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2022 King Clancy Trophy Nominees Announced

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The NHL has announced the 31 nominees for the King Clancy Memorial Trophy, annually presented to “the player who best exemplifies leadership qualities on and off the ice and has made a noteworthy humanitarian contribution in his community.” Last year’s winner was Pekka Rinne of the Nashville Predators.

Each team submits one nominee. This year’s are:

Anaheim Ducks: Ryan Getzlaf

Arizona Coyotes: Andrew Ladd

Boston Bruins: Nick Foligno

Buffalo Sabres: Jeff Skinner

Calgary Flames: Mikael Backlund

Carolina Hurricanes: Jordan Staal

Chicago Blackhawks: Connor Murphy

Colorado Avalanche: Nazem Kadri

Columbus Blue Jackets: Jack Roslovic

Dallas Stars: Jason Robertson

Detroit Red Wings: Alex Nedeljkovic

Edmonton Oilers: Darnell Nurse

Florida Panthers: Aleksander Barkov

Los Angeles Kings: Cal Petersen

Minnesota Wild: Matt Dumba

Montreal Canadiens: Jake Allen

Nashville Predators: Luke Kunin

New Jersey Devils: P.K. Subban

New York Islanders: Anders Lee

New York Rangers: Chris Kreider

Ottawa Senators: Nick Holden

Philadelphia Flyers: Scott Laughton

Pittsburgh Penguins: Bryan Rust

San Jose Sharks: Matt Nieto

Seattle Kraken: Jaden Schwartz

St. Louis Blues: Ryan O’Reilly

Tampa Bay Lightning: Victor Hedman

Toronto Maple Leafs: Wayne Simmonds

Vancouver Canucks: Bo Horvat

Vegas Golden Knights: Max Pacioretty

Washington Capitals: Garnet Hathaway

Winnipeg Jets: Josh Morrissey

Injury Notes: Nurse, Raanta, Blackhawks

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The Edmonton Oilers are still hoping that Darnell Nurse will be ready for game one of the playoffs, though that isn’t a guarantee. Jason Gregor of TSN tweets that Nurse will not play this week and the team won’t know until Friday if he’s going to be able to suit up to start their first-round series.

It is very likely that the Oilers will take on the Los Angeles Kings in the first round, and having their 25-minute-a-night defensive leader in the lineup would certainly be a positive. Edmonton has won just one playoff series since 2006, and certainly isn’t a heavy favorite at this point despite their strong second half. The team sits just two points ahead of Los Angeles, meaning home-ice advantage is still up for grabs this week as they take on the Pittsburgh Penguins (tomorrow), San Jose Sharks (Thursday, and Vancouver Canucks (Friday). If he isn’t playing again in the regular season, Nurse finishes with 35 points in 71 games.

  • Good news for the Carolina Hurricanes, who are crossing their fingers hoping for some health in goal as the playoffs arrive. Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet tweets that Antti Raanta, who was pulled from last night’s game, should be ready to go tomorrow. It was apparently a “cramping issue” that Raanta was dealing with when the team was forced to put Pyotr Kochetkov into the net. With no clear timeline at this point for Frederik Andersen, Raanta is obviously of huge importance to the Hurricanes at the moment.
  • Though they were on the ice today (in non-contact jerseys), Kirby Dach and Connor Murphy are not expected to play again for the Chicago Blackhawks this season, according to Charlie Roumeliotis of NBCS Chicago. It’s a predictable end to a terribly disappointing season for Dach especially, who registered just nine goals and 26 points in 70 games. The third-overall pick from 2019 has scored just 19 times in his 152 regular season games so far.

Blackhawks Place Connor Murphy On LTIR And Tyler Johnson On IR

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It has been a busy day for Chicago.  After shipping Brandon Hagel along with a pair of fourth-round picks to Tampa Bay for two future top-ten protected first-rounders plus wingers Boris Katchouk and Taylor Raddysh, the team announced that they’ve placed defenseman Connor Murphy on long-term injured reserve and center Tyler Johnson on injured reserve.

Murphy was stretchered off the ice on Saturday after taking a hit from Ottawa’s Parker Kelly and it’s no surprise that the placement has been back-dated to Saturday.  He’ll have to miss at least 10 games and 24 days from there which means he wouldn’t be able to return until April 7th at the earliest.  With it being a concussion and the fact that the Blackhawks are well out of playoff contention, it’s possible that they simply shut him down for the rest of the season.

Doing so would effectively allow Chicago to add all of Murphy’s $3.85MM AAV to their LTIR pool and give them that much extra room to work with by Monday’s trade deadline.  With several buyers having limited cap space, a bit more flexibility for the Blackhawks to work with could certainly be useful for GM Kyle Davidson.

As for Johnson, his placement is also retroactive to March 12th and with him just being on regular IR, he’s technically eligible to return as soon as Sunday against Winnipeg.  However, that won’t be the case.  Charlie Roumeliotis of NBC Sports Chicago notes that Johnson only resumed skating on Thursday and while interim coach Derek King noted that the veteran will need to go through the various stages of concussion protocol, he should be able to return sooner than later.

Connor Murphy Stretchered Off Ice With Apparent Upper Body Injury

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7:05 pm: The Athletic’s Mark Lazerus reports that Murphy will not return to the game, however he remains at the arena under the supervision of the team’s medical staff.

6:43 pm: Chicago Blackhawks’ defenseman Connor Murphy was taken off the ice by stretcher after a collision into the boards early in the first period of Chicago’s game against the Ottawa Senators Saturday night. The incident happened after Ottawa’s Parker Kelly landed a hit on Murphy that sent Murphy face-first into the boards. Kelly was assessed a five-minute major penalty for boarding Murphy.

After being down on the ice for several minutes, Murphy appeared to move his extremities and was then taken off the ice on a stretcher, giving a thumbs up. What makes the situation all the more concerning is that Murphy also missed time in December of this season with a concussion, having now apparently hit his head on the boards.

The 28-year-old Murphy has been a mainstay on Chicago’s blue line for the past five seasons, seeing his time-on-ice climb steadily for the Blackhawks as they have navigated a rebuild. It remains unclear the extent of Murphy’s injury or any timetable, however at this time, Murphy’s overall health is the primary concern.

Injury Updates: Kuemper, Byram, Boqvist, Murphy

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It appears as if Colorado’s goaltending situation will be tenuous for a little while.  Following last night’s victory in Montreal, Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar told reporters including Mike Chambers of the Denver Post that starting netminder Darcy Kuemper could be out for two days or two months, meaning that there’s no timeline for his return.  Kuemper is believed to have suffered his upper-body injury at Wednesday’s morning skate after taking a high shot which, coupled with Bednar’s comment, suggests that the veteran may be dealing with a concussion.  With Pavel Francouz only beginning his LTI conditioning loan on Wednesday, it will be Jonas Johansson’s crease for the time being.

Other injury news from around the league:

  • Still with the Avalanche, Chambers notes in a separate column that defenseman Bowen Byram’s injury isn’t a concussion but that it does pertain to the head injury he just came back from. That return only lasted two games and it wouldn’t be surprising of Colorado errs on the side of caution when it comes to determining when he returns.  When healthy, the 20-year-old has impressed with nine points in 13 games while averaging nearly 20 minutes a night on the back end.
  • The Devils announced (Twitter link) that they’ve activated center Jesper Boqvist from injured reserve. The 23-year-old has missed the last couple of weeks due to an upper-body injury and has split his season between New Jersey and their AHL affiliate in Utica.  With the Devils, he has one assist in five games but has eight points in seven minor league contests.  New Jersey had an open roster spot so no one needed to be sent down to make room for Boqvist on the active roster.
  • The Blackhawks have placed defenseman Connor Murphy in concussion protocol, relays Phil Thompson of the Chicago Tribune. There is no timetable for his return.  The veteran is second to Seth Jones in ATOI for Chicago’s defensemen at just under 22 minutes a night while leading the team in blocked shots with 48.

Chicago Blackhawks Extend Connor Murphy

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With just one year left on his current deal, Connor Murphy was set to become an unrestricted free agent next summer. No more, as the Chicago Blackhawks defenseman has inked a four-year extension that keeps him under contract through the 2025-26 season. The deal comes with a $4.4MM cap hit. Blackhawks GM Stan Bowman explained exactly why he did the deal now:

When we acquired Connor in the summer of 2017, we had visions of him growing as both a player and leader in our organization for many years. He has transformed into a defenseman capable of matching up with the opponent’s best players and someone we trust to help us preserve a lead in the final minutes. Connor’s voice carries weight in our locker room as a veteran presence and we’re thrilled that his development and leadership will continue as a Blackhawk.

Murphy, 28, has come so far since arriving in Chicago that a $4.4MM cap hit now appears to be a bit of a discount for the Blackhawks. The former Arizona Coyotes defenseman was acquired in a deal for Niklas Hjalmarsson and was already making $3.85MM per season. That small raise is a win for Chicago given how much responsibility Murphy has taken on over the last couple of years, including averaging more than 22 minutes a game in 2020-21. He led the team in both even-strength and shorthanded ice time, being matched against the opponent’s best every night.

A four-year extension buys out his age 29-32 seasons, meaning there likely isn’t a steep decline during the contracted years, though any long-term deal does come with some obvious risk. Murphy has never been a very effective offensive player and has a career-high of just 19 points, meaning his entire value comes from his defensive ability. If that falters at all, the Blackhawks would be paying a healthy contract to a player with little impact on the game.

It seems obvious that the Chicago management team wasn’t completely sold on some of the young players that have come through the system in recent years. Henri Jokiharju and Adam Boqvist have both been traded, while this summer they brought in veterans like Seth Jones and Jake McCabe on long-term deals. Murphy will be expected to be the third member of that core group of defenseman as they look to get back into playoff contention. Those three-Murphy, Jones and McCabe–will now carry a combined cap hit of $17.9MM in each of the three seasons after this one.

2021 King Clancy Trophy Nominees Announced

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The NHL has announced the 31 nominees for the King Clancy Memorial Trophy, annually presented to “the player who best exemplifies leadership qualities on and off the ice and has made a noteworthy humanitarian contribution in his community.” Last year’s winner was Matt Dumba of the Minnesota Wild.

Each team submits one nominee. This year’s are:

Anaheim: Cam Fowler

Arizona: Oliver Ekman-Larsson

Boston: Charlie Coyle

Buffalo: Jack Eichel

Calgary: Mikael Backlund

Carolina: Jordan Staal

Chicago: Connor Murphy

Colorado: Pierre-Edouard Bellemare

Columbus: Cam Atkinson

Dallas: Esa Lindell

Detroit: Dylan Larkin

Edmonton: Kyle Turris

Florida: Sergei Bobrovsky

Los Angeles: Trevor Moore

Minnesota: Mats Zuccarello

Montreal: Jonathan Drouin

Nashville: Pekka Rinne

New Jersey: P.K. Subban

NY Islanders: Anders Lee

NY Rangers: Chris Kreider

Ottawa: Thomas Chabot

Philadelphia: Scott Laughton

Pittsburgh: Sidney Crosby

San Jose: Kurtis Gabriel

St. Louis: Ryan O’Reilly

Tampa Bay: Alex Killorn

Toronto: John Tavares

Vancouver: Tyler Motte

Vegas: Marc-Andre Fleury

Washington: Garnet Hathaway

Winnipeg: Blake Wheeler

Latest On Nikita Zadorov, Chicago Blackhawks

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The Chicago Blackhawks were reportedly listening to offers for defenseman Nikita Zadorov at the NHL Trade Deadline, but ultimately decided not to move him. However, that doesn’t mean that the two sides will stay together for much longer. As Ben Pope writes for the Chicago Sun-Times, the Blackhawks have dropped some hints that they are not content with the big blue liner and time is running out for him to prove himself.

Zadorov, 25, is in his first season in Chicago after coming over from the Colorado Avalanche in the Brandon Saad trade this past off-season. The Blackhawks hoped that Zadorov would step into a lineup that was missing many difference-makers on the back end and would transform into a bona fide top pair defenseman. While Zadorov has still been impressive as a physical force and solid defender, there has not been much else to praise about Zadorov’s game this season. He has been firmly entrenched as a second-pair defender in terms of time on ice, is fifth in defensive scoring and even lower in per-game production, and is on pace for a career-high in giveaways, even in a shortened season. Zadorov has merely continued to play the same role in Chicago as he did in Colorado, that of a complementary stay-at-home defenseman. While that is not without value, it isn’t what was expected of the 2013 first-round pick and may not be worth the cost to the Blackhawks. The team has not-so-subtly expressed their frustration recently, acquiring a younger and similar style of defender in Riley Stillman and then making Zadorov a healthy scratch on deadline day after discussing him with other teams beforehand.

This off-season, Zadorov presents a number of challenges to Chicago. The impending restricted free agent will need a new contract, which at a minimum will require a $3.2MM qualifying offer. However, despite his underwhelming effort this season, Zadorov can probably argue for making more than that and has the option to file for arbitration to support that claim. The problem for the Blackhawks is that they have very few contracts coming off the books this off-season and are projected to have limited cap flexibility to make other moves. Retaining Zadorov at a higher number even further reduces that cap space without making a material change to their roster, which is only a fringe playoff team this season. A potential arbitration case makes using their cap space even more problematic. If the relatively young blue liner demands a long-term deal as well, that becomes an issue with a number of young players already pushing for play time. Beyond the actual contract, the only way that Chicago can ensure that they even retain Zadorov’s RFA rights beyond July 21 is to protect him in the upcoming NHL Expansion Draft. With Duncan Keith and Connor Murphy as virtual locks to be protecting, adding Zadorov to that group would mean exposing valuable veteran Calvin de Haan and the recently-acquired Stillman. Yet, if they don’t protect Zadorov he could very easily be selected and lost for nothing.

In order to avoid a difficult expansion decision and possible contract battle and arbitration case, the Blackhawks may decide to re-ignite trade talks for Zadorov once their season has come to an end. Until then, Pope notes that Zadorov will be given every chance to prove that he is worthy of a longer look in Chicago. With de Haan and Adam Boqvist currently injured and the Blackhawks fighting for a playoff spot, Zadorov has the chance to step up and finally show that he can be a complete top-four defenseman. If he succeeds, perhaps all of the off-season issues fall by the wayside in favor of keeping a rare physical specimen and good young defender at all costs. However, if he falters then the partnership between the Blackhawks and Zadorov could be coming to an end sooner rather than later.

Injury Notes: Chicago, Colorado, Raymond

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The Chicago Blackhawks issued a few injury updates today, including that Dylan Strome has been put in the concussion protocol. Strome, who has essentially been working as Chicago’s top center this season, is a huge loss for a team that is still very much in the thick of a playoff race. The Blackhawks are sitting third in the Central Division, though have already played 19 games—Tampa Bay and Dallas, two teams chasing them, have only had 15 and 12 respectively.

Lucas Carlsson will also miss some time and has been placed on injured reserve. The defenseman is dealing with a strained groin and is expected to miss 10-14 days. It’s not all bad news though. Connor Murphy, who hasn’t played since February 7 while dealing with a hip injury, has been activated from injured reserve. Murphy is averaging a career-high 22:45 through 13 games this season.

  • Dennis Gilbert may not be a Blackhawks defenseman anymore, but he’s getting injured like one. The Colorado Avalanche blueliner will be out four to six weeks after undergoing facial surgery according to Peter Baugh of The Athletic. The injury was presumably suffered in a fight with Keegan Kolesar last week, which resulted in Gilbert’s exit after fewer than two minutes of ice time. Erik Johnson and Pavel Francouz meanwhile are both still out long-term, according to head coach Jared Bednar.
  • Detroit Red Wings top prospect Lucas Raymond suffered an elbow injury while playing in Sweden and according to Ted Kulfan of the Detroit News, will have surgery that is expected to keep him out eight weeks. There is no long-term concern for Raymond, the fourth-overall pick from the 2020 draft. The young winger had 18 points in 34 games for Frolunda this season and still needs to sign his entry-level contract with the Red Wings.

Snapshots: Tatar, Dumba, Devils, Murphy, Hamonic

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The Montreal Canadiens will be without Tomas Tatar Saturday against the Toronto Maple Leafs, who is a healthy scratch, according to Sportsnet’s Eric Engels. The move made by head coach Claude Julien is believed to be a message sent to both Tatar and the team after Montreal has lost three of their last four games.

Tatar, despite having four goals and eight points in 14 games, has been adequate on the ice, but not as good as last season when he posted 22 goals and 61 points in 68 games. Engels believes that the message is meant just as much to the team as Tatar is one of the most popular players in the locker room.

The Philadelphia Flyers attempted a similar benching of leading scorer Travis Konecny on Jan. 30. Unfortunately, he has not scored a point since then.

  • Corey Masisak of The Athletic reports that a New Jersey Devils team spokesman said the team will be allowed to return to practice on Monday. That will be the first time the team has been allowed on the ice since the game at Buffalo on Jan. 31. The team is currently scheduled to play on Tuesday at the New York Rangers.
  • The Minnesota Wild got even more good news when they learned that defenseman Matt Dumba should be in the lineup on Tuesday when they begin playing once again after suffering what looked to be a severe ankle injury, according to Star Tribune’s Sarah McLellan. Dumba got tangled up with teammate Jordan Greenway and suffered an awkward fall on Jan. 30, but the blueliner said that he’s feeling good and has no issues regarding the injury. The 26-year-old Dumba is looking solid this season, already with three goals in just nine games this season. Teammate Mats Zuccarello is also getting closer to a return. The veteran forward practiced Friday in a non-contact jersey.
  • The Chicago Blackhawks have placed defenseman Connor Murphy on injured reserve, retroactive to Feb. 9, according to NHL.com’s Brandon Cain. The blueliner was suffered a right hip injury in that game and is expected to miss up to two weeks. Murphy has been playing well for Chicago with two goals and five points in 13 games, while averaging 22:45 of ATOI.
  • The Vancouver Canucks could be getting a boost back to their defense as head coach Travis Green reported that defenseman Travis Hamonic is close to returning to the team. The 30-year-old blueliner remains on long-term injured reserve with an upper-body injury. He has only appeared in five games with the Canucks this year with two assists, but could be a big addition if he returns soon.

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