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Minor Transactions: 05/16/23

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For the first time since the playoffs began, we have a break in the NHL schedule. While the four remaining teams won’t start their Conference Final series until Thursday and Friday, offseason activity hasn’t slowed down in other leagues as rosters for 2023-24 take form. As always, we’re keeping tabs on all notable minor transactions from across the hockey world, and we’ll list today’s right here.

  • SHL veteran Filip Sandberg signed a one-year extension with Skellefteå AIK today, the team announced. Sandberg, who began his pro career with HV71, was an undrafted free agent signing by the San Jose Sharks in 2017 but played just over one full campaign with the AHL’s San Jose Barracuda before returning to Sweden in November of 2018. After two additional seasons with HV71 and a brief stop in Finland with TPS, Sandberg is now back in his home country, having recorded 11 goals and 27 points in 52 SHL games with Skellefteå last season.
  • The SHL’s Frölunda HC and longtime forward fixture Ryan Lasch have agreed to part ways this offseason with a year left on his contract, the team said Tuesday. The 36-year-old American never made much of an impact professionally stateside, mostly due to his 5-foot-7, 157-pound frame, but has excelled overseas in a longstanding pro career. Lasch led the entire SHL in scoring in 2021-22, recording well over a point per game, but lost a step this year with Frölunda, posting just five goals and 24 points in 41 games.
  • Former Tampa Bay Lightning netminder Kristers Gudlevskis is extending his stay in Europe with a two-year contract in Germany, signing today with the DEL’s Fischtown Penguins. The 30-year-old Latvian netminder was pivotal last season in earning Swedish club MODO Hockey promotion back to the SHL, recording a .920 save percentage in the regular season, but MODO opted to bolster their crease this offseason by signing pending Anaheim Ducks free agent Olle Eriksson Ek. Gudlevskis now returns to Fischtown, where he played 25 games in the 2019-20 season.

This page will be updated throughout the day…

Jonathan Lekkerimaki Will Play In SHL This Season

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Despite signing his entry-level contract earlier this month, Vancouver Canucks prospect Jonathan Lekkerimaki won’t play for the organization this season. Orebro HK has announced a contract with the young forward, one that extends through the 2024-25 season.

In the release, the team explains that Lekkerimaki will travel to Vancouver for training camp in the summer but return to Sweden before the season begins. That same process will be repeated the following year, though the Canucks will have the option to put him on the NHL roster if they feel he is ready.

Lekkerimaki will be joined in this exercise by fellow Swedish prospect Elias Pettersson (no, not that Elias Pettersson), who signed his entry-level deal in April. Both players can continue to develop overseas, while their contracts slide forward, maintaining team control.

Selected 15th overall in 2022, the 18-year-old Lekkerimaki has still not found consistent success at the highest level in Sweden. While there were encouraging signs in 2021-22 with Djurgardens IF, the club was relegated the following season, meaning he was limited to Allsvenskan competition.

Now joining Orebro gives him a chance to compete in the SHL once again, challenging his development and preparing him for life in the NHL.

Minor Transactions: 05/15/23

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With Game Seven between the Dallas Stars and Seattle Kraken tonight, the NHL’s second round is set to come to a close. Just four NHL franchises will remain in contention for the Stanley Cup, while the majority of teams are now earnestly preparing for their offseason work.

One minor league did give out a championship yesterday, the Federal Prospects Hockey League, a league that brands itself as being “Single-A” level. (Where the ECHL is Double-A, AHL is Triple-A, and so forth.) The Danbury Hat Tricks erased a 2-0 series deficit and took home the Commissioner’s Cup in a decisive Game Five, the first title for a Danbury team since the now-defunct Danbury Whalers won the same trophy in 2013. The Hat Tricks’ victory was another notable moment in the history of pro hockey in Danbury, a city whose former pro team, the Trashers, once rostered players with NHL experience such as Mike Rupp, Rumun Ndur, and Brent Gretzky and was the subject of a Netflix documentary.

With fewer and fewer leagues still set to play and the IIHF World Championships fully underway, teams across the hockey world are getting to work on their offseason moves. We’ll keep track of any notable transactions here:

  • After hitting the open market late last month, former NHL forward Patrice Cormier has found his next team. The 32-year-old two-time Manitoba Moose captain has signed with the DEL’s Eisbaren Berlin, a club desperate for a bounce-back season after following up their back-to-back titles with a playoff miss. Cormier is five seasons removed from his last in North America and has been in the KHL for that entire period. He spent this past season with Automobilist Yekaterinburg and scored 19 points in 55 games. He’s also had stops elsewhere in Russia and in Kazakhstan in his time since playing for the Moose.
  • Former Florida Panthers depth defenseman Colby Robak announced his retirement from professional hockey today on social media, according to the Daily Sentinel’s Ben Birnell. The 33-year-old defenseman played 47 NHL games, mostly for the Florida Panthers, between 2011-12 and 2014-15. Beyond his NHL experience, Robak’s career highlights include three seasons spent as a star defenseman for the WHL’s Brandon Wheat Kings, being named to the AHL All-Star game in just his second season as a professional, and leading the German DEL in points by a defenseman in 2020-21. After spending 2021-22 with the DEL’s Schwenninger Wild Wings, his third campaign in Germany and second as an alternate captain for the franchise, Robak didn’t play in 2022-23 and has now made the choice to end his playing career.
  • Matt Bradley, a former Montreal Canadiens prospect and ECHL champion, has signed with the DEL’s Straubing Tigers after spending the better part of the last two seasons playing for the Vienna Capitals in the ICEHL. The 26-year-old has played exceptionally well in the Austrian capital, notching 82 points in 67 games alongside 22 points in 22 playoff games. His success in the Central European ICEHL has now earned him a chance in Germany’s top flight, and while Vienna will now need to cope with the loss of their top scorer Bradley gains a significant opportunity to step onto a DEL playoff team and look to seize a similarly important offensive role.
  • Slovakian forward Miroslav Mucha, a recent graduate of the college hockey ranks with Lake Superior State and Michigan State University, has signed with Bili Tygri Liberec of Czechia’s Extraliga. The 25-year-old has three games of pro experience under his belt, them all coming with the ECHL’s Greenville Swamp Rabbits on a contract he signed late in the ECHL campaign. The former Michigan State captain scored 35 points in 37 games in his final season with Lake Superior State University before transferring to the Spartans for this season, and scored 17 points in his final 38 games of college hockey. Now he’ll head to Czechia, where he’ll look to score his first professional points and establish himself in the country’s top league.
  • Two-time SHL champion Eric Martinsson, a veteran of the European pro circuit, has signed with the Vaxjo Lakers of the SHL, the club he played for from 2014-2018. Martinsson is a 30-year-old blueliner who spent this past season playing for HV71, and the year before played for Barys Astana in Kazakhstan. Martinsson has 13 games of pro experience in North America, all of them coming in 2018-19 with the Iowa Wild. He scored an impressive nine points in that span but ultimately chose to return to Europe to play in Switzerland. Now, he’ll get to join the reigning Swedish champions.
  • HC Davos of Switzerland’s National League made two notable signings today. First, they inked a deal with 34-year-old veteran blueliner Noah Schneeberger, who has over 500 games of experience at the National League level. Schneeberger has played for Davos before, and won a title with the team in 2015. The other player they signed is 24-year-old Aleksi Peltonen. The captain of St. Lawrence University this past season, Peltonen is the son of Finnish Hockey Hall of Famer Ville Peltonen, who also is the head coach of Liiga side HIFK Helsinki. He’s also the grandson of another Finnish hockey Hall of Famer, Esa Peltonen, a former top scorer and champion at HIFK. Now, the younger Peltonen will get his pro career started in Switzerland, the league where his father was a head coach for two seasons.
  • Young blueliner Theodor Johnsson has made the switch from the SHL to the Finnish Liiga. The 20-year-old has transferred from the Malmo Redhawks to Liiga’s Vaasan Sport. Johnsson broke into the SHL this past season skating in 35 games for the Malmo Redhawks, a team that only narrowly avoided relegation to the second-tier HockeyAllsvenskan. While he only scored three points, Johnsson’s performance in that stretch and his 18-game run for the Vaxjo Lakers last year proved good enough for Vaasan to take this chance and sign him to this contract.
  • Undersized defenseman Aleksi Anttalainen has signed a contract with SaiPa after spending the last four seasons with TPS Turku in Liiga. Anttalainen impressively carved out a role as a lineup regular for TPS the season after aging out of the QMJHL, where he played with the Blainville-Boisbriand Armada and Moncton Wildcats. Though some might look at Anttalainen’s physical attributes and typecast him as more of an offensive defenseman, Anttalainen has actually remained in the lineup in TPS despite not producing very many points. He’s scored just 24 in 149 career Liiga games, and SaiPa are clearly comfortable with the unique package of skills he’ll bring to their lineup, hoping that his blend of skating skill and physicality will help improve a team that came in last place in last season’s Liiga campaign.
  • Recent ICEHL champions EHC Red Bull Salzburg have announced that four players will not be continuing with the club. Among those names is Danish forward Nikolai Meyer, the player who scored the team’s championship-winning goal in Game Seven of the finals against HC Bolzano, and was among their top scorers on a point-per-game basis with 26 points in 31 games this season. The 29-year-old is no stranger to success in the European pro ranks, as he led HockeyAllsvenskan in scoring during his 2018-19 season with Sodertalje SK and was named the league’s forward of the year. While his short stay in Czechia with HC Plzen didn’t exactly go swimmingly, Meyer has been productive in multiple leagues across Europe and should be able to receive some interest now that he’s hit the open market.

This page will be updated throughout the day

Snapshots: Brossoit, Boedker, McCabe Trade Conditions

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After helping the Vegas Golden Knights to a comfortable first-round series win over the Winnipeg Jets, the expectation was that Laurent Brossoit would be between the pipes for Vegas during their playoff run, their Stanley Cup hopes resting on his shoulders. Brossoit suffered a lower-body injury stopping an Edmonton Oilers scoring chance in Game Two of the second round, though, scuttling those plans. With Vegas now on the brink of qualifying once again for the Western Conference final, it does not seem as though Brossoit’s return is imminent.

As relayed by The Athletic’s Jesse Granger, Golden Knights head coach Bruce Cassidy said that Brossoit wouldn’t be traveling with the team to Edmonton for Game Six. This has left Vegas in the hands of Adin Hill, who the team acquired from the San Jose Sharks over the summer in exchange for a fourth-round pick. While Hill is a capable goalie, one might presume that Vegas would feel more comfortable backstopped by the netminder who helped them win their series against Winnipeg. In any case, it’s looking as though Vegas will have to attempt to fend off Edmonton without Brossoit in their crease.

Some other notes from across the hockey world:

  • The SHL’s HV71 announced today that Mikkel Boedker, a veteran of over 700 games in the NHL, would not be returning to the club for next season. It’s a disappointing if entirely unsurprising result for the 33-year-old, as he struggled in his return to Sweden’s top flight, a league he hasn’t played in since he skated in two contests for Frolunda HC way back in 2006-07. A former 50-point scorer in the NHL, Boedker managed just 11 points in 41 games for HV71 and could not help them make noise in the league standings as the team finished 11th. Now he’ll have to look for a new opportunity to continue his pro career, and perhaps a return to the Swiss league could be in the cards as he played for Lugano from 2020-2022.
  •  While the storylines involving the franchise’s general direction might draw more attention, Maple Leafs’ elimination last night also made some more minor news. One of the conditions of the Maple Leafs’ trade for Jake McCabe and Sam Lafferty was finalized as McCabe played in more than 50% of Toronto’s playoff games. As a result, all McCabe must do is play in more than 25% of the Maple Leafs’ regular-season games next year, and Toronto will receive a 2025 fifth-round pick as part of the deal. Should McCabe play in less than 25% of games, the Maple Leafs will instead receive Chicago’s 2025 third-round pick.

Panthers RFA Logan Hutsko Signs In Sweden

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After a pair of seasons in the minors, Panthers prospect Logan Hutsko has opted for a change of scenery.  The forward has signed a two-year contract with IK Oskarshamn of the SHL, per a team release.

The 24-year-old was a third-round pick by Florida back in 2018 (89th overall) but only has a couple of years of pro experience under his belt since he played a full four years at Boston College.  Hutsko had a good first season in the minors last year with 38 points in 71 games but injuries limited him to just 43 appearances in 2022-23 where he was fairly productive with 27 points.  That makes his decision to leave a little surprising but the fact that he wasn’t among Florida’s ‘Black Ace’ promotions earlier this month probably didn’t help things.

Florida can still control Hutsko through 2026 and with this deal running through the end of the 2024-25 campaign, it seems likely that they will still tender him a qualifying offer this summer to retain his rights.  In the meantime, they’ll hope that Hutsko can take another step in his development in Sweden and then assess if he’s worth bringing back in a couple of years.

Minor Transactions: 05/11/23

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As the NHL season has drawn to a close for most of the league, free agency periods for other leagues are entering their frenzy. Many North American minor leagues and European pro leagues are making significant transactions, and as always, we provide a daily running list of the most notable ones from around the men’s hockey world.

  • Vancouver Canucks 2017 draft pick Petrus Palmu has signed a two-year agreement to return to TPS in the Finnish Liiga after an extremely disappointing SHL campaign in 2022-23. Palmu’s high-end European scoring production made him an appealing prospect early on in his development, but he was never able to make a dent professionally in North America after playing junior hockey with the OHL’s Owen Sound Attack. Returning to Finland after his draft year, Palmu only ever played 12 games in the Canucks system with the AHL’s Utica Comets in 2018-19, recording just one assist. Now, he’ll head back home to the Liiga, where he scored at a point-per-game pace with Jukurit in 2021-22. He split the 2022-23 season between two SHL clubs, Örebro HK and Linköping HC, but scored just one goal and nine points in 41 games.
  • AHL mainstay Garrett Wilson is staying with the Lehigh Valley Phantoms for the next two seasons after signing a contract extension today. Wilson, 32, does have 84 NHL games under his belt with the Florida Panthers and Pittsburgh Penguins. He’s been exclusively in the minors since 2019-20, however, and this will be Wilson’s fourth and fifth seasons with the Phantoms. Last season, he scored 43 points in 68 games and led the AHL in penalty minutes (195).

This page will be updated throughout the day.

Gustav Rydahl Returns To SHL

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His North American hockey career is over as quickly as it began, as Gustav Rydahl has officially signed a new contract in the SHL. Reports emerged in March that the 28-year-old would be inking a multi-year deal with Frolunda, and today the club announced a five-year contract.

That effectively ends any chance of him playing in the NHL, after failing to make it with the New York Rangers and Colorado Avalanche this season. Rydahl signed a one-year, $750K deal last summer to join the Rangers after developing into one of the SHL’s most well-rounded power forwards, but would see only minor league action before being shipped to Colorado at the deadline.

After 52 unspectacular AHL contests, he’ll return to Sweden to continue his strong international career. Rydahl was part of his country’s 2022 Olympic squad, and is a significant addition for Frolunda through 2028.

Given his age, Rydahl was headed to unrestricted free agency, meaning there will be no qualifying offer or rights retained by the Avalanche.

Linus Omark Signs In SHL

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Not all influential hockey careers are spent in North America. One of his generation’s most creative and exciting players, Linus Omark, has spent the last decade overseas, playing for various clubs. At the age of 36, he’ll now head back to the SHL after signing a new contract with Luleå HF.

A fourth-round pick of the Edmonton Oilers in 2007, Omark had one of the most memorable NHL debuts by scoring a wild shootout goal—a talent he would showcase for the rest of his career. While his time in the NHL would last just 79 games (and include 32 points), Omark has continued to have an offensive impact where he’s gone, whether it be the KHL, SHL, or Swiss National League, where he won a league title with Geneve-Servette this season.

Though often credited to Pavel Datsyuk, it was Omark who first pulled off the “flip goal” in competition, scoring it against Switzerland in a pre-tournament game for the 2009 IIHF World Championship.

At his age, there’s virtually no chance of a return to North American pro hockey. But Omark’s career has been impressive either way.

Minor Transactions: 05/10/23

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The eyes of the hockey world are on two significant NHL contests tonight. The Toronto Maple Leafs are fighting to keep their season alive against the Florida Panthers, while the Edmonton Oilers are looking to tie their series against the Vegas Golden Knights at two games a piece.

While the NHL playoffs continue on, teams across the hockey world are getting significant offseason work done. We’ll keep track of any notable moves those teams make here:

  • Minnesota Wild 2022 first-round pick Liam Ohgren has transferred to Farjestad BK of the SHL, according to a team announcement. Ohgren spent this past season in Sweden’s second-tier HockeyAllsvenskan looking to help his longtime club Djurgardens IF achieve immediate promotion back to the SHL. While Djurgarden ultimately failed, falling in a seven-game promotion series final to MoDo, Ohgren himself had a strong season. The 19-year-old scored 19 goals and 33 points in 53 combined regular-season and postseason games. He’ll now join the 2022 SHL champions for next season, and then potentially head to North America to play in the NHL or AHL with the Wild organization in 2024-25.
  • Former NHL bottom-sixer Frederik Gauthier has signed a one-year contract extension with Swiss National League side HC Ajoie. Gauthier signed with Ajoie last summer after spending seven seasons as an NHL-AHL tweener in North America. He has nearly 200 NHL games on his resume, and scored 23 points in 52 games last season. Now 28 years old, this contract extension ensures Gauthier will spend another season in Switzerland before potentially contemplating making a return to North American ice.
  • David Warsofsky, a former NHL defenseman and AHL All-Star, has signed a one-year contract extension to remain with his current club, the DEL’s Augsburg Panthers. The 32-year-old blueliner was never quite able to overcome the disadvantage his five-foot-eight frame presented when attempting to establish himself in the NHL, though he nonetheless became a quality player at the AHL level. Warsofsky’s 2016-17 season was his best, as he scored 47 points in 58 games for the Wilkes-Barre Scranton Penguins, and he now two years removed from his most recent AHL game Warsofsky has become a solid DEL offensive defenseman. He scored 21 points in 36 games last season at Augsburg and represented the United States at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
  • Reigning Liiga champions Tappara Tampere issued updates on the contracts of quite a few players today, including one on a quality NHL prospect. Calgary Flames 2022 second-round pick Topi Ronni has signed a two-year extension to remain with Tappara until the end of the 2024-25 season. Ronni split the season between Tappara’s main team and their U20 team, scoring 25 points in 19 U20 games and 5 points in 22 games in Liiga. In addition to the news on Ronni, Tappara also announced that they have signed a two-year deal with former Tampa Bay Lightning prospect Otto Somppi, 25. He had 19 points in 59 for Lukko this past season and will now head to Tampere to join the league champions. They have also signed former Florida Panther Anton Levtchi to a three-year extension, locking him down after he scored 25 points in 29 games after returning mid-season from the Panthers organization.
  • Former Philadelphia Flyer Linus Hogberg has signed a two-year contract with the SHL’s Frolunda HC. Hogberg, a 2016 sixth-round pick, is a left-shot defenseman who spent several seasons developing his game with Vaxjo and HC Vita Hasten in his home country before crossing the pond in 2021 to play in the AHL with the Lehigh Valley Phantoms. Hogberg’s time with the Phantoms was decent, and he even earned five NHL games, though he didn’t fully establish himself in the organization’s plans. As a result, he left in the middle of this past year to re-join the SHL, and now has his club for the next two years of his career.
  • Sergei Kostitsyn, a former 50-point scorer with the Nashville Predators, has reportedly signed a one-year extension to remain with Metallurg Zhlobin, the champions of the Belarusian Extraleague. Kostitsyn has had quite the journey since leaving the KHL after 2018-19. The 36-year-old has had stops in Romania and Ukraine before signing back in his native Belarus for this season. Now, he’ll stay with Zhlobin looking to help them defend their recent title.
  • 2015 third-round pick and former Soo Greyhounds star Blake Speers will not return to HockeyAllsvenskan’s Vasteras IK for next season. Speers’ debut in Sweden was a difficult one, as he managed only four goals and 14 points in 38 games. He did help Vasteras reach the second division’s playoffs, but ultimately now will have to look elsewhere to continue his professional career. Part of the trade that landed Taylor Hall with the Arizona Coyotes, Speers has five NHL games on his resume.
  • Arvid Henrikson, a former Montreal Canadiens and (briefly) San Jose Sharks prospect, has signed with Vasterviks IK in HockeyAllsvenskan. The 25-year-old was a 2016 seventh-round pick of the Canadiens and was part of the trade that net the team a fifth-round pick when they acted as a “cap broker” to facilitate the trade of Nick Bonino to the Pittsburgh Penguins. Henrikson only played in one game as a member of the Sharks organization, an April 15th win over the Tucson Roadrunners, and did not see his ATO converted into a full-time opportunity. Now he begins his pro career in earnest overseas.

Matt Tomkins Terminates SHL Contract, Expected To Sign NHL Deal

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Former Blackhawks prospect Matt Tomkins decided back in 2021 that it was time to try his hand at playing overseas.  However, he didn’t lose his desire to try to play in the NHL and it appears he’ll get another chance at that opportunity as Farjestad of the SHL announced that the netminder has terminated the final year of his deal with them and is expected to sign an NHL contract with an undisclosed team for next season.

The 28-year-old was a seventh-round pick by Chicago back in 2012 and spent four years in their system, never advancing past the AHL level where he had a 3.35 GAA and a .896 SV% in 36 contests.  After his contract expired following the 2020-21 campaign, he went overseas, a decision that worked out well for him.

In 2021-22, Tomkins earned a spot on Canada’s roster for the Olympics where he got into three games before serving as their third-string goalie at the Worlds, making one appearance.  Those opportunities came on the heels of a strong season with Frolunda where he had a 2.46 GAA and a .908 SV% in 33 games.  This past season with Farjestad, his numbers were quite similar, checking in at 2.53 and .911, respectively while splitting time with Maple Leafs prospect Dennis Hildeby.

Considering his track record thus far, it seems reasonable to suggest that Tomkins will be getting a two-way contract wherever he winds up signing.  It’s unlikely that he’ll be in the mix for an NHL roster spot in training camp but if he can lock down a regular role in the minors, he could play himself into the recall mix when injuries arise.  That opportunity appears to be too good for him to pass up on, even if it means leaving what would have been a strong situation with Farjestad where he was in line to be the full-fledged starter with Hildeby leaving for North America early last month.

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