Shane Wright Leaves Game With Injury
- In tonight’s game between the Seattle Kraken and Buffalo Sabres, the former will leave with some injury concerns for their center corps. After only 3:36 of ice time, the Kraken announced that center Shane Wright exited the game due to injury. Wright was not obviously injured during a specific play, but he had been hurt in Thursday’s game against the Tampa Bay Lightning, which means he may have started tonight’s game in discomfort.
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Kraken Recall Logan Morrison
The Seattle Kraken have recalled forward Logan Morrison from the AHL under emergency conditions. He will help Seattle address a slew of injuries, including to Jaden Schwartz, Jared McCann, and Ryan Winterton.
Morrison played in his NHL debut on March 26, 2024 – nearly two years ago to the day. He totaled four NHL appearances that season and recorded no scoring, no penalties, and a minus-one. Morrison has been with the AHL’s Coachella Valley Firebirds ever since. He carved out a top role on the Firebirds with back-to-back 40-point seasons over the last two years. With that footing, Morrison has taken off this year. He leads Coachella Valley in goals (27) and points (56) through 61 games. He has added 40 penalty minutes and a plus-22, also career-highs for the young professional.
The 23-year-old winger could be set to play in his fifth NHL game as the Kraken seek out a right-winger to fill out their depth chart. Seattle has operated with 11 forwards and seven defenseman recently, creating room for Cale Fleury to play in four games this month. He has one point and a minus-one in those appearances, bringing his season totals up to three points in 21 games. With that quiet stretch, and a 1-4-0 record in their last five games, Seattle could look back towards a traditional lineup structure to provide a spark.
Kraken Recall Oscar Fisker Molgaard
The Kraken announced Wednesday that they’ve recalled center Oscar Fisker Molgaard from AHL Coachella Valley. The team reassigned right-winger Jani Nyman to Coachella Valley in the corresponding move.
Fisker Molgaard, 21, lands his fourth recall of the season. He suited up twice for the team in November, didn’t get into a game on his second recall in January, and entered the lineup a third time in February before the Olympic break as a send-off before he represented Team Denmark in Milan.
Seattle has to be pleased with how their 2023 second-round pick has developed thus far. The 6’0″ two-way pivot has impressed mightily in professional environments in the three seasons since draft day, suiting up for the Swedish Hockey League’s HV71 until coming to North America last year. He had an 18-29–47 scoring line in 129 career SHL games before joining Coachella Valley, including a 19-point effort in 38 games last season.
As a rookie in the AHL, the Dane has immediately settled in as one of the Firebirds’ top producers. With 10 goals and 32 points in 46 games, he sits fourth on the team in scoring. Combined with his already attractive international resume – he’s represented Denmark at three straight World Championships and had three points in four Olympic contests – the question now becomes simply how high Fisker Molgaard will climb on Seattle’s depth chart over the next few years, not whether he’ll be an NHL talent or not.
They’ve been trialing him as a fourth-line pivot at points this season, and he hasn’t looked out of place with an assist, a +1 rating, and a 58.3% faceoff win percentage in his three NHL outings so far while averaging just 6:14 per game. With the Kraken opting to dress 11 forwards and seven defenders for last night’s shootout loss to the Panthers, Fisker Molgaard could re-enter the lineup again in a fourth-line role tomorrow night in Tampa.
Nyman has been on Seattle’s roster for the past week. He got into back-to-back games but had a horrific go of things defensively, posting a -4 rating against the Blue Jackets last Saturday in just 8:15 of ice time, leading to him being scratched against Florida last night. Seattle is still waiting for the gifted goal-scorer, who has a 4-2–6 scoring line across 26 NHL outings this year, to develop the other areas of his game in the AHL.
Ryan Winterton Takes Leave Of Absence
The Seattle Kraken announced today that forward Ryan Winterton has taken a temporary leave of absence to attend to a family matter. The Kraken did not provide further detail and requested that the privacy of Winterton and his family be respected. As is always the case with situations like these, what happens on the ice is secondary. With that said, Winterton’s absence does have lineup implications for a Kraken team that is still under pressure to chase down a playoff spot.
Hurricanes, Kraken To Play 2026 Global Series In Finland
The Hurricanes and Kraken will play a pair of games in Helsinki, Finland, on Nov. 12 and 14 next season as part of the 2026 Global Series, the league announced. That brings the NHL’s total regular-season games in Europe next year to four, following the previously announced pair of dates between the Blackhawks and Senators in Düsseldorf, Germany, in December.
It will be the first time either Carolina or Seattle has played a regular-season game under the Global Series designator. The Kraken have not played a game that counts outside North America in their five active seasons as a franchise, while the Canes haven’t gone overseas since opening up their 2010-11 season with a back-to-back against the Wild, also in Helsinki.
While neither club boasts Finnish NHL talent to rival the Stars’ Finnish mafia, there will be some high-powered homegrown talent in that game – namely, Carolina star center Sebastian Aho. He’ll be joined by teammate Jesperi Kotkaniemi as Finnish Carolinians under contract through next season. Seattle’s roster boasts another three Finnish forwards – Kaapo Kakko, Jani Nyman, and Eeli Tolvanen – although Tolvanen is a pending unrestricted free agent.
Finland has been one of the NHL’s most frequented destinations for European events. The country ranks third in the IIHF men’s world rankings, has medaled in five of the last six Winter Olympics, and accounts for roughly 5% of the NHL’s active player base.
It will be the league’s first time going to Veikkaus Arena (formerly known as Hartwall Arena) in Helsinki since 2018, though. The last two Global Series in Finland, 2022’s games between the Blue Jackets and Avalanche and 2024’s between the Panthers and Stars, were played at Nokia Arena in Tampere, the second-largest urban area in the country by population. Veikkaus Arena was closed for the last several years as the Finnish government went through the process of seizing it from its previous Russian ownership amid their invasion of Ukraine, opening back up last summer.
Kraken Recall Jani Nyman On Emergency Basis
The Kraken announced that they’ve recalled winger Jani Nyman from AHL Coachella Valley under emergency conditions. Seattle hadn’t yet burned through any of its five post-deadline standard recalls anyway. They have 14 forwards on the active roster but are dealing with injuries to Jaden Schwartz (face, indefinite) and Eeli Tolvanen (upper body, day-to-day), leaving them without any healthy extras. Evidently, the Kraken believe somebody else may be questionable for tomorrow’s contest against the Predators, making Nyman eligible for an emergency recall.
Nyman, 21, started the season on the NHL roster but was assigned to Coachella Valley before the Christmas break. The 2022 second-round pick has remained there since. He’s still in the second year of his three-year entry-level deal and has another two seasons left before he requires waivers, so there’s no reason to rush his development.
The 6’2″, 212-lb Finn is in the minors to prove he’s more than a one-trick pony aside from his elite shooting ability. He doesn’t play a physical style for his size but has scored at a torrid pace in the AHL since arriving in North America in 2024, including 18 goals in 29 games this season since his demotion. He’s now up to a 48-25–73 scoring line in 92 AHL games.
Nyman’s results have been tempered in an NHL role. He’s slotted into the lineup 36 times over the past two seasons, scoring seven goals and 12 points. That’s fine production considering he’s averaging 11:48 of ice time per game, but his defensive impacts have been disastrous. Seattle has only controlled 46.1% of shot attempts with Nyman on the ice at 5-on-5 despite him starting over 60% of his shifts in the offensive zone, indicative of how the Kraken might plan to use him long-term as a bottom-six supplemental piece and a power-play specialist.
He could get another brief chance here to make an impact in the Kraken’s lineup as they chase down the second playoff berth in franchise history. Seattle sits tied with the Kings for the second wild-card spot in the West at 71 points, sitting just inside the playoff picture as they hold the regulation wins tiebreaker over Los Angeles. With the Sharks, Predators, and Jets all within striking distance, though, their postseason odds only sit at 36.4%, according to MoneyPuck. That’s the second-best odds out of the group after the Kings’ 50%.
Kraken Activate Matt Murray From IR
Another goaltender is set to join the Seattle Kraken depth chart. Matt Murray has been activated off of injured reserve after recovering from a lower-body injury sustained in November. Murray was originally expected to miss six weeks with the injury but instead totaled nearly four months out.
Murray has been working over injury complications since 2023. He underwent bilateral hip surgery in October 2023 to address nagging injuries. That procedure forced him to miss the entire 2023-24 season and the bulk of 2024-25. He made a brief appearance with the Toronto Maple Leafs in December 2024 before being knocked out of the lineup again until May. Murray seemed well over the injury headed into the 2025 summer, prompting the Kraken to sign him to a one-year, $1MM contract for this season.
The two-time Stanley Cup-winning netminder began the season in a normal role with the Kraken – but only managed five appearances before going down with another injury. He allowed eight goals on 102 shots – good for a .922 save percentage – in his limited appearances. His injury pushed the Kraken back towards a tandem of Joey Daccord and Philipp Grubauer for the bulk of this season. Both are having strong years backing a Kraken team that has allowed the ninth-fewest goals-against (182) this season. Daccord has set 18 wins and a .902 save percentage in 37 games, while Grubauer has 11 wins and a .913 save percentage in 24 games.
The Kraken are likely to continue leaning on their de facto duo while allowing Murray a chance to ease back from injury. He has not played more than 30 games in a single season since the 2019-20 campaign. In total, Murray has recorded 147 wins and a .910 save percentage in 279 career games, and 10 seasons in the NHL. He could be a timely addition to Seattle’s depth chart as they fight to hang onto the Western Conference Wild Card. They sit one point ahead of the San Jose Sharks and Los Angeles Kings in the Wild Card race.
Kraken’s Jaden Schwartz Out Indefinitely With Upper-Body Injury
The Kraken announced this afternoon that winger Jaden Schwartz is out indefinitely after sustaining an upper-body injury, suspected to be his face/head, in Saturday’s loss to the Senators. No corresponding roster move was made, but with Frederick Gaudreau sick and Bobby McMann still working on acquiring a work visa following his acquisition from the Maple Leafs on Friday, Seattle will be eligible to make an emergency recall for tomorrow’s game against the Predators if both remain unavailable.
Thankfully, Schwartz’s injury wasn’t worse. He was skating by the bench area when teammate Eeli Tolvanen laid a check on Ottawa forward Nick Cousins, who lost his footing in the collision and his skate boot rocketed up into Schwartz’s face. He didn’t sustain any drastic cuts but the force of the collision understandably caused him to leave the contest.
Schwartz, who’s been with the Kraken since day one in 2021, is a pending unrestricted free agent. Seattle opted to hold onto him and all their other pending UFAs at the deadline last week amid a playoff race that currently has them in the second wild-card spot, just one point ahead of the Sharks, who have a game in hand. They’ve dropped four of six since the Olympic break and, only scoring 2.84 goals per game on the year, don’t exactly have offense to spare.
The 33-year-old has already missed time once this season, sitting out around six weeks with a lower-body injury between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. In 42 appearances on the year, he has 10 goals and 21 points. He’s one of Seattle’s eight double-digit goal-scorers but is still having the third-worst offensive performance on a per-game basis over his 14 full NHL seasons.
He’d been skating mostly on a line with Tolvanen and Chandler Stephenson down the middle. McMann, acquired from the Maple Leafs, could be a natural fit to step into Schwartz’s vacated left-wing slot tomorrow against Nashville if his visa gets sorted by then.
AHL Assignments: 3/6/25
Today’s trade deadline also has minor-league implications. Players must be on an AHL roster at 2:00 p.m. Central in order to be eligible to play in the Calder Cup Playoffs. As such, teams will be ferrying a large number of waiver-exempt players to the minors this morning and afternoon before recalling them before the end of the league day for cap counting at 4:00 p.m. That allows them to bypass the new rule that players must play at least one game in the minors after being reassigned before they’re eligible for a recall again.
Here’s the rundown of today’s reassignments that will be announced during the blizzard of other moves today:
- The Flames will ferry winger Matvei Gridin to the Calgary Wranglers, Ryan Pike of Flames Nation reports. The 2024 #28 overall pick is in his first professional season and is already beginning to look like a natural fit in the Flames’ top nine, posting seven points through his first 18 NHL games while averaging 14:18 of ice time per night. Gridin’s 4.17 shot attempts per game are fourth on the team after Rasmus Andersson and MacKenzie Weegar were traded away. He’s also got 10 goals and 29 points in 36 games for the Wranglers, but with the Flames’ roster thinning out as they sell pieces off, he’ll be up in the NHL for the stretch run before returning to the playoff-bound Wranglers after the regular season ends.
- The Jets announced they’ve sent winger Walker Duehr and defender Isaak Phillips to AHL Manitoba. Both may find their way back down to Manitoba on a full-time basis before the end of the season as Winnipeg gets some of its IR-bound players back in the lineup, but for now, they’ll serve as depth pieces for the Jets as they potentially subtract more talents from their roster today.
- The Mammoth sent defenseman Dmitriy Simashev to Tucson, per PuckPedia. The 2023 sixth overall pick got into the Utah lineup for the first time since December last night. The rookie has been exceptional in the minors but has just one assist with a -9 rating through his first 25 career NHL outings.
- The Blackhawks assigned defender Ethan Del Mastro to Rockford, per PuckPedia. He’ll be back up after being recalled earlier in the week to replace Connor Murphy on the roster after he was dealt to the Oilers.
- The Penguins have sent down winger Avery Hayes to make him post-season eligible, per Seth Rorabaugh of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. The 23-year-old rookie has two goals through his first six NHL contests over the past several weeks, both of which came in his debut.
- The Avalanche have demoted winger Gavin Brindley to the AHL’s Colorado Eagles. Brindley is in his first full NHL season after being acquired from the Columbus Blue Jackets last year, scoring six goals and 12 points in 47 games, averaging 9:51 of ice time per game.
- The Rangers are making sure that AHL Hartford has reinforcements for the playoffs. New York has reassigned forwards Jaroslav Chmelar and Juuso Pärssinen. The former scored the first goal of his NHL career in a lopsided victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs.
- According to a team announcement, the Vancouver Canucks have reassigned netminder Nikita Tolopilo and defenseman Cole Clayton to AHL Abbotsford. Tolopilo has been a mainstay between the pipes for Vancouver over the last little while, managing a 3-5-2 record in nine starts this season with a .901 SV% and 3.27 GAA.
- Unlikely to make the playoffs this season, the Panthers are making sure the cupboards are stocked for the Charlotte Checkers’ playoff run. The Panthers have reassigned Tobias Björnfot and Sandis Vilmanis, allowing them to remain eligible for the postseason.
- The Kraken have reassigned forwards Jacob Melanson and Ryan Winterton to the AHL’s Coachella Valley Firebirds. The pair have combined for four goals and 19 points in 82 games for Seattle this season.
- According to Bill Hoppe of the Times Herald, the Buffalo Sabres have assigned Zach Metsa to the AHL’s Rochester Americans in a paper transaction. Metsa, 27, is in his first full NHL season, scoring two goals and four points in 31 games, averaging 9:45 of ice time per game.
- The best team in the AHL may be even better during the playoffs. To maintain their eligibility for the postseason, the Grand Rapids Griffins announced that captain Dominik Shine and defenseman Axel Sandin Pellikka have been reassigned in a paper transaction.
- According to Charlie O’Connor of PHLY Sports, the Flyers have reassigned Denver Barkey and Adam Ginning to AHL Lehigh Valley. Barkey has been an encouraging story of late, scoring two goals and 10 points in his first 26 games of NHL action.
- Murat Ates of The Athletic confirmed that the Winnipeg Jets reassigned defenseman Elias Salomonsson to retain his postseason eligibility. Salomonsson has been relatively disappointing for AHL Manitoba this season, registering one goal and nine points in 29 contests.
- Pushing back on the earlier report today indicating that the Canucks had recalled Ty Mueller, Brendan Batchelor of Sportsnet shared that he won’t be joining the Canucks. Vancouver will run with a bare-bones roster tonight against the Blackhawks.
- Missing the playoffs for the first time in a decade, the Maple Leafs are making sure AHL Toronto has additional firepower for their postseason run. According to Lance Hornby of the Toronto Sun, the Maple Leafs have reassigned Easton Cowan and Jacob Quillan in a paper transaction. Despite being a higher-regarded prospect, Cowan only has two games of AHL experience.
- As expected, the Edmonton Oilers have reassigned forward Josh Samanski to the AHL’s Bakersfield Condors to ensure his postseason eligibility. Samanski has been exceptional for AHL Bakersfield this year, registering eight goals and 31 points in 43 games with a +6 rating.
This page will be updated throughout the day.
Seattle Kraken To Acquire Bobby McMann
The Toronto Maple Leafs have traded Bobby McMann to the Seattle Kraken, reports Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet. The return heading to Toronto is a second-round pick in 2027 and a fourth-rounder in the upcoming 2026 draft, according to Frank Seravalli of Victory+.
The move ends McMann’s nearly six-year tenure with the Maple Leafs, a tenure in which he emerged a real developmental success story for the organization. He signed with the team as an undrafted player out of Colgate University, began in the ECHL, and worked his way up the professional ladder to the NHL, where he became a 20-goal scorer.
With his contract set to expire, McMann has been widely reported to be seeking a significant pay raise from his current $1.35MM cap hit. The recent signing of a comparable player, San Jose Sharks winger Kiefer Sherwood, to a five-year, $5.75MM AAV contract may very well have pushed the price tag on a McMann extension past where the Maple Leafs were comfortable going.
With Toronto likely to miss the playoffs for just the second time since drafting Auston Matthews, collecting some assets for McMann became an important goal for the team’s deadline work.
Toronto may have been hoping to receive a first-rounder for McMann, who has 19 goals and 32 points this season, rather than a second-rounder. McMann is widely considered a more valuable player than Minnesota Wild center Michael McCarron, who net the Nashville Predators a second-round pick earlier this week. But it seems as though no team was willing to part with a first-rounder for McMann, and with the deadline looming, the Maple Leafs seem to have decided that a package for McMann that is lighter than they may have hoped is better than retaining him beyond today.
More to come…