Lightning Notes: Howard, Guentzel, Glendening
On today’s rendition of 32 Thoughts by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, the NHL insider touched on the ongoing situation between the Tampa Bay Lightning and prospect Isaac Howard. The product of Michigan State University has already announced he’ll return to the Spartans’ program for the 2025-26 NCAA season, and there’s no guarantee he’ll ever wear a Lightning uniform.
Friedman indicates there’s no bad blood between the Lightning and their top prospect, but the odds are against them signing him to an entry-level contract. As Friedman puts it, Howard will play through his final year of eligibility at Michigan State and become an unrestricted free agent on August 15, 2026. The Hobey Baker Award finalist would quickly become one of the highest-profile collegiate free agents in recent memory.
Howard is unlikely to sign with Tampa Bay partly due to the organization’s preferred usage of him. The plan was for Howard to play in the AHL for the 2025-26 season, and the collegiate standout has indicated he’d make more in NIL money in East Lansing than he would on an AHL salary. Friedman hinted that Lightning General Manager Julien BriseBois could look to trade Howard at the 2025 NHL Draft, with plenty of teams likely having an interest.
More notes from Tampa Bay:
- According to Eduardo A. Encina of the Tampa Bay Times, the Lightning will have winger Jake Guentzel back tonight for their intra-divisional contest against the Detroit Red Wings. Guentzel had missed Tampa Bay’s most recent contest because of personal reasons, and it appears he’s at a point in his life off the ice where he can return. Fortunately, that’s only one of two games Guentzel has missed for the Lightning this season, scoring 38 goals and 77 points in 76 games.
- Unfortunately, there is one Tampa Bay forward who won’t be available to the team for their remaining regular season contests. Lightning insider Erik Erlendsson reported earlier that Luke Glendening, who’s out with an undisclosed injury, is out for the rest of the regular season, although the Lightning are hopeful he’ll return for the postseason. Glendening will finish the 2024-25 season with four goals and seven points in 77 contests with a customarily high 57.0% success rate in the faceoff circle.
Avalanche Recall Wyatt Aamodt, Jack Ahcan, Jere Innala
The Avalanche announced today they’ve recalled defensemen Wyatt Aamodt and Jack Ahcan, along with forward Jere Innala from AHL Colorado. The trio will presumably get into game action for the Avs’ season-ending back-to-back this weekend to allow some lineup fixtures extra rest ahead of the postseason.
Colorado is already without a laundry list of lineup fixtures for their final two games, namely superstar pivot Nathan MacKinnon. He’s dealing with a minor injury that wouldn’t hold him out of playoff action, but he’s expected to sit for both contests after missing last night’s game against the Canucks. Carrying more serious injury designations up front are Ross Colton (undisclosed) and Jonathan Drouin (lower body), both of whom are day-to-day and probable for their Game 1 lineup in over a week. On the back end, Ryan Lindgren and Josh Manson are unavailable with upper-body injuries.
On top of those absences, today’s recalls indicate they’ll allow multiple other players to rest. It would be Aamodt’s NHL debut if he plays. Colorado signed the 27-year-old as an undrafted free agent out of Minnesota State in 2022, playing exclusively with their AHL club since. While he was set to be an unrestricted free agent this summer, he signed a two-year extension at the trade deadline. The lefty is amid a spectacular two-way season with the Eagles, posting 3-13–16 in 66 games while posting a league-leading +35 rating. The Minnesota native has 12-36–48 with 131 PIMs and a +48 rating in 181 career AHL games over the last four years.
Ahcan hasn’t seen NHL ice since suiting up nine times with the Bruins in the 2020-21 and 2021-22 seasons. Now 27, the 5’9″ lefty is set to be a UFA this summer upon completing the two-year, two-way deal he signed with the Avs in 2023. The 2017 World Juniors gold medalist with Team USA has a career-high 5-36–41 scoring line in 67 games with the Eagles this year.
Innala is the most familiar of the trio. The 27-year-old Finn is in his first season in North America, signing an entry-level deal with the Avs last summer following a standout playoff performance with Rögle BK of the Swedish Hockey League. He made 15 NHL appearances for Colorado earlier this season, going without a point and logging a minus-three rating while averaging just 6:55 per game. He hasn’t made an appearance for the Avs since January. The 5’9″ left-winger has been a decent complementary scorer in the minors, logging 16-11–27 in 42 games.
Rangers Expected To Consider Coaching Change
Without any coaches on expiring contracts without club options, it’s likely to be a quieter summer than normal on the coaching carousel. The one name on most radars is Rangers bench boss Peter Laviolette, who has one year left on his deal. Speaking on Insider Trading yesterday, Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic called Laviolette’s future “low-hanging fruit,” adding, “The expectations from a lot of people I’ve talked to is that Peter Laviolette could get fired.”
There’s no denying New York’s nightmarish season. After a 55-win 2023-24 campaign that saw them win the President’s Trophy, they’re just two games over .500 with three contests remaining on their schedule and have just a 0.3% chance of leapfrogging the Canadiens for the final playoff spot in the East, per MoneyPuck. Goaltending certainly isn’t to blame – star starter Igor Shesterkin ranks fourth in the league with 21.9 goals saved above expected. Nor is poor finishing luck – the Rangers’ 10.7% shooting rate this year is 0.1% above the league average.
A limping power play and poor team defense jump out as the Rangers’ limiting factors this season. The latter could certainly be attributed to the team’s blue line overhaul, but the same issues persisted before New York’s midseason retool on defense. It’s easy to see why, with limited roster maneuverability available this summer, the Rangers might view a coaching change as their best chance to return to postseason action in 2025-26. Barring another cap-clearing trade, the club won’t be a major player in free agency – they have just $9.67MM in cap space for next year with pending RFAs William Cuylle and K’Andre Miller in need of new deals.
That means Laviolette’s seat is the hottest of them all as the end of the regular season draws nigh. The same can’t be said for general manager Chris Drury, whom LeBrun expects to remain in his post. “My sense there is that he should be okay. I think there’s a lot of loyalty from Jim Dolan, the owner,” LeBrun said. “He was pretty busy out of the trade deadline, too, really kind of setting up his offseason with a lot of moves he made. I think he plans to be aggressive in trying to retool the Rangers again here this summer.”
There won’t be many recently-fired options for the Rangers to choose from, unless they’re interested in pursuing a reunion with John Tortorella. In terms of high-profile names who spent this year on the sidelines, Bruce Boudreau could be a realistic option. The veteran bench boss expressed an interest in taking over the Devils last year but was passed over for Sheldon Keefe.
Looking internally would risk digging their hole of being a non-dominant possession team even deeper. Associate head coach Phil Housley would theoretically be next in line, but his previous shot as an NHL head coach didn’t go well. He posted a 58-84-22 record over a pair of seasons with the Sabres from 2017 to 2019.
Blackhawks Reassign Ethan Del Mastro
The Blackhawks are reassigning defenseman Ethan Del Mastro to AHL Rockford for the balance of the season, Charlie Roumeliotis of WGN Radio 720 reports. Doing so gives the rookie some extra tune-up time before kicking off the Calder Cup Playoffs with the IceHogs later this month.
So ends a promising rookie season in the NHL for Del Mastro, whom Chicago selected in the fourth round of the 2021 draft. The 6’4″, 210-lb lefty skated in a pair of games to end last season but only got an extended look in the Blackhawks lineup this year. He didn’t make the opening night roster and needed to wait until January for his first recall, leapfrogging Wyatt Kaiser on the depth chart after a strong start to the season in the AHL.
While he’s never likely to put up flashy point totals at the professional level, he’s not a pure defensive specialist. He’s a good outlet passer and will get involved in rush plays, evidenced by a promising 2-4–6 scoring line in 24 showings in Chicago this year. He averaged 18:19 per game and was among the Hawks’ more physical players, ranking eighth on the team with 5.46 hits per 60 minutes.
Possession-wise, Del Mastro looked promising – and that may be an understatement. He had the best outright and relative shot attempt impacts at even strength of any Blackhawks skater, controlling 47.4% of shot attempts. In contrast, Chicago only controlled 42% of shot attempts without Del Mastro on the ice in games he played. That’s excellent work for a 22-year-old and goes a long way toward vaulting him into consideration for their 2025-26 opening night roster.
Del Mastro was on the AHL roster on deadline day, though, making him eligible to play in the minor-league postseason. He has eight assists and a plus-five rating in 42 AHL appearances this year. That’s not the offensive production he flashed in his rookie year, putting up 7-30–37 in 69 games for Rockford in 2023-24, but he’s continued to log heavy minutes while showing his strengths as a physical, intelligent, smooth-skating defender.
As for Chicago’s final few regular season games, the demotion indicates either Wyatt Kaiser or Connor Murphy should be returning tomorrow against the Jets after sitting out of last night’s win due to illness. Del Mastro appeared in that win, posting a plus-one rating in over 20 minutes of ice time after serving as a healthy scratch for the previous three.
Oilers Recall Cam Dineen, Assign Olivier Rodrigue To AHL
The Oilers have made a pair of roster moves in advance of Friday’s game against San Jose. The team announced that they’ve recalled defenseman Cam Dineen from AHL Bakersfield on an emergency basis while also returning goaltender Olivier Rodrigue to the Condors. As part of the announcement, Edmonton noted that the emergency conditions for Rodrigue had concluded, meaning Stuart Skinner has been cleared to return to the lineup.
It’s the third recall of the season for Dineen although the first two didn’t yield much action as he suited up just once for Edmonton, his first NHL appearance since the 2021-22 season when he played in 34 games for Arizona. The 26-year-old has spent most of the year in Bakersfield and has done well offensively, leading all Condors blueliners in scoring with nine goals and 34 assists through 59 games.
Rodrigue, meanwhile, was brought up late last month when Skinner suffered a head injury. The 24-year-old made his first two NHL appearances during this stint, one start and one relief appearance, turning aside 25 of 29 shots in a little over 77 minutes of action. Rodrigue has played in a career-best 40 games with Bakersfield this season, posting a 3.05 GAA and a .899 SV%.
As for Skinner, he has missed the last two weeks with that head injury. It has been an up-and-down year for him once again. He has a 2.91 GAA and a .894 SV% through 49 games, his worst marks over the last four seasons. Meanwhile, Calvin Pickard has played well in Skinner’s absence so Skinner won’t have much time to re-stake his claim to the top spot heading to the playoffs.
East Notes: Bruins, Greaves, Cousins, Penguins
The Bruins are shutting down defenseman Charlie McAvoy and center Mark Kastelic for the final week of the season, relays Boston.com’s Conor Ryan (Twitter link). Interim head coach Joe Sacco indicated that both players are making progress from their respective injuries but will run out of time before the year comes to an end. McAvoy has missed the last two months with a shoulder injury sustained during the 4 Nations Face-Off; his year comes to an end with just 23 points in 50 games, the lowest point total of his eight-year NHL career. As for Kastelic, he has missed the last three weeks with an upper-body issue. He finishes with a career-best 14 points in 61 games while chipping in with 128 hits, earning him a three-year, $4.7MM extension in early January.
Elsewhere in the East:
- With Elvis Merzlikins unavailable for tonight’s must-win game against Buffalo, the Blue Jackets announced the recall of Jet Greaves from AHL Cleveland on an emergency basis. The 24-year-old has been up with Columbus several times this season, posting a 2.83 GAA and a .905 SV% in six outings heading into today’s action. He has a 2.62 GAA and a .910 SV% in 40 games with the Monsters and with Daniil Tarasov struggling, Greaves got the start against the Sabres.
- Senators winger Nick Cousins was a full participant in practice today and hasn’t been ruled out of Friday’s game against Montreal, relays Postmedia’s Bruce Garrioch. Originally expected to miss at least three months after suffering a knee injury in late January, it looks like the 31-year-old will be able to beat that by a couple of weeks at least. Ottawa will have to make a roster move in order to activate Cousins off LTIR as they don’t have the cap space to add him back to the roster otherwise. Cousins has 13 points and 80 hits in 47 games this season.
- The Penguins announced (Twitter link) that forwards Noel Acciari, Blake Lizotte, Rutger McGroarty, Matthew Nieto, and Thomas Novak are all being shut down for the final few games of the season. Those players being out provide the context for the three players Pittsburgh recalled earlier today. Of the absences, McGroarty is the most notable as he had been given a bigger role since being recalled late last month, logging over 16 minutes a night while playing on the top line as the Penguins hoped to give one of their top prospects a good look down the stretch but that look winds up being shorter than expected.
Brock Boeser Unlikely To Stay With Canucks This Summer
The Canucks have been mathematically eliminated from the postseason. For the fourth time in the last five years, they’ll end their season with more focus on exit interviews than must-win games. In the case of this year’s Canucks squad, an early end will also bring tough questions about star players back to the surface.
Trade rumors swirled around the team’s offense for much of the season, with winger Brock Boeser at the forefront of a lot of speculation. Boeser was believed to be a top name at the Trade Deadline after failing to agree on an extension with Vancouver. But a rich asking price kept the former 40-goal scorer in place past the deadline. Now, a few months later, Boeser shared that a return seems unlikely when asked about his next contract by Sportsnet’s Iain MacIntyre:
Honestly, it’s unlikely at this point. It sucks, it’s unfortunate. I’m just trying to play good hockey, and then I’ll worry about everything after that. We all know it’s been a roller coaster of a year. There’s been a lot of different things.
News that Boeser is headed out of Vancouver isn’t necessarily a surprise given that contract extension discussions didn’t yield much traction throughout the season even as those talks were held close to the deadline. But still, likely losing a long-term core player for no return in a year that saw Vancouver also miss the playoffs has to sting for GM Patrik Allvin.
Barring an unlikely change of heart over the next two-plus months, Boeser will test unrestricted free agency for the first time in his career. He’ll be doing so on a bit of a down year relative to his performance a year ago when he had 40 goals and 33 assists, both career highs. Through 71 games this season, Boeser has 25 goals and 24 helpers, numbers that are closer to his career norms.
Back in late February, Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli reported that Boeser declined a five-year, $40MM extension, an offer that would have given him a $1.35MM raise compared to his current deal. Had he been able to replicate his 40-goal effort from 2023-24, he’d have been well-positioned to beat that on the open market.
But last season is also the only time that Boeser reached the 60-point mark, let alone 70. In previous years, his point totals have ranged from 45 to 56 with some of those coming in shortened seasons between injuries and a shorter schedule in 2019-20 and 2020-21. Even with some significant increases coming in the salary cap, how much more could Boeser realistically command when his track record of production is more of a high-end second liner most years? That question will be answered in a few months and it doesn’t appear that the Canucks will be the team to provide it.
PHR’s Gabriel Foley contributed to this post.
Photo courtesy of Nick Turchiaro-Imagn Images.
Golden Knights Recall Alexander Holtz
After spending the last two months in the minors, Alexander Holtz is getting another NHL shot. The Golden Knights have recalled the winger according to the NHL’s Media Portal while Danny Webster relays (Twitter link) that Holtz was on the third line in the morning skate.
The 23-year-old was acquired at the draft last year from New Jersey with Vegas hoping that a change of scenery could help unlock things for the 2020 seventh overall selection. However, that didn’t exactly happen. Holtz had a limited role with the Golden Knights in the first half of the season, notching just three goals and eight assists in 49 games while averaging 11:31 per night. That playing time was similar to last season with the Devils when Holtz put up 16 goals and 12 helpers while playing all 82 games. Instead of taking a step forward, he took a step back offensively.
That resulted in the Golden Knights taking a step back with Holtz when they assigned him to AHL Henderson in early February. He certainly had more success with the Silver Knights, tallying seven goals and six assists in 16 appearances to earn this promotion.
It’s one that could be short-lived, however. Webster notes (Twitter link) that winger Victor Olofsson was held out of the game day skate due to illness but could still play tonight against Seattle. In that case, emergency conditions would no longer apply, meaning Holtz would either have to be returned to Henderson or be converted to one of their four post-deadline regular recalls.
In other Vegas news, Webster adds that center Jack Eichel remains listed as day-to-day and won’t suit up against the Kraken. However, center Tomas Hertl was a full participant in the morning skate and appears to be set to play on the second line so they will at least get one impact center back for this one as they look to get one spot closer to clinching the Pacific Division title. Hertl missed a little more than two weeks with a shoulder injury but still sits second on the Golden Knights in goals with 33 and third on the team in points with 59 in 70 games.
Sharks Assign Igor Chernyshov To AHL
The San Jose Sharks have assigned top wing prospect Igor Chernyshov to the AHL following the end of his season with the OHL’s Saginaw Spirit. Chernyshov signed his entry-level contract on August 1st, just over one month after the Sharks drafted him with the 33rd-overall pick in the 2024 NHL Draft.
Chernyshov underwent surgery to address a shoulder injury soon after signing his entry-level contract. The procedure forced him to sit out until January 30th. In that time, Chernyshov moved from Russia’s Dynamo Moskva to the OHL’s Saginaw Spirit – where he quickly made up for lost time. He scored two goals in his OHL debut, then followed it up with a jaw-dropping 19 points in his first six games in the league. Chernyshov was a scoring machine on the OHL’s second-highest-scoring offense, and posted seven different games of at least four points versus just five games with no scoring. His OHL season ended with an incredible 19 goals and 55 points in 23 games – or an average of 2.39 points-per-game. That scoring pace was the highest in the CHL this season, and ranks as the fourth-highest in the OHL since 2000, just behind Chicago Blackhawks legend Patrick Kane.
Chernyshov’s scoring output ranks him among some of the best scorers in OHL history – but his game is far less flashy than many of his contemporaries. He’s instead an aggressive and cerebral forechecker who earned his points on the back of tireless pressure and smart positioning. Chernyshov didn’t shy away from contact after undergoing surgery either – and his muscular six-foot-three, 205-pound frame clearly stood out in the junior league. He seemed poised for immediate pro games after splitting last season between 34 games in the KHL and 22 games in the MHL. An OHL stint helped cushion him after an injury emerged, and Chernyshov took full advantage. He’ll enter North American pros with plenty of momentum behind him, and look to use his feisty style and cerebral scoring to support the San Jose Barracuda to a deep playoff run.
Kyle Dubas Named Team Canada GM For 2025 World Championship
Hockey Canada has announced that Pittsburgh Penguins general manager Kyle Dubas will fill their role of general manager for the upcoming World Championship. The tournament is set to take place from May 9th to May 25th in Sweden and Denmark. Dubas will be supported by former Anaheim Ducks captain Ryan Getzlaf and Team Canada’s senior vice president of hockey operations Scott Salmond.
The management team will be joined in their evaluation of NHL talent by a selection committee featuring four NHL executives and former players. They are Dennis Bonvie (Boston Bruins Director of Professional Scouting), Gregory Campbell (Florida Panthers assistant general manager), Andrew Cogliano (Colorado Avalanche special assistant), and Jason Spezza (Penguins assistant general manager). The management team and selection committee were selected by Doug Armstrong, executive director of Canada’s National Men’s team.
Much of the management team was also part of Team Canada’s gold medal win at the recent 4-Nations Face-Off tournament, the first in-season international competition featuring NHL talent since 2014. The winning Canadian squad was dominated by talent headed for the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Only Sidney Crosby, Travis Konecny, and Travis Sanheim will be available to return to the World Championship lineup when the 2024-25 season ends. Additional players could become eligible as teams are eliminated from the postseason. Crosby notably hasn’t taken part in a World Championship since 2015, when he scored 11 points in nine games while captaining Canada.
Dubas and his team will begin making decisions on their coaching staff and roster immediately, with a full announcement expected in the coming weeks. Canada kicks off the tournament with an early morning game against Team Slovenia on May 10th.