Avalanche Sign Jason Polin, Matthew Stienburg To One-Year Deals
In separate announcements, the Colorado Avalanche shared that they’ve signed forwards Jason Polin and Matthew Stienburg to one-year deals through the 2025-26 season. According to contract data provided by Puck Pedia, Polin will earn an NHL salary of $775K and $130K in the AHL. No contract details for Stienburg have been disclosed, but his salary will likely fall within a similar range.
Polin’s new deal comes with some surprise. The former Hobey Baker Award finalist hasn’t come close to the scoring output that he demonstrated with the NCAA’s Western Michigan University Broncos. Throughout his tenure with Colorado, the Holt, MI native has scored 15 goals and 30 points in 88 AHL contests, and only one goal in nine NHL appearances. Still, given the improbable number of injuries sustained by the Avalanche throughout the 2024-25 season, it makes sense that the team would like to retain most of their depth pieces in the system.
Like Polin, Stienburg signed with the organization out of college, though he had been previously drafted by the Avalanche in 2019, from Cornell University. Unlike Polin, Stienburg didn’t come to the organization with as much hype, given his career high of 13 goals and 29 points in 28 games with Cornell during his junior campaign in 2021-22.
Similarly to many of his peers, Stienburg earned a call-up with Colorado this past season, due to injuries to players on the NHL roster. Going scoreless in eight games, Stienburg’s only notable play was earning a two-game suspension for elbowing Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman Erik Černák.
Colorado’s Matthew Stienburg Suspended Two Games, Reassigned
The Colorado Avalanche are losing another player up front, although this time it won’t be for an injury. The NHL’s Department of Player Safety announced they have suspended Avalanche rookie forward Matthew Stienburg for two games for charging Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman Erik Černák in last night’s contest. Shortly after the suspension was issued, the Avalanche announced they had reassigned Stienburg to their AHL affiliate, the Colorado Eagles.
The news came roughly seven hours after the Department of Player Safety shared that Stienburg was scheduled for a hearing regarding the incident. The discipline served by the Department of Player Safety is in addition to the on-ice referees giving Stienburg a five-minute major penalty and a game misconduct.
In the video shared by the Department of Player Safety, the contributing factor to the suspension was that Stienburg turned his back on the hit and lifted himself off the ice causing the focal point of the hit to be Černák’s head. They also noted that Stienburg’s NHL experience of eight games played a part in the length of the suspension.
He’s been one of Colorado’s most physical players since being recalled from AHL Colorado on October 16th. He’s seventh on the team in hits with 16 despite only being 16th in games played with eight. Consequently, thanks to the illegal hit on Černák yesterday evening, he now sits first on the team in PIMs with 22. According to Evan Rawal of The Denver Gazette, Stienburg must wait to serve his suspension until he’s recalled back to the NHL.
The biggest implication of this suspension and subsequent demotion is that the Avalanche only have 10 healthy forwards and an upcoming game on Saturday against the Nashville Predators. Gabriel Landeskog, Artturi Lehkonen, Valeri Nichushkin, Ross Colton, and Jonathan Drouin are all on the shelf for one reason or another, and Colorado will now have to pull from their organizational depth even further with Stienburg being sent down.
Avalanche Recall Matthew Stienburg For NHL Debut
Avalanche center prospect Matthew Stienburg will make his NHL debut tonight against the Bruins after the team announced he’d been recalled from AHL Colorado. Forwards Ivan Ivan and Nikolai Kovalenko were also brought back up to give the Avs 12 healthy forwards for tonight’s game after being papered down earlier in the week. Veteran Chris Wagner, who was sent down along with Ivan and Kovalenko, remains in the AHL.
Colorado’s 23-man roster is full after the moves. They had 10 forwards on the active roster, but one of them, Jonathan Drouin, remains day-to-day with an upper-body injury and can be placed on IR if they need an additional roster spot.
Stienburg, 24, is expected to center Ivan and Joel Kiviranta to comprise Colorado’s fourth line in his NHL debut, filling in for the role that Wagner held in their 6-2 loss to the Islanders on Monday. The 2019 third-round pick is off to a strong start in the AHL with the Eagles, scoring a goal and adding an assist through his first two games of the season.
Drafted out of the Canadian high school circuit, Stienburg played his college hockey at Cornell from 2019 to 2023. There, the 6’1″ pivot had 20 goals and 46 points in 73 games and was named to the ECAC’s Second All-Star Team in 2021-22, when he broke out for 29 points in only 28 contests. Injuries and COVID slashed Stienburg’s availability throughout school, costing him his entire sophomore season and limiting him to seven points in 18 games during his senior year. He’s in the final year of his two-year entry-level contract that he signed in August 2023.
Last season was Stienburg’s first as a full-time professional. He made 54 appearances for the Eagles, but wasn’t a factor offensively with just five goals and eight assists for 13 points with 63 PIMs and a +2 rating. In an extremely small sample size this year, he looks more comfortable with the pro game and will now get at least a brief look to see how his game grades out against NHL competition.
Colorado Avalanche Sign Matt Stienburg
The Colorado Avalanche have signed forward Matt Stienburg to a two-year, entry-level contract, per a team post on X. Stienburg was a draft pick of the Avalanche but briefly became a free agent on August 15 when his exclusive signing rights expired.
The 22-year-old center prospect was a third-round draft pick in 2019, heading off the board to Colorado at 63rd overall. He just completed a four-year collegiate stint at Cornell, although his sophomore season was wiped out entirely due to COVID. At Cornell, Stienburg finished with 20 goals, 26 assists and 46 points in 73 games and a +21 rating.
Stienburg stands out as a center with good size at 6-foot-1 and 183 pounds, with some aggressiveness in his game, although he’ll need to work on his offensive consistency to play a middle-six role in the NHL. He ended last season in the AHL on a tryout with the Colorado Eagles, recording two assists in eight games combined across the regular season and playoffs.
The Avalanche did not release the financial terms of Stienburg’s contract. However, he will be a restricted free agent upon the deal’s expiration in 2025. Over the next two years, he’ll look to make enough of an impact in the minors to warrant receiving a qualifying offer from Colorado at that point.
Snapshots: Schneider, Bally Sports, Stienburg
Frank Seravalli of the Daily Faceoff is reporting that the National Hockey League Players’ Association (NHLPA) and Mathieu Schneider are parting ways after 12 years. Since his retirement after the 2009-10 NHL season, Schneider originally started as a Special Assistant in the NHLPA and had been working as the direct Special Assistant to the now-former head of the NHLPA, Don Fehr.
Seravalli also pointed out that the dismissal had been pushed by the new Executive Director of the NHLPA, Marty Walsh. Some of the most significant projects in the league that Schneider had been directly involved in, were changes to the ‘head-shot’ and boarding rules across the NHL, working directly with the league’s Senior Vice President at the time, Brendan Shanahan.
Even after his dismissal, it shouldn’t be difficult for Schneider to find employment elsewhere, either with an individual team, or the league itself. A veteran of 21 years in the NHL spanning from 1987-2010, Schneider spent time with Montreal Canadiens, Detroit Red Wings, Toronto Maple Leafs, Los Angeles Kings, New York Islanders, and New York Rangers, as well as four other teams for short spells.
Other snapshots:
- In an ongoing legal battle with Diamond Sports Group, the parent company to Bally Sports, the NHL is reportedly seeking emergency relief funds if negotiations are not settled quickly. Currently, 12 organizations have their media rights held by Bally Sports, and with a Texas judge extending DSG’s reorganization deadline to September 30th, the NHL is seeking a contract break well before that date. On March 14, 2023, DSG filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, holding responsibility for a reported $9B in debt, with the inability to pay.
- Seeing his exclusive draft rights expire only 48 hours ago, Peter Baugh of The Athletic is reporting that center Matt Stienburg and the Colorado Avalanche organization are still in contact about a possible contract. Stienburg was the team’s 63rd overall pick from the 2019 NHL Draft and had spent the last four seasons playing for the Cornell University of the NCAA, earning a four-game tryout with the Colorado Eagles at the conclusion of last year’s AHL season.
Update On This Year’s August 15 Free Agents
Most NHL free agent business is dealt with in the early summer months. There is one important date later each year, however. August 15 marks the date when NHL teams lose their exclusive signing rights to most college-drafted players if they’ve graduated (or completed without graduating) college and are not yet signed to an entry-level contract.
Earlier this month, we published a list of players slated to hit the UFA market yesterday if not signed to an ELC within the coming days. However, the guidelines the NHL uses to determine a college graduate are some of the most complex sets of rules relating to contractual obligations in pro sports. That means it’s often impossible to glean a full list of players whose rights have expired (or not expired) until after the August 15 deadline has passed.
This year was no different, as CapFriendly issued multiple updates today on their X account regarding the list of August 15 free agents they’d made public earlier in the month. Three players who were slated to expire actually remained on their team’s reserve list: Calgary Flames 2018 fourth-round pick F Demetrios Koumontzis, Ottawa Senators 2018 seventh-round pick F Jakov Novak, and Senators 2018 second-round pick D Jonny Tychonick.
On the flip side, 12 players they expected to remain on teams’ reserve lists hit the free-agent market yesterday. With that in mind, we have a revised, accurate list of players who became unrestricted free agents yesterday. Asterisked players were not originally expected to come off their team’s reserve list.
Anaheim Ducks
*F Trevor Janicke (2019 fifth round, 132nd overall)
Arizona Coyotes
F John Farinacci (2019 third round, 76th overall)
*F Anthony Romano (2019 sixth round, 176th overall)
Boston Bruins
*D Dustyn McFaul (2018 sixth round, 181st overall)
Calgary Flames
*F Joshua Nodler (2019 fifth round, 150th overall)
Carolina Hurricanes
F Kevin Wall (2019 sixth round, 181st overall)
Chicago Blackhawks
F Jake Wise (2018 third round, 69th overall)
Colorado Avalanche
*F Matt Stienburg (2019 third round, 63rd overall)
Columbus Blue Jackets
D Robbie Stucker (2017 seventh round, 210th overall)
Detroit Red Wings
F Robert Mastrosimone (2019 second round, 54th overall)
*F Ethan Phillips (2019 fourth round, 97th overall)
Edmonton Oilers
F Skyler Brind’Amour (2017 sixth round, 177th overall)
Minnesota Wild
*D Marshall Warren (2019 sixth round, 166th overall)
New Jersey Devils
*D Case McCarthy (2019 fourth round, 118th overall)
*F Patrick Moynihan (2019 sixth round, 158th overall)
New York Islanders
D Christian Krygier (2018 seventh round, 196th overall)
F Jacob Pivonka (2018 fourth round, 103rd overall)
New York Rangers
*F Eric Ciccolini (2019 seventh round, 205th overall)
*F Riley Hughes (2018 seventh round, 216th overall)
Ottawa Senators
*F Luke Loheit (2018 seventh round, 194th overall)
Philadelphia Flyers
F Jay O’Brien (2018 first round, 19th overall)
San Jose Sharks
D Arvid Henrikson (2016 seventh round, 187th overall) Originally drafted by the Montreal Canadiens
Toronto Maple Leafs
D Ryan O’Connell (2017 seventh round, 203rd overall)
Winnipeg Jets
G Jared Moe (2018 sixth round, 184th overall)
Of the list above, Krygier and Pivonka are remaining in the Islanders organization on confirmed AHL contracts for 2023-24, although they remain eligible to sign with another NHL team should one come calling. All others are either returning to school for 2023-24, have contracts signed in other leagues, or are not signed for next season.
Notably, this is the official confirmation that the Flyers’ exclusive signing rights of O’Brien have lapsed. As compensation for not signing a first-round pick to their entry-level contract, the Flyers will receive a compensatory second-round pick from the league in the 2024 NHL Draft.