rearguards ensures that they’ll be a squad with a strong back end once again but that’s a roster composition that hasn’t worked for them lately. If Armstrong wants to shake up the structure of the team, this is it.
Deal For Garland
Sometimes, teams can get lucky in the draft and that’s what happened with Conor Garland. The undersized winger went unpicked in his first year of eligibility, was scooped up with a fifth-rounder by Arizona the following draft as a low-risk flier, and now, he finds himself as one of the top scorers on the Coyotes. It has worked out great for the team so far, getting top-six production for a bargain price tag as Garland accepted a two-year low-cost bridge deal that carried a cap hit of just $775K. As far as top bargains in the NHL go, he should have been in the conversation more than he had been.
It’s about to work out a lot better for the 25-year-old. That bridge contract is up this summer and he’s about to become a restricted free agent with arbitration eligibility for the first time. Along the way, he’ll be able to add several million dollars to his price tag for next season and beyond. He’s two years away from being eligible for unrestricted free agency so if they wind up with a one-year pact and push the bigger commitment down the road, that’s not the worst outcome, especially with some questions surrounding just how much he’s worth.
It’s for that reason that Garland came up in trade speculation closer to the trade deadline where it got to the point that they were willing to move him although the right price obviously never got offered up. Still, it suggested that Arizona may not view Garland as a long-term player to build around which makes the prospects of a long-term agreement in the coming weeks a little lower. Accordingly, a deal could mean two different things here – a new contract, or a new team altogether.
Extension Talks
A pair of core veterans will be entering the final year of their contracts this summer and once the calendar flips to the 2021-22 campaign at the beginning of free agency, the Coyotes will be allowed to sign Darcy Kuemper and Phil Kessel to extensions.
Kuemper went from being a lower-end backup early in his career to one of the top goalies in the league after being acquired in 2018. In each of the last two seasons, he was among the league leaders in save percentage but took a step back this season as his save percentage dipped to .907, his lowest since his final year in Minnesota. Still, there has been much more good than bad for the 31-year-old and with Adin Hill not looking like a starter of the future (though he should be the full-time backup next season), there is a need for Kuemper to stick around a little while longer.
Meanwhile, Kessel has seen his offensive numbers plummet since joining the Coyotes but he still finished one point off the team lead in 2019-20 and led the team in points this season. He may not be a player that can carry a line which is what they were hoping for when he was acquired in 2019 but he is still a capable, albeit streaky, scorer. The free agent market wasn’t kind to wingers last year and it’s likely to be the case for most wingers this year as well which means he won’t have any success trying to find a deal close to his current $8MM price tag (with Pittsburgh still paying 15% of that). If Armstrong is able to upgrade their forward group, Kessel could be in line for a rebound year which would give him a better case for a new contract a year from now.
Of the two, Kuemper seems like the likeliest to sign an early extension but Armstrong will undoubtedly be having discussions on both fronts in the months to come.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images. Cap information courtesy of CapFriendly.
Hurricanes Loan Vasili Ponomaryov To Spartak Of The KHL
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.
Oilers Re-Sign Devin Shore
The Oilers have taken care of one of their pending restricted free agents as they announced the re-signing of forward Devin Shore to a two-year contract. The deal carries an AAV of $850K with CapFriendly clarifying (Twitter link) that he will make the league minimum of $750K next season and $950K in 2022-23.
The 26-year-old was non-tendered last fall by Columbus and had to settle for a PTO deal with Edmonton in late December, one that he was able to convert to a two-way contract. Shore wound up spending most of the season with the Oilers, getting into 38 games where he had five goals and four assists. While he did clear waivers a couple of times as Edmonton shuffled several veterans back and forth from their taxi squad, he clearly made enough of an impression to stick around, earning himself a one-way deal in the process.
Shore spent most of this past season in a depth role, often playing on the fourth line when he was in the lineup and it stands to reason that he’ll have a similar role throughout this contract. The Oilers, like many teams, will be relying on cheap depth to free up a little bit of wiggle room on the salary cap and that will allow Shore to stick around for a couple more years.
GM Ken Holland still has plenty of work to get to before free agency begins. He has a trio of other restricted free agents to re-sign while 11 others will soon see their contracts expire as pending unrestricted free agents so there should be several signings to come over the coming weeks.
Lukas Parik Signs AHL Contract
After bouncing from the Czech Republic to the WHL, back to the Czech leagues, and then to the USHL, all with some World Junior action mixed in, Lukas Parik finally has his first pro contract. The young goaltender has signed a one-year deal with the Ontario Reign of the AHL for the 2021-22 season.
Parik, 20, was selected 87th overall by the Los Angeles Kings in 2019 with a pick they received from the Washington Capitals in the Carl Hagelin deal. The season that followed that selection, he came to the WHL and played in 32 games with the Spokane Chiefs, posting a 22-7-2 record and .917 save percentage. In 2020-21, he spent most of the season with the Dubuque Fighting Saints of the USHL, going 15-8-4 in the regular season but registering just an .867 save percentage.
That performance really means nothing now, as the Kings will give Parik the chance to show his skills in the minor leagues, but note this is not yet his entry-level NHL contract. He’ll still need to perform in order to receive that, but the team does have some time to continue to evaluate him. According to CapFriendly, the Kings’ exclusive draft rights will not expire until 2023. At any rate, this is a great opportunity for the 6’4″ netminder to get accustomed to professional hockey and test his skills against his toughest competition yet. The fact that both Jonathan Quick and Cal Petersen are scheduled for unrestricted free agency in the next two years should be motivation enough for any goaltender in the Kings system. Even if the team extends Petersen, there will be an opportunity to move up the ladder and compete for playing time at some point down the line.
Vancouver Canucks Hire Brad Shaw
The Vancouver Canucks will have many of the same faces back behind the bench and on the ice at practice next season, but one important position has been filled with an experienced free agent. Brad Shaw, who previously worked with the Columbus Blue Jackets but parted ways with them last month, has been hired as an assistant for head coach Travis Green.
Kyle Gustafson has also been hired as an Assistant/Special Assignment Coach, while Nolan Baumgartner, Jason King, Darryl Seward and, perhaps most importantly, Ian Clark have all signed contract extensions. Chris Higgins will resume his role with the player development department.
The big hire here is Shaw, who has nearly two decades behind NHL benches. Before joining John Tortorella in Columbus, he worked with the New York Islanders and St. Louis Blues. He served as an associate coach with the Blues from 2012-2016, helping to develop the defensive core that helped them win a Stanley Cup a few years later. Green released a statement on his newest assistants:
We’re excited to welcome two new members to our coaching staff. Brad has a vast amount of coaching experience and a strong technical mind for the game. Kyle is a bright, young coach who will help our team and strengthens our coaching staff.
There was also plenty of concern that Clark would be leaving the organization, but Patrick Johnson of the Vancouver Province tweets that it is expected to be a five-year deal for the goalie coach. That’s a very long term for an assistant, longer even than the deal that Green recently signed.
Latest On Rod Brind’Amour’s Contract
Now that the Carolina Hurricanes have been eliminated from the Stanley Cup playoffs, all eyes are on head coach Rod Brind’Amour. The likely 2021 Jack Adams finalist is without a contract for next season and though there have been reports over the last few months that negotiations were close, nothing has been officially announced.
Previously, it had come up that Brind’Amour was focused on securing contract extensions for his entire coaching staff as well as his own. Today, Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic tweets that there is still work to be done on those assistants’ contracts and that it is “important” to Brind’Amour that they get them.
That’s not to say things won’t get worked out between the Hurricanes and their franchise icon. Not only was Brind’Amour the captain when the team hoisted its only Stanley Cup in 2006, he’s also been one of the most successful coaches in the NHL since he took the reins in 2018, winning 120 of his 206 regular season games. Brind’Amour is beloved by the fan base and it would be lunacy for the organization to let him go, unless the contract demands are completely unreasonable.
The Hurricanes may have been defeated in the second round, going quietly against the Tampa Bay Lightning, but it’s hard to really critique what they’ve done to this point. The team is full of young stars that are just starting to realize their potential and the coaching/management group has done a great job maximizing their resources to this point. Until it is done, anything can happen, but it seems very likely that Brind’Amour–and his full staff–will be returning.