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Rangers Place Matt Rempe On IR, Send Connor Mackey To AHL

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Nov. 8: The Rangers announced that Mackey has been sent back down to Hartford.  He didn’t see any game action while on recall.  They now have one open roster slot.

Nov. 3: The New York Rangers have recalled defenseman Connor Mackey from the AHL’s Hartford Wolf Pack. They have also placed enforcer Matt Rempe on injured reserve, per the NHL media site. Rempe is expected to be out long-term after sustaining an injury in a fight with San Jose Sharks bruiser Ryan Reaves.

Mackey has bounced between the NHL and AHL lineups this season, but has still found his way into all nine of Hartford’s games so far. He’s posted two assists, one penalty, and a minus-five in those appearances, and also serves as one of four alternate captains. Despite the routine call-ups to the Rangers roster, Mackey hasn’t appeared in the NHL since December 2024, when he appeared in two games and recorded no points and one fight. He’s played just three NHL games since 2023, and 42 across a five-year career. He’s posted 11 points, 80 penalty minutes, and a minus-one in the NHL.

Mackey will serve as an insurance option for New York’s extra defenseman Urho Vaakanainen, who is day-to-day with a lower-body injury per Stephen Whyno of AP News. Vaakanainen has played in 10 games and recorded one assist, eight penalty minutes, and a plus-one this season. He is expected to be replaced in the lineup by fellow left-shot defenseman Matthew Robertson, who has one goal in seven NHL games this season.

To make room for Mackey’s recall, the Rangers will now move Rempe to the inactives list. The 6-foot-9 bruiser managed one goal, seven penalty minutes, and a plus-one in nine games before going down with injury. He looked noticeably more impactful when play was moving this season, taking a stride towards impact that helped round out his enforcer presence. New York has turned towards Jonny Brodzinski to fill Rempe’s fourth-line role. Brodzinski has two points in five games this season.

Metro Injury Notes: Capitals, Rangers, Hurricanes

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The Washington Capitals took the ice for practice this morning, and there were a few takeaways on the injury front. A report from Sammi Silber of The Hockey News indicated that forward Ethen Frank had returned to skating in a non-contact jersey, while defenseman Rasmus Sandin has been fully cleared for contact.

Additionally, Silber shared that center Pierre-Luc Dubois, who’s considered day-to-day with a lower-body injury, did not join the team for practice. All around, it’s mostly positive news for the Capitals, given that Frank and Sandin are the only two currently on the team’s injured reserve.

Since he hasn’t played since October 21st, Sandin has missed the most time of the trio. He’s tallied two assists in seven games for Washington this year, averaging 19:24 of ice time per contest. Meanwhile, Frank hasn’t played since the Capitals’ game on October 28th against the Dallas Stars after being reverse-hit by Mikko Rantanen. Despite the play looking relatively scary, it appears that Frank is on track to return sooner rather than later.

Other injury notes from the Metropolitan Division:

  • Peter Baugh of The Athletic provided updates on a pair of injured New York Rangers. Baugh reported that defenseman Urho Vaakanainen is considered day-to-day with a lower-body injury and wasn’t on the ice for practice this morning. However, in a positive update, Baugh shared that Vincent Trocheck has returned wearing a non-contact jersey. Although Baugh didn’t comment on a potential return for Trocheck, it at least shows that a return is on the horizon. He’s currently on the team’s long-term injured reserve and hasn’t played since October 9th.
  • The injury news isn’t as positive for the Carolina Hurricanes. According to Chip Alexander of the Raleigh News & Observer, defensemen Jaccob Slavin and K’Andre Miller have yet to return to practice for the Hurricanes. It’s another blow to a defensive core that’s been devastated by injuries to begin the 2025-26 campaign. Still, despite the unlikelihood of Miller playing in Carolina’s next game, he’s not expected to miss much more time.

Morning Notes: Robertson, Pinto, Varone

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In this early stretch of the 2025-26 NHL season, one of the better storylines on the New York Rangers has been the emergence of rookie defenseman Matthew Robertson, who scored his first NHL goal last night in the team’s much-needed comeback victory over the Montreal Canadiens. Robertson took on injured defenseman Carson Soucy’s role as the Rangers’ number-five defenseman, and while he hasn’t been perfect, he has generally impressed. This has led to questions as to what will happen when Soucy is ready to return to the lineup, and The Athletic’s Peter Baugh wrote yesterday that it “definitely feels like” Robertson will retain a spot in head coach Mike Sullivan’s regular lineup once Soucy returns.

Should Robertson end up retaining his regular lineup spot, that would likely mean veteran Urho Vaakanainen would become the team’s seventh defenseman, filling the role Robertson began the season in. Vaakanainen, 26, is averaging the fewest minutes per game of any Rangers blueliner (15:02) though he has played in all seven of the team’s games thus far this season. The stay-at-home defenseman has an additional year on his contract beyond this one at a $1.55MM AAV, and managed a healthy 15 points in 46 games for the Rangers last season. Vaakanainen’s play has drawn more criticism than Robertson’s this year, though, and being on the wrong end of a Trent Frederic game-winning goal on Tuesday didn’t help his case to stay in the lineup.

Other notes from around the hockey world:

  • Yesterday, we covered reports coming out of Ottawa that Senators center Shane Pinto and the team were set to re-engage in talks over a contract extension for the talented young center. Those reports indicated that there was a notable gap between the Senators’ expectations for a new contract and the expectations of Pinto’s representatives, led by Lewis Gross of Sports Professional Management. Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman added to the reporting around Pinto last night, revealing that the Senators had offered Pinto an eight-year contract extension. It’s unclear at this time whether Pinto and the Senators will be able to reach an agreement on such a long-term contract (Pinto’s goal-scoring success so far this season should certainly embolden his camp’s pursuit of a major pay raise) but as of right now, it’s abundantly clear the Senators are hoping to keep Pinto in the fold for as long as possible.
  • Former AHL MVP Phil Varone has found a place to play the 2025-26 season, signing a contract with Slovakia’s HK Dukla Trencin. The 34-year-old, who was once one of the top players in the AHL and has 97 career NHL games to his name, has landed in Slovakia after a two-year stint in Germany’s DEL. Since leaving North America at the end of a 2019-20 season that saw him post 19 points in 33 AHL games, Varone has struggled to find consistency in Europe. He’s bounced between six different clubs over the last five years across three different leagues and four different countries, with his best year coming in 2023-24, when he scored 27 points in 34 games for the DEL’s Düsseldorfer EG. He now joins a Trencin team in desperate need of scoring reinforcement: the team currently sit in the No. 8 spot in the Slovak Extraliga standings (out of 12 teams) and have scored the third-fewest goals as a team (27 through 12 games played).

Rangers Sign Urho Vaakanainen To Two-Year Extension

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The Rangers announced they’ve signed defenseman Urho Vaakanainen to a two-year extension. The deal is worth $3.1MM with a $1.55MM cap hit, Arthur Staple of The Athletic reports. He was a pending restricted free agent with arbitration rights.

The extension marks a yearly raise of $450K for Vaakanainen, whom the Rangers acquired from the Ducks in the Jacob Trouba deal in December. The 26-year-old Finn is now on his third team after being drafted in the first round by the Bruins in 2017 and later dealt to Anaheim in 2022’s Hampus Lindholm trade.

After sitting on the fringes of the lineup with Anaheim to begin the season, Vaakanainen has enjoyed expanded usage in New York. He served as a healthy scratch for 11 of the Ducks’ first 16 games before sustaining an upper-body injury – an unfortunately common theme throughout his career – that lasted through his trade to the Blueshirts. After making his Rangers debut, he’s missed a pair of games due to illness but has otherwise remained in the lineup. He’s a bottom-pairing piece, averaging a shade under 16 minutes per game, but has contributed 2-7–9 in 30 games with a plus-two rating.

Vaakanainen was the 18th overall selection to the Boston Bruins in the 2017 NHL Draft. The stocky defender made his NHL debut two seasons later and quickly found a spot at the top of Boston’s call-up list. He was never a hot scorer, netting just two points across his first 16 games and three seasons in the NHL. Those top-flight appearances were intercut with 28 points in 84 AHL games between 2018 and 2020.

The Bruins opted to trade Vaakanainen to the Anaheim Ducks at the 2022 Trade Deadline in their acquisition of top defenseman Hampus Lindholm. Vaakanainen continued his depth role through his first two seasons in Anaheim – tallying four points in 36 games. After years of platooned roles, he finally earned his first shot at a daily lineup role last year – netting a stout 14 points and 26 penalty minutes in 68 games.

Vaakanainen has matched his point totals from last season in just 30 games with the Rangers. He seems to finally be on the right track after seven years of depth roles. The Rangers have taken the step needed to solidify Vaakanainen’s spot in the lineup, extending him to a cost-controlled two-year deal. He should continue to serve as a bottom-pair or seventh-defender option for the Rangers while they sort of a heap of new arrivals on the back-end.

PHR’s Gabriel Foley contributed to this article.

Team Finland Adds Henri Jokiharju, Urho Vaakanainen To 4-Nations Roster

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Team Finland has added Buffalo Sabres defenseman Henri Jokiharju and New York Rangers defenseman Urho Vaakanainen to their 4-Nations Face-Off roster. The duo will fill in after Miro Heiskanen and Jani Hakanpaa each suffered injuries that will hold them out through February. They will join Esa Lindell (Dallas), Olli Maatta (Utah), Niko Mikkola (Florida), Rasmus Ristolainen (Philadelphia), and Juuso Valimaki (Utah) on Finland’s blue line.

Finland was down to the wire in finding replacements for their pair of injuries. There are only 11 active Finnish defensemen in the NHL. With this news, Team Finland has already invited nine of those names to the tournament – leaving Ville Heinola (Winnipeg) and Nikolas Matinpalo (Ottawa) as the only two to not receive a call from team general manager Jere Lehtinen. Heinola and Matinpalo are the only active Finns to play in the AHL this season, excluding Hakanpaa’s pair of minor league outings during a conditioning stint.

While their output pales in comparison to who they’re replacing, Finland will get a nice match of styles in Jokiharju and Vaakanainen. The former has been an aggressive two-way defenseman for the Sabres this season. He only has four points through 36 games this season, but has posted a +6 – just the second positive plus-minus of his seven-year NHL career. He posted his first, a +14, through 74 games last season – and coupled it with a career-high 20 points. Jokiharju is working to rediscover those numbers this season, but nonetheless brings stout neutral zone control to the Finnish lineup. While he controls north of the blue line, Vaakanainen will be tasked with filling Hakanpaa’s stout defensive role. Vaakanainen began this season with the Anaheim Ducks but joined the Rangers after just five games, as part of the deal that sent Jacob Trouba to the west coast. Vaakanainen has since stepped into 21 games with New York, filling a bottom pair role and recording five assists, 10 penalty minutes, and a +2. He’s also been a quietly impactful defender in New York state, bringing physicality and size to a Rangers blue line in need of both. He’ll bring the same attributes to the 4-Nations tournament, and hopefully blend with Jokiharju well enough to somewhat match the top-tier impact lost by Heiskanen’s injury.

Injury Updates: Faulk, Thomas, Red Wings, Vaakanainen

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The Blues will welcome back a key blueliner tonight against Edmonton.  Team reporter Chris Pinkert reports that Justin Faulk will return to the lineup after missing the last two games due to an upper-body injury.  The 32-year-old has been more limited than usual offensively over the first couple of months as he has just one goal and six assists so far in 25 games.  However, Faulk is carrying a big workload, averaging a team-high 23:26 per night, his highest ATOI since the shortened 2020-21 campaign.

Other injury news from around the NHL:

  • The Kings announced (Twitter link) that they’ve activated forward Akil Thomas off injured reserve. The 24-year-old had missed the last week due to an undisclosed injury.  Thomas has been limited to just ten games so far in his first full NHL season and has a goal and an assist while logging a little more than 11 minutes a night of playing time.  Los Angeles had two open roster spots so no corresponding move was needed to bring Thomas back to the active roster.
  • The Red Wings won’t have goaltenders Cam Talbot and Alex Lyon available for a little while longer. MLive’s Ansar Khan relays (Twitter link) that the netminders will likely miss the next two games as they continue to deal with lower-body injuries.  Talbot has posted an impressive .915 SV% in 15 games in his first season with Detroit while Lyon is only a few points lower at .911 in his first nine outings.  Ville Husso will continue to serve as the starter for the time being while prospect Sebastian Cossa is back with the team after being papered down on Friday for cap reasons and will serve as Husso’s backup.
  • New Rangers defenseman Urho Vaakanainen took part in the team’s optional practice today in a non-contact jersey, notes NHL.com’s Dan Rosen (Twitter link). The 25-year-old has missed more than three weeks with an upper-body injury and is still likely a few games away from being cleared to return.  Vaakanainen has played in just five games so far this season, those coming with Anaheim before being part of yesterday’s Jacob Trouba trade.

Anaheim Ducks Acquire Jacob Trouba

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3:34 PM: The Ducks organization has made the deal official through a team announcement.

1:28 PM: According to Arthur Staple of The Athletic, the New York Rangers are working on a trade that would send Jacob Trouba to the Anaheim Ducks. Staple’s report comes shortly after TSN’s Pierre LeBrun indicated that Anaheim had quickly become the front-runner in acquiring Trouba’s services. ESPN reporter Emily Kaplan shares that Anaheim will send depth defenseman Urho Vaakanainen and a draft pick to the Rangers, completing the trade.

This brings an end to a tumultuous saga for Trouba in New York. The oft-mentioned trade candidate had been in the rumor mill for a year as he was reportedly nearly dealt to the Detroit Red Wings this past offseason before using his modified no-trade clause to nix the deal. It wouldn’t be the last time either as Aaron Portzline of The Athletic reports Trouba also used his trade protection earlier today to prohibit a move to the Columbus Blue Jackets organization.

The former ninth-overall selection of the 2012 NHL Draft will now join the third organization of his 12-year career, albeit in a different environment. Trouba is only a year removed from captaining the Rangers to President’s Trophy honors during the 2023-24 NHL season but will now join a team that hasn’t qualified for the playoffs since the 2017-18 season and is sitting 29th in league standings. In the end, it was his choice, as Frank Seravalli of the Daily Faceoff reported Trouba waived his no-trade clause to facilitate a deal with the Ducks.

He’s certainly fallen off in recent seasons which surely influenced New York’s desire to move on. He’ll finish his Rangers’ tenure with 31 goals and 136 points in 364 regular season games with a +16 rating. Most of Trouba’s lack of success in recent seasons can be seen from his possession metrics. He averaged an approximated 47.0% CorsiFor% through his first four years in New York but has fallen to 42.6% and 40.0% in the last two years, respectively.

Still, Trouba provides value via his physicality from the blue line. For better or for worse, Trouba’s massive hits have become well-known throughout the league and that kind of toughness will be received well in Greg Cronin’s system in Anaheim.

The Ducks already boast one of the league’s most rugged defensemen in captain Radko Gudas and will now add Trouba to the equation. The Rochester, MI native has totaled more than 100 hits over the last six years and eclipsed the 200 mark twice from 2021-23.

New York will receive a mild return for their now-former captain in Vaakanainen and Anaheim’s fourth-round pick in 2025 (as per TSN’s Pierre LeBrun). Vaakanainen, who is currently on injured reserve, is a former first-round pick of the Boston Bruins from the 2017 NHL Draft and is a year removed from playing in a career-high 68 games for the Ducks. He won’t provide much on the offensive side of the puck given his career 25 points in 141 games but his $1.1MM expiring contract will give the Rangers increased financial flexibility moving forward.

That’s largely what this deal was about from the Rangers’ perspective. They have now cleared $12MM from their salary cap table after sending Barclay Goodrow through waivers this past offseason and now have the financial freedom to retain key pieces and be aggressive on the trade and free agent market. General manager Chris Drury has stayed adamant on his desire to reshape the Rangers roster and trading Trouba was one of the necessary steps toward that goal.

Ducks Activate Cam Fowler, Place Urho Vaakanainen On IR

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Anaheim will welcome back the organization’s longest-tenured player this evening. The Ducks announced they’ve activated defenseman Cam Fowler from the team’s injured reserve and have placed defenseman Urho Vaakanainen on it in a corresponding roster move.

There was an expectation that the Ducks would make a formal roster move after Derek Lee of The Hockey News reported earlier that Pavel Mintyukov would be a healthy scratch for tonight’s contest for Fowler. Lee also mentioned that young forward Leo Carlsson wouldn’t play tonight due to an upper-body injury.

Anaheim has a few reasons to be thankful that Fowler is back in the lineup. First, he gives the team another veteran presence to a blue line that’s struggled this season. The Ducks are 26th in the league in shots against and their shortcomings have largely been covered up by the phenomenal play of Lukáš Dostál. Fowler won’t have much to give on the offensive side of the puck but he is in his 15th straight season averaging more than 20 minutes a night and has a career on-ice save percentage in all situations of 90.3%.

The other reason Anaheim is thankful to have Fowler back is to showcase him to the rest of the league. It’s public knowledge that the Ducks and Fowler hope for a trade to materialize and it would be better for inquiring teams to see how he’s continuing to handle top-four minutes.

Vaakanainen’s move to the injured reserve is curious. The Joensuu, Finland native has played sparingly for Anaheim this season with his last game coming on November 13th. This leads to the idea that Vaakanainen may have been injured for quite some time and the Ducks are just now taking him off the active roster. Still, it’s a big win for Anaheim to get a top-four defenseman back in the lineup.

West Notes: Eberle, Ducks, Joseph

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The Kraken will be without their captain for at least the next two games and possibly more as Tim Booth of The Seattle Times relays that Jordan Eberle won’t play this weekend due to a lower-body injury.  The 34-year-old was injured in a collision on Thursday against Chicago.  Head coach Dan Bylsma noted that while Eberle was feeling a little better on Friday, there still needs to be further testing and evaluation done; that will come early next week to determine how much longer he might be out for.  Eberle is off to a decent start to the season, notching six goals and five assists in 17 games so far while playing a little under 16 minutes a night.

More from the Western Conference:

  • The Ducks issued several injury updates late Friday. After originally being classified as day-to-day with an upper-body injury, defenseman Cam Fowler will now miss the next two to four weeks because of it.  A speculative trade candidate, the 32-year-old has been limited to just 12 games so far this season where he has only two points in a little over 21 minutes a night.  Meanwhile, forward Mason McTavish is day-to-day with an upper-body injury while defenseman Urho Vaakanainen’s upper-body issue is being evaluated; he’s also listed as day-to-day for now.  McTavish has two goals and six assists in 13 games so far while Vaakanainen has suited up just five times and has one assist and seven blocked shots.
  • Blues defenseman Pierre-Olivier Joseph left the road trip to have his injury better evaluated but the test results were good, relays Matthew DeFranks of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Twitter link). Accordingly, the 25-year-old is listed as day-to-day.  Joseph is in his first season in St. Louis after signing with them in free agency following his non-tender from Pittsburgh.  He has played in 13 games so far this season, recording one assist while averaging a little under 14 minutes a night.

Ducks Re-Sign Brett Leason, Urho Vaakanainen

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6:23 p.m.: Anaheim’s now finalized these deals. Per Stephens, Leason’s is worth $1.05MM, while Vaakanainen’s is worth $1.1MM.

11:33 a.m.: The Ducks have re-signed winger Brett Leason and defenseman Urho Vaakanainen to one-year deals, The Athletic’s Eric Stephens reports. The pair were briefly UFAs after being non-tendered by Anaheim yesterday.

Anaheim does a good job by bringing back two valuable depth pieces on one-year contracts for the 2024-25 season. Neither Leason nor Vaakanainen are game-breakers in their own right but they do eat up minutes as the Ducks’ prospects continue to make their way up the depth charts.

In his third season with the Ducks organization, Leason experienced a career year compared to his previous standards. Scoring 11 goals and 22 points in 68 games, not only did Leason set career-highs in goals, assists, and points; he tied for seventh in Anaheim in goal-scoring altogether.

Vaakanainen just completed his first full season with the Ducks even though he has been with the organization for two and a half. Limited by injuries at the start of his tenure in Anaheim, Vaakanainen managed a solid outing during the 2023-24 season by putting up one goal and 14 points in 68 games while being one of the three Anaheim defensemen to not produce a negative rating.

Both should factor into the Ducks’ lineup next season as the team continues to climb their way back into contention. However, with multiple prospects looking to graduate to the NHL level, neither player may be in the long-term plans for Anaheim.

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