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Tampa Bay Lightning Sign Emil Martinsen Lilleberg

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The coffee must be good in Tampa Bay today, as Lightning general manager Julien BriseBois has announced his third signing of the day. Per the team, the Lightning have signed Norwegian defenseman Emil Martinsen Lilleberg to a two-year, two-way contract.

Lilleberg was part of the Arizona Coyotes organization until four days ago, when the team let his exclusive draft rights expire by not signing him to an entry-level contract. Arizona drafted Lilleberg with the 107th overall pick in the 2021 NHL Draft.

The 22-year-old left-shot defender was drafted out of Norway’s top league, a rarity among an already rare class of Norwegian nationals. Since his draft year, though, he’s made the move to the more competitive SHL, playing the last two seasons with IK Oskarshamn.

Lilleberg recently committed to SHL club Växjö Lakers HC for the 2023-24 season, so it remains to be seen whether Tampa Bay will loan him there for the first year of his contract. While he may still have some upside, he won’t be ready to see NHL ice in any event next year.

He’s represented Norway at the highest possible level of international competition for six straight years, including three World Championships, two U20 World Juniors, and two U18 World Juniors. Last year with Oskarshamn, Lilleberg recorded three goals and 11 points in 46 games, along with a -4 rating.

If he does come to North America next year, he’ll be headed to the AHL’s Syracuse Crunch.

Columbus Blue Jackets Sign Jake Christiansen To Extension

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A busy day on the NHL signing wire continues, as the Columbus Blue Jackets have signed defenseman Jake Christiansen to a one-year, two-way contract extension. Columbus didn’t disclose the details of the deal.

Christiansen has amassed 32 games of NHL experience over the past two seasons, proving himself to be a callup option when injuries strike. The 23-year-old is still developing and will fight for NHL time with Columbus’ growing group of young defenders.

24 of those 32 appearances came last season as injuries decimated the team. He recorded four assists in those outings, strictly playing depth minutes.

With healthy seasons from Nick Blankenburg, Jake Bean, and Adam Boqvist next year, though, it seems unlikely Christiansen will build much on his NHL experience to date. The undrafted free agent signing has shown significant offensive upside in the minors, but he simply doesn’t have the NHL ceiling of other players in the Columbus system.

If he does make it to the NHL full-time someday, it would likely be as a bottom-pairing player with power-play time. He has an accurate finish from the back end and is smart with breakout passes, but he doesn’t have much to write home about in his defensive game.

Christiansen is entering his fourth campaign with the Blue Jackets organization after five seasons spent with the WHL’s Everett Silvertips.

Arizona Coyotes Sign Patrik Koch

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The Arizona Coyotes announced today the team has signed defenseman Patrik Koch to a one-year entry-level contract. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

Koch, 26, brings a wealth of international professional experience to the Coyotes organization. In 2022-23 with HC Vítkovice in the Czech Extraliga, the Slovak defender recorded three goals and nine assists for 12 points in 46 regular season games. In the playoffs, Koch contributed two goals and two assists in 16 games while amassing 17 penalty minutes.

A physical, shutdown defenseman, Koch provided some unexpected offense for Slovakia at the 2023 Men’s World Championship. Koch notched a goal and three assists in seven games, leading all Slovak defensemen in scoring.

Coyotes general manager Bill Armstrong had this to say about the signing:

We are very pleased to have Patrik join our organization. He is a competitive, defensive defenseman with good puck moving capability and was an integral contributor to the Slovak National Team’s defense for many years. We look forward to seeing him in training camp.

Standing at 6-foot-1 and weighing 190 pounds, Koch spent the last three seasons with Vítkovice, accumulating six goals and 17 assists for 23 points in 156 career Extraliga regular-season games. Koch also played eight games with HC Kometa Brno between 2015 and 2017, where he was briefly teammates with Coyotes goaltender Karel Vejmelka.

The Coyotes have been active in terms of bringing over European free agents in recent seasons, but most of them ended up playing marginal NHL roles at best. Koch is likely destined for AHL Tucson to start the season and will need to work his way up the depth chart to make his NHL debut.

Anaheim Ducks Name Greg Cronin Head Coach

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The Anaheim Ducks have named veteran assistant Greg Cronin the team’s 11th head coach in franchise history, as announced Monday morning. At age 60, this is Cronin’s first role as an NHL head coach.

Cronin has held head coaching roles at the NCAA and AHL levels, including the past five seasons with the Colorado Eagles. With the hiring, the Colorado Avalanche are now in the market for an AHL head coach.

His previous NHL experience came with the New York Islanders and Toronto Maple Leafs. Cronin’s first NHL work came with the Isles in 1998, hired as an assistant coach before being named the team’s director of player development (as well as head coach of the AHL’s Bridgeport Sound Tigers) in 2003. After the 2004-05 lockout, though, Cronin returned to the college ranks as the head coach of Northeastern University, a title he held six seasons. He won the Hockey East Coach of the Year award in 2008-09.

In 2011, Cronin returned to NHL coaching by taking an assistant job with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Three seasons later, he returned to the Islanders for a four-year stint on their bench before heading to the Eagles in 2018.

He replaces the outgoing Dallas Eakins, who the Ducks decided not to retain with his contract expiring this offseason. Eakins’ fourth season behind the Ducks bench ended in last place, with Anaheim allowing the most goals against per game of any team in the past 25 years.

Cronin’s hire is thinly veiled as a targeted approach to address their defense. While he could be described as a firebrand personality, he’s regarded as one of the more detail-oriented coaches at the minor league level and should focus on developing the all-around games of Anaheim’s young talent.

Anaheim general manager Pat Verbeek alluded to that in a statement:

While we did cast a wide net in searching for the next head coach, it became clear to me that Greg would be the ideal fit for the position. Being a young team, I felt we needed a teacher of the finer points of the game, and someone who has worked extensively over time with talented young players, helping them develop into successful NHL players. Greg has done all that and more, and we are excited to name him head coach of the Anaheim Ducks.

Cronin hasn’t had much to work with in terms of prospects during his time with the Eagles, so it’s unfair to judge him on his development of young players into NHL talents at the pro level. However, that’s the task he’ll have to take on as the Ducks look to gain some forward momentum in their rebuild.

Tampa Bay Lightning Sign Wallteri Merelä

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The Tampa Bay Lightning have signed forward Waltteri Merelä to a one-year, two-way contract, the team said Monday. It’s the team’s first undrafted free agent signing of the offseason.

Merelä, 24, spent 2022-23 with Liiga club Tappara, recording 15 goals and 33 points in 41 games while capturing his second consecutive Liiga championship. The right-winger was under contract with Tappara for 2023-24 but will now head stateside.

Merelä is quite the late bloomer, not even getting a look in Finland’s U20 league during his draft year, 2015-16. He’s pushed his development into overdrive since, however, and has showcased himself as one of the top U25 forwards in the Liiga.

He briefly appeared for Finland at this year’s Men’s World Championship, scoring a goal in one appearance, a 7-1 win against Hungary.

Merelä does have a decent chance to crack Tampa’s opening night roster, with some holes bound to be created in their forward corps by free-agent departures. Alex Killorn, Corey Perry, and Pierre-Édouard Bellemare are all pending unrestricted free agents and could either retire or price themselves out of a return.

He has proper size at 6-foot-2 and 196 pounds, and he does have a fair amount of physicality to his game. At first glance, he appears well-suited for a bottom-six role in head coach Jon Cooper’s system.

Tampa Bay Lightning Re-Sign Sean Day

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The Tampa Bay Lightning re-signed defenseman Sean Day to a one-year, two-way contract Monday, the team announced today.

Financial terms were not disclosed. The 25-year-old defender recorded 14 points in 63 games with the AHL’s Syracuse Crunch last season.

Day, who was granted exceptional status to enter the OHL as a 15-year-old, struggled for years to find his professional footing. The stability finally came in the Lightning organization, where Day posted back-to-back strong campaigns for the Crunch in 2020-21 and 2021-22, even earning a two-game NHL call-up in the latter season.

Things dried up for the 2016 third-round pick in 2022-23, however. Day went the entire campaign without scoring a goal and slipped down the Lightning organizational depth chart considerably, appearing in just one Calder Cup Playoffs game for Syracuse.

The one-year deal guarantees Day a spot in North American professional hockey for another season, but he’ll need to regain his 2021 form to earn him another NHL contract next summer.

A two-way defender by trade, Day was never able to put a complete game together after entering the OHL a season early. A rushed, high-intensity development process prohibited Day from taking the time he needed to grow his consistency and decision-making, dropping him from a highly-touted youngster to a middling prospect, even by the time he was drafted into the NHL seven years ago.

Without much organizational depth at the position, Day has more runway in Syracuse/Tampa Bay than most players in his situation to regain his confidence.

Montreal Canadiens Extend Cole Caufield

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The Montreal Canadiens have agreed to terms on an eight-year contract extension for star winger Cole Caufield through the 2030-31 campaign, the team announced Monday morning. The deal will carry a $7.85MM cap hit.

Per CapFriendly, Caufield has a modified no-trade list in the final three seasons of his contract, which is all he’s eligible for, given his unrestricted free-agent eligibility. The full breakdown of the contract is as follows:

2023-24: $4.975MM base, $5MM signing bonus
2024-25: $4.975MM base, $5.5MM signing bonus
2025-26: $9.975MM base
2026-27: $8.705MM base
2027-28: $6.215MM base
2028-29: $5.985MM base, 15-team no-trade list
2029-30: $5.985MM base, 10-team no-trade list
2030-31: $5.985MM base, five-team no-trade list

Not only does this wrap up Montreal’s highest offseason priority, but it also marks a generation-defining signing for this Canadiens core. Caufield, arguably on a discount deal, immediately becomes the second-highest-paid healthy Canadien behind captain Nick Suzuki, who earns $7.875MM per season through 2030.

While he has just over 120 NHL games of experience under his belt, the 22-year-old has been among the better goal-scorers in the league in limited samples. His 53 goals are second among 2019 NHL Draft picks, trailing only New Jersey Devils star Jack Hughes.

A season-ending shoulder injury in 2022-23 may have cost him a few thousand dollars on this deal. However, reports suggested the Canadiens are committed to keeping a strict salary hierarchy with Suzuki at the top. He tied for the team lead in goals despite playing in just 46 games, and his 26 goals in that time put him on pace for 46 in an entire 82-game season. That would have tied him for seventh in the league (and second among US-born players) with Dallas Stars phenom Jason Robertson.

The Wisconsinite may be one of the slightest wingers in the league at just 5-foot-7, but that hasn’t stopped his all-world release from translating to the NHL level, even with little help around him. While Suzuki provides a formidable linemate, Montreal’s offense ranked in the league’s bottom 10 this year and boasted just seven double-digit goal-scorers.

In terms of the percentage of the salary cap ceiling at signing, Caufield’s max-term extension is nearly identical to the eight-year deal signed by Carolina Hurricanes winger Andrei Svechnikov before the 2021-22 campaign. Svechnikov, however, had already eclipsed 200 NHL appearances before signing his extension.

Neither the Canadiens nor Caufield released a statement upon the initial announcement of the signing.

For other NHL teams, Caufield’s extension takes 2023’s top offer sheet candidate off the market. The last two offer sheet transactions in NHL history, Sebastian Aho (2019) and Jesperi Kotkaniemi (2021), involved the Canadiens.

For Montreal, the value of Caufield’s cap hit gets them more than just a star goal-scorer for eight more seasons. It also gets them extremely valuable cost certainty as the cap ceiling is bound to rise in the coming seasons, allowing them to more comfortably afford any RFA or UFA signings as the team aims to return to championship contention over the next five years or so.

Behind Caufield and Suzuki, the two Habs under contract the longest are veterans Brendan Gallagher and Josh Anderson, both signed through 2027.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Minor Transactions: 6/5/23

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The 2022-23 NHL season is drawing ever closer to a dramatic close. The Vegas Golden Knights can move one step closer to hockey’s ultimate prize with a win tonight, avoiding a similar fate to the 2018 Stanley Cup Final when they were swept in Games 2 through 5 by the Washington Capitals. The Florida Panthers, meanwhile, will need to play a tighter and more disciplined road game to avoid falling into a 2-0 hole in the series.

On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, there still remains quite a lot of movement in the free agency and transfer markets. As always, we’ll list today’s notable moves right here.

  • Liiga club HIFK made significant strides today to build a championship-caliber roster for 2023-24, inking six players to commitments between one and two seasons. The most notable among them is 17-year-old defender Aron Kiviharju, who’s expected to be among the first five names called in the 2024 NHL Draft. The left-shot, 5-foot-10 rearguard had spent his development up until this point with TPS, where he made his Liiga debut last season, recording three assists in 21 games. Kiviharju also recorded 20 points in 22 U20 league games and notched seven assists in five games at the 2023 U18 World Juniors. His contract was through the 2024-25 campaign, but he could potentially be in the NHL for the second season of that deal.
  • HIFK’s big signing up front was former St. Louis Blues and Philadelphia Flyers center Jori Lehterä. Lehterä is still going strong overseas at age 35, finishing second in Liiga scoring last season with Tappara after posting 57 points in 57 games. He was instrumental in Tappara’s second straight championship, and he also helped guide the team to a Champions Hockey League title. Lehterä, who last played in the NHL with the Flyers in 2018-19, was sentenced to four months of probation in Finland in 2019 for obtaining and possessing cocaine.
  • HIFK is also bringing former NHL defender Sami Lepistö into the fold at age 38. It will be quite the gap between appearances in Finland’s top league for Lepistö, who last suited up in the SM-liiga (as it was then called) for Helsinki club Jokerit in 2006-07. After a five-season NHL career between 2007 and 2012 which saw him play for Washington, Phoenix, Columbus, and Chicago, Lepistö did spend four seasons with Jokerit once again between 2017 and 2021, but the team was then playing in the KHL. The 2004 Capitals draft pick recorded five goals and 20 points in 52 games last season for the NL’s SCL Tigers.
  • Boston-born forward Greg Mauldin is one of the last remaining active forwards from the 2002 NHL Draft despite not having played in the NHL since 2010-11 with the Colorado Avalanche. In recent years, the 40-year-old has found a home for himself in Norway’s top league, where he’ll extend his stay for another season with the Stavanger Oilers. In the past two seasons, Mauldin’s recorded 16 points in 30 combined playoff games to help Stavanger to back-to-back league championships. In 2021-22, Mauldin did briefly attempt a North American comeback with the ECHL’s Kalamazoo Wings, where he played just five games.

This page will be updated throughout the day

Five Key Stories: 5/29/23 – 6/4/23

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As expected, the turn of the calendar has resulted in an uptick of activity around the NHL, the bulk of it coming away from the ice, including an early extension for Seattle GM Ron Francis and surgery for pending UFA Patrick Kane.  We recap the most notable news in our key stories.

Treliving To Toronto: After parting ways with Kyle Dubas a couple of weeks ago, the Maple Leafs have found their new GM, hiring Brad Treliving for the role.  The 53-year-old had been in the same role with Calgary for the last nine seasons before stepping aside at the end of the regular season.  Treliving is no stranger to roster shakeups after making several changes of note for the Flames last year and will be tasked with determining if a core move needs to be made plus the future of head coach Sheldon Keefe.  While Treliving is in charge now, it’s worth noting that he will not be permitted to be at the draft table later this month, a stipulation they agreed to before receiving permission to interview Treliving, whose deal with Calgary ran until the end of June.

Dubas To Pittsburgh: It didn’t take long for Dubas to find his next team as he has joined Pittsburgh as their President Of Hockey Operations.  The term of the deal wasn’t officially released but Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reports (video link) that it’s a seven-year agreement.  Dubas had been GM in Toronto for the past five seasons, building a team that has been quite strong during the regular season but has struggled in the playoffs with just a single series victory.  He’ll be asked to try to get the Penguins’ core back in the playoff picture after the team came up just short this season, resulting in the departures of Ron Hextall and Brian Burke.  Dubas will hold GM duties as well for the time being but is expected to hire one later this summer.

Changes In Nashville: After a long review and search of the coaching options available, incoming Predators GM Barry Trotz opted to make a change behind the bench, firing John Hynes while hiring Andrew Brunette as their next head coach.  Hynes spent a little over three seasons with the Preds, compiling a 134-95-18 record during the regular season but the team won just three of 14 playoff contests.  The 48-year-old has just over 600 games under his belt including his time in New Jersey and if he doesn’t land a job this summer, his name will likely come up in midseason openings.  As for Brunette, this will be his second time running an NHL bench after he coached Florida for the bulk of the 2021-22 campaign.  Brunette was passed over for the full-time spot with the Panthers that summer, sending him to New Jersey as an associate coach.  Trotz indicated that he’s hoping that Brunette can bring more of an offensive focus to the team, a stark contrast to his own philosophies when he was behind the bench.

More Coaching Moves: The Capitals were actually the first team to bring in their new bench boss, bringing in Spencer Carbery on a four-year contract.  It’s the second stint with Washington for the 41-year-old who was the head coach for their AHL affiliate in Hershey for three years before leaving to serve as an assistant with Toronto for the last two seasons.  He is the fourth first-time hire out of Washington’s last six head coaches.  Meanwhile, the Blue Jackets appear to have their next coach as veteran Mike Babcock is set to return behind an NHL bench for the first time since 2019-20.  The 60-year-old has a 700-418-183 record over parts of 17 seasons and will be tasked with turning around a Columbus franchise that improved on paper last summer but dropped to the bottom of the Eastern Conference.  The hire is expected to be made official next month once his contract with Toronto expires.

Gibson Hoping For A Trade: The goaltending market this summer just got a bit more interesting following a report that Ducks netminder John Gibson indicated to the team last month that he’d like a change of scenery.  The 29-year-old was one of the top goalies in the league a few years ago but as Anaheim has struggled, so has he as he posted a 3.99 GAA with a .899 SV% this season while leading the league in goals allowed and losses.  However, on a more competitive win-now franchise, there’s reason to hope that he could turn things around.  Gibson has four years left on his contract at a $6.4MM cap charge so the Ducks may have to retain salary or take a contract back to help facilitate a move.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Offseason Checklist: Tampa Bay Lightning

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The offseason has arrived for all but the two teams that still have a shot at winning the Stanley Cup.  It’s time to examine what those eliminated squads will need to accomplish over the coming months.  Next up is a look at Tampa Bay.

After three straight Stanley Cup Final appearances, the Lightning weren’t able to make it four straight this season.  Instead, the third seed in the Atlantic Division fell in six to Toronto.  GM Julien BriseBois is all in on trying to keep as much of this core as possible so accordingly, their checklist this summer revolves around that desire.

Sign A Backup Goalie

Let’s start with a relatively simple one for Tampa Bay to hit on.  Brian Elliott has been the backup for the Lightning for the last two seasons.  The first one went well – better than expected, even – but 2022-23 was nowhere near that level.  His goals-against-average was up by nearly a full goal (2.43 to 3.40) while his save percentage dipped 21 points (.912 to .891).  He basically went from an above-average second-stringer to a below-average one.  Of course, the 38-year-old still provided some value for the team thanks to his $900K cap hit, just $150K below the league minimum.

With a little over $7MM in cap room per CapFriendly (which includes Brent Seabrook’s LTIR space), the cost of Andrei Vasilevskiy’s backup next season is almost as important as how they perform.  Is there a goalie on the open market that will be willing to take close to the minimum salary to play 20-25 games next season for the Lightning?  Probably.  Will that netminder be better than another season of Elliott?  That’s a decision that will need to be made once the free agent market opens up next month.

Try To Keep Killorn

Alex Killorn picked a pretty good time for a career year.  More specifically, another career year.  After setting new personal benchmarks in 2021-22 in assists (34) and points (59) as a 32-year-old, he went and did it again this season with 27 goals, 37 assists, and 64 points.  Impressively, he was able to do so despite seeing his ice time cut by nearly a minute and a half per game with a lot of that drop coming from the power play.  Heading into an opportunity to test the open market for the first time in his career, things went pretty well this year for Killorn.

His seven-year, $31.5MM started out on the pricey side relative to his point totals but has turned into a team-friendly deal the last couple of years.  Now, the 33-year-old will enter the market as the highest-scoring UFA, putting him in a spot to cash in with one last long-term agreement.

Tampa Bay would love for Killorn’s tenure to continue with them.  Making that happen, however, will certainly be challenging.  There’s no way they can afford to pay market value to bring the winger back as they need to spread that $7MM in cap room across at least five roster spots.  Even if the other four were at the minimum salary, the maximum they could offer Killorn would still represent a small cut from what he was making before.

Basically, their only hope to keep him around as things stand might be to work out a max-term contract or very close to it.  In exchange for being paid into his early 40s, Killorn would likely accept a price tag below what he made on his now-expiring contract and well below market value.  Frankly, even that feels like a stretch, not to mention the pressure points it would put on their other free agents (more on them momentarily).  Their other option to try to keep Killorn would be to move another player out to create some extra cap room.  Nick Paul ($3.15MM) is one candidate that stands out but he’s signed through 2028-29, a term that might be too long for most other teams to willingly take on.

It certainly doesn’t feel like Killorn will be back with the Lightning next season unless he’s willing to leave a lot of money on the table to stay with the only NHL organization he has ever been with since they drafted him back in 2007.  However, given his importance to the team, expect BriseBois to exhaust every possible way to try to make it happen over the next few weeks.

Deal With Pending RFAs

Now let’s get to those pending restricted free agents.  Tampa Bay has two of note to deal with this summer, wingers Tanner Jeannot and Ross Colton.  Notably, both players are arbitration-eligible and have one year of club control left before they can become unrestricted free agents as soon as 2024.  That option does give them some leverage in upcoming negotiations.

Jeannot was the Lightning’s key acquisition at the trade deadline when they parted with five draft picks over the next three seasons (one in each of the first five rounds of the draft) along with young defenseman Cal Foote to bring in the rugged winger.  In 2021-22, he had a breakout year with Nashville, notching 24 goals and 17 assists along with 130 penalty minutes and 318 hits, putting him in the top ten in Calder Trophy voting.

However, he wasn’t able to repeat the offensive production this season, notching just six goals with a dozen assists with 107 penalty minutes and 290 hits.  That said, considering how much they paid to get him, it stands to reason that BriseBois will be looking to sign Jeannot to a multi-year deal and make him a big part of their bottom six moving forward.  A contract like that will push past the $2MM mark at a minimum, likely closer to $3MM if it’s a long-term pact.

As for Colton, he has worked his way into a capable secondary scorer the last two seasons after scoring the Cup-clinching goal in 2021.  He had 16 goals and 16 assists this season, a year after putting up 22 tallies and 17 helpers.  Colton can play down the middle which also boosts his value.  Basically, his value has gone up to a point where it’s quite unlikely that they’ll be able to afford to keep him; a multi-year deal likely pushes the $3MM mark.

The good news for Tampa Bay is that Colton should have some value on the trade market.  Even with a lot of teams being tight to the cap, a capable middleman with a decent playoff track record is sure to generate some interest.  Draft picks and prospects would certainly help but it wouldn’t be shocking to see the Lightning try to acquire a controllable depth piece or two to help offset the potential losses of Corey Perry and Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, important role players that are set to hit the open market this summer.  Tampa has had to move quality pieces in recent years and there’s a good chance that Colton finds himself in that situation this summer.

Stamkos Extension Talks

Over the last couple of years, BriseBois has actively sought to sign players to extensions as soon as they become eligible.  Last summer, Mikhail Sergachev, Erik Cernak, and Anthony Cirelli all signed on July 1st.  The year before, it was Brayden Point getting his new deal in place on July 28th, the first day of the new league year.  With that in mind, it wouldn’t be surprising to see history repeat itself, this time with captain Steven Stamkos.

The 33-year-old hasn’t been able to get back to the 50-goal mark that he did in two of his first four seasons but he remains a consistent impact scorer.  A year after putting up a career-high 106 points, Stamkos took a small step back this season but still scored 34 goals along with 50 assists in 81 games to finish third on the team in scoring.  While it’s fair to believe that he will start slowing down at some point, he should have several more strong seasons in him before that point.

Given his age, Stamkos’ next contract should come in below his current $8.5MM AAV.  It’s possible that they look to do what they’ve tried to with Killorn by offering a longer-term agreement in exchange for a more favorable cap charge but if they opt for more of a medium-term contract, it should check in closer to the $7.5MM to $8MM range.  This is something that isn’t a rush for the Lightning – Stamkos’ last negotiation came much closer to the wire – but knowing the affinity BriseBois has for his core, expect him to take a run at getting this done early in the summer, possibly as soon as July 1st, the first day a new deal can be finalized.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

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