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Valtteri Filppula Announces Retirement

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16-year NHL veteran Valtteri Filppula has ended his playing career. Helsinki-based Jokerit of Finland’s second-tier league, Mestis, where he spent the 2024-25 campaign, made the announcement today.

Filppula, 41, hasn’t played in the NHL since the 2020-21 campaign but remained steadily active overseas. After a strong three-year run in Switzerland with Genève-Servette HC of the National League, he returned to Jokerit, where he began his professional career, last summer as player and part-owner.

Jokerit, a staple of top-flight Finnish hockey, joined Russia’s Kontinental Hockey League in the mid-2010s but withdrew from the league abruptly in 2022 following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. They were denied re-entry into the top-level Liiga and thus restarted play in Mestis in 2023-24. Filppula captained the team to a Mestis championship this season and finished second on the team in scoring with 14-27–41 in 39 games, but Jokerit dropped the Liiga relegation series against Pelicans and will thus remain in Mestis for 2025-26.

It was a mostly triumphant end to Filppula’s 22-year professional career. He made his Liiga (then the SM-liiga) debut with Jokerit in 2003-04, one year after the Red Wings selected him in the third round of the 2002 NHL draft. He led the league in rookie scoring that year and then reached the championship series in 2004-05 before heading to Detroit for 2005-06.

Filppula spent most of his first season in North America with AHL Grand Rapids, where he exploded out of the gate for a 20-50–70 scoring line in 74 games and was naturally a participant in the league’s All-Star Game. He earned a full-time role on the powerhouse Red Wings for 2006-07 and never looked back. The 6’0″ center played a key depth role in Detroit’s back-to-back Stanley Cup Final appearances in 2008 and 2009, winning the only ring of his career in the former year, recording 27 points and a +15 rating in 45 games across the two runs.

The left-shot pivot got more of a run in top-six minutes in the years to come, but his offense was hot and cold from year to year. After scoring 23 goals and a career-high 66 points for Detroit in 81 games in the 2011-12 campaign, he mustered just 17 points in 41 games in the lockout-shortened 2013 season, leading the team to let him walk in unrestricted free agency after the five-year, $15MM deal he signed in the 2008 offseason expired.

Filppula landed another five-year deal on the open market, receiving $25MM from the Lightning to stay in the Atlantic Division. His offensive production came roaring back, lighting the lamp a career-best 25 times in 75 games in 2013-14 while playing just south of 20 minutes per night. In Year 2 in Tampa, he played a crucial top-line role with Alex Killorn and Steven Stamkos as the Bolts marched to the Stanley Cup Final but lost to the Blackhawks. He scored 4-10–14 in 26 games in that playoff run.

His offense soon began to taper off for good. He never eclipsed the 20-goal mark again after that 25-goal season, and his last time hitting 40 points was in the 2016-17 campaign. He remained a capable defensive presence in dwindling minutes, though. After brief stints with the Flyers and Islanders in the late 2010s, Filppula hit the open market in 2019 and reunited with Detroit on a two-year, $6MM deal.

An aging Filppula understandably wasn’t much of an impact player, especially on a 2019-20 Red Wings squad that finished with the worst points percentage of any team in the salary cap era. After recording a 12-24–36 scoring line with a -43 rating in 108 games for the Wings over two seasons, Filppula opted to play out the remainder of his career in Europe.

Filppula was one of Switzerland’s premier talents in his three-year run in the NL, scoring 47-84–131 in 145 games with a +16 rating for Genève-Servette after signing there in 2021. He won a league title with the club in 2023 while leading the postseason in assists and won a Champions Hockey League title as the top club in Europe in 2024. Heading overseas at the time also allowed him to represent Finland in the 2022 Winter Olympics, where he recorded two assists in six games as captain and won a gold medal. He also won a gold medal at the World Championship that year, making him the only Finnish member and most recent entrant of the Triple Gold Club.

Filppula retires after scoring 197 goals, 333 assists, and 530 points in 1,056 career regular-season games. The ever-steady center also won 50.8% of his career faceoffs and ranks 34th in playoff scoring since the 2004-05 lockout with 86 points in 166 career postseason games. All of us at PHR wish Filppula the best in retirement.

Photo courtesy of Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports.

Connor Hellebuyck, Darcy Kuemper, Andrei Vasilevskiy Named Vezina Trophy Finalists

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Connor Hellebuyck of the Jets, Darcy Kuemper of the Kings, and Andrei Vasilevskiy of the Lightning have been selected as the NHL’s Vezina Trophy finalists as the league’s top goaltender for the 2024-25 season, the league announced today (X link).

Hellebuyck backstopped a Jets roster that faced some question marks at the beginning of the season to the franchise’s first Presidents’ Trophy, posting a league-best 47-12-3 record in his 62 starts and one relief appearance. It’s Hellebuyck’s third consecutive Vezina nomination, and it comes in conjunction with his second straight Jennings Trophy for tending the goal of the league’s stingiest defensive team on the whole.

Playoff performance so far notwithstanding, Hellebuyck’s regular-season numbers have him as the clear favorite to win the Vezina for the second year in a row and the third time in his career. That’s certainly a long way off from Jacques Plante’s record of seven, but he could be the first one to join the three-time club since Martin Brodeur won his third of four in 2007.

Hellebuyck led the league in goals against average (2.00), shutouts (eight), and goals saved above expected (39.6, per MoneyPuck). That’s the best figure a goalie has posted in a season since Juuse Saros posted a remarkable 46.7 GSAx in the 2022-23 campaign. Hellebuyck’s .925 SV% also ranks second among goalies who played 25 or more games, just one tick behind the Maple Leafs’ Anthony Stolarz. He’s not a finalist, but he will almost certainly be in the top 10 when the voting results are announced next month.

Vasilevskiy will likely finish as Hellebuyck’s runner-up. The Big Cat had a resurgent 2024-25 campaign after an unusually pedestrian showing in 2023-24, logging a .921 SV%, 2.18 GAA, six shutouts, and a 38-20-5 record in a league-high 63 starts. That .921 mark was Vasilevsky’s highest in four years, and the now five-time finalist also finished second in the league behind Hellebuyck with 29.2 goals saved above expected. That’s also a career-high for the 30-year-old.

Kuemper, 34, also exploded for a bounce-back season. After struggling over the first two seasons of the five-year, $26.25MM pact he signed with the Capitals in free agency following his Stanley Cup win with the Avalanche in 2022, Washington traded him to the Kings in a swap of anchor contracts for Pierre-Luc Dubois. Now a clear win-win deal, Kuemper posted a 31-11-7 record in 50 starts for L.A. and posted a .921 SV%, 2.02 GAA, and five shutouts for his best numbers since his Cup-winning campaign. He’s a Vezina finalist for the first time in his 13-year career after finishing fifth and seventh in voting in 2019 and 2020, respectively, while a member of the Coyotes.

Photo courtesy of James Carey Lauder-Imagn Images.

Panthers Matthew Tkachuk Avoids Suspension

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Florida Panthers forward Matthew Tkachuk will not face any supplemental discipline for his late-game hit on Tampa Bay Lightning forward Jake Guentzel in game three. Despite Tkachuk receiving a five-minute major for interference on the hit, the NHL has determined no additional punishment is justified. As Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman notes, the reasons could be related to several factors, including there being no head contact and that Guentzel did touch the puck prior to the hit.

Tkachuk’s hit drew the ire of multiple Lightning players, including captain Victor Hedman. He told reporters following the game, including Eduardo A. Encina of the Tampa Bay Times, that the timing of the hit was also questionable, as the Lightning were in the process of scoring an empty net goal to make the score 5-1. Hedman added that the team can’t control what actions are or are not worthy of suspension.

Brandon Hagel Receives One-Game Suspension

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Down 2-0 in their opening-round series to Florida, the Lightning will be without one of their top wingers for Saturday’s game as the league announced late Friday that Brandon Hagel received a one-game suspension for his hit on Aleksander Barkov on Thursday.

The incident occurred just before the midway mark of the third period with Hagel receiving a major penalty for interference on the play but not a game misconduct.  Barkov left the game and did not return; head coach Paul Maurice revealed Friday that the center hasn’t been ruled out or in for tonight’s contest.

In the video explaining the decision, the Department of Player Safety noted that supplemental discipline was warranted because Barkov was never in possession of the puck and therefore was not eligible to be checked.  After the puck was well past the players, Hagel delivered “a high, hard body check that makes some head contact.”

Hagel made the case that he approached the play as if Barkov would eventually play the puck as it came to him, but the ruling stated that “the onus is on Hagel to ensure that the player he is hitting is eligible to be checked” and that he intentionally delivered “an extremely forceful body check to an unsuspecting opponent with sufficient force.”

This is Hagel’s first career suspension in 375 regular-season and 36 playoff games. However, it’s not his first supplemental discipline for a playoff incident against the Panthers as he was fined for boarding Florida’s Eetu Luostarinen back in May 2022.

Lightning's Yanni Gourde And Anthony Cirelli Good To Go

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  • Tampa Bay Lightning fans can breathe a sigh of relief after head coach Jon Cooper shared that both Yanni Gourde and Anthony Cirelli are expected to stay in the lineup, per NHL.com’s Benjamin Pierce. Both players missed Friday morning’s practice for undisclosed reasons. Neither player has found any scoring through two playoff games so far, though they’ve continued to serve physical roles from the team’s second-line. The band could be without their third in Tampa Bay’s next matchup, with left-winger Brandon Hagel facing a suspension after a dirty hit on Florida Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov.

Lightning’s Brandon Hagel Facing Suspension

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Lightning winger Brandon Hagel will have a player safety hearing today for his major interference penalty against Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov in last night’s loss, the league announced.

Officials upheld the major for Hagel after reviewing the play, which occurred midway through the third period of Tampa’s eventual 2-0 loss in Game 2. While Hagel was forechecking on Barkov as the puck got dumped into the Tampa zone, he delivered a huge check as the two neared the corner. While there wasn’t a ton of head contact and the mechanics of the hit appeared rather clean, there was one problem – Barkov never had nor came close to having possession of the puck, resulting in a five-minute power play for the Cats (video via Sportsnet). Barkov didn’t return to the game after the collision, and the team has yet to issue an update on his status for Game 3 in Sunrise on Saturday.

Generally, supplemental discipline for interference doesn’t result in particularly long suspensions. That should hold true, especially considering the time of year, but Barkov leaving the game doesn’t bode well for Hagel’s case to walk away with just a fine. After scoring a career-high 35 goals in the regular season and setting the all-time record for goals in a season without a power-play marker, Hagel has no points and a minus-four rating through two games against Florida.

The 26-year-old isn’t the only one struggling to produce. Only Jake Guentzel and Brayden Point have scored for the Bolts thus far, and notable secondary names like Anthony Cirelli and Nick Paul have yet to record a point. Still, potentially missing him for Game 3 as the series shifts to South Florida will certainly make life harder for the higher-seeded Lightning as they try to avoid going down 3-0 in the series against the defending Stanley Cup champions.

Anthony Cirelli Will Be Game-Time Decision For Game 2

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Lightning center Anthony Cirelli is a game-time decision for Game 2 vs. Florida tonight after departing Game 1 early with an undisclosed injury, tweets Colby Guy of the Palm Beach Post. It’s not yet certain whether Cirelli will participate in warm-ups. He initially left the game early in the second period after awkwardly landing a hit and only came back for a couple of shifts before sitting out the third period. If he’s not able to go for Game 2, it doesn’t look like he’ll carry anything more serious than a day-to-day designation and shouldn’t be ruled out when the series shifts to Sunrise for Game 3. Cirelli was a minus-two with just one shot on goal in 6:21 of action Tuesday, a rare statline for one of the league’s best two-way centers. Now in his eighth year in Tampa, Cirelli had a career-best +30 rating, 27 goals, and 59 points in the regular season.

Oliver Bjorkstrand Confirmed Out For Round One

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  • Tampa Bay Lightning head coach Jon Cooper confirmed that trade deadline acquisition Oliver Bjorkstrand won’t be available for the team’s Round One matchup against the Florida Panthers (Tweet Link). Bjorkstrand sustained a lower-body injury a few days ago, and his Round One availability was in doubt, given that his recovery timeline was designated as week-to-week. The Herning, Denmark native scored five goals and nine points in 18 games for the Lightning after being acquired from the Seattle Kraken before the trade deadline.

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David Savard To Retire Following Season

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Canadiens defenseman David Savard will retire whenever Montreal’s time in the postseason ends, he confirmed to reporters today (including Renaud Lavoie of TVA Sports).

Savard, 34, will close the book on an 870-game career spanning 14 seasons. It began at the 2009 draft, when the Blue Jackets selected him in the fourth round from the QMJHL’s Moncton Wildcats. An elder statesman for his draft year, thanks to his October birthday, the defensive-minded defender had still managed 44 points in 68 games in his draft year with a +29 rating. Combined with his 6’1″, 234-lb frame as a right-shot defender, it’s surprising at first glance that he slipped that far in the draft.

In turn, his development path quickly outpaced that of the average fourth-round pick. Savard erupted for over a point per game the following year with Moncton, earning QMJHL Defensive Defenseman of the Year honors while also leading the league’s blue liners in scoring. That landed him his entry-level deal with Columbus, and he joined the team’s AHL affiliate, then the Springfield Falcons, for the 2010-11 campaign.

Savard spent most of his three-year rookie deal in the minors, although he did appear in 35 NHL games in limited minutes during that span. After posting 97 points in 176 minor-league games with a +12 rating, Savard entered Blue Jackets camp in 2013-14 looking to land a full-time role after inking his qualifying offer over the summer. He achieved his goal. While he wasn’t yet a top-four force, he avoided an AHL assignment that year and hasn’t touched minor-league ice since. Following a five-goal, 15-point performance in 70 regular-season games and an exceptional postseason showing in Columbus’ first-round loss to the Penguins, the Jackets signed Savard to a two-year, $2.6MM bridge deal.

That was quite the prudent decision from former Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekäläinen. Savard had the best season of his career in 2014-15, serving as the team’s No. 2 defenseman behind Jack Johnson while posting an 11-25–36 scoring line in 82 games. He led the Jackets with 195 hits to boot and posted an even rating on a streaky Jackets team that finished with a -21 goal differential and missed the playoffs. That was also Savard’s first season averaging over 19 minutes per game, a mark he’d eclipse in every following season until this year.

Before leading Blue Jackets defensemen in scoring in 2015-16 with 25 points in 65 games, Savard agreed to the first long-term deal of his career: a five-year, $21.25MM commitment to keep him in Columbus through the 2020-21 season. He continued to serve as the Jackets’ premier shutdown defenseman for most of that contract, including a team-leading +33 rating when the Jackets recorded the only 50-win season in franchise history in the 2016-17 campaign.

Coming out of the pandemic, Savard’s game nosedived in the final year of his deal. He managed just six points and a -19 rating in 40 games for Columbus in the shortened 2021 season, and with the Jackets entering a rebuild, there wasn’t a path toward an extension. They retained some of his salary and traded him to the Lightning before the deadline, ending his time in Columbus after nearly 10 seasons with the club.

Savard’s time in Tampa was short but fruitful. He continued to struggle down the stretch in the regular season and had his minutes slashed in the playoffs, averaging just 14 minutes per game in third-pairing duties with Mikhail Sergachev. His play improved when he was lower in the lineup, posting five assists and an even rating in 20 games as he helped the Bolts win their second consecutive championship.

A free agent the following offseason, Savard inked a four-year, $14MM contract with the Canadiens – the team he defeated in the 2021 Stanley Cup Final – to help fill the void left by captain Shea Weber hanging up the skates due to multiple injuries. While Savard’s possession impacts lacked in Montreal on a team that’s failed to control possession well during his tenure, the Quebec native has been a vital leadership figure as the Habs continue to graduate younger rearguards into NHL minutes. With his regular-season career now behind him, he posted 13-63–76 and a -45 rating across 259 appearances for Montreal, averaging 19:50 per game.

Savard had averaged over 20 minutes per game in his first three seasons with the Canadiens but saw his minutes slashed to 16:35 per game in 2024-25, slipping down the depth chart behind Lane Hutson, Kaiden Guhle, and Alexandre Carrier. That, plus the toll injuries have taken over the past few years, likely influenced his decision to step away from the game. Lavoie adds that Savard informed Montreal’s front office of his intent to retire a few weeks ago.

He ends his career with 54-188–242 and a -29 rating in 870 career regular-season games. Despite spending the last four-plus years of his career elsewhere, Savard’s 597 games played in a Blue Jackets uniform still rank fifth in franchise history and first among defensemen, although Zach Werenski will eclipse that record next season, barring injury. All of us at Pro Hockey Rumors congratulate Savard on his lengthy career and wish him the best in his future endeavors.

Photo courtesy of Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports.

Lightning Recall Cam Atkinson

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  • The Tampa Bay Lightning have recalled veteran depth forward Cam Atkinson. The move comes after fourth-line forward Mitchell Chaffee was banged up in the team’s Tuesday win over the Florida Panthers. Atkinson has been assigned to the minors on multiple occasions but hasn’t played in any AHL contests. His only hockey this season has come from 38 games in the Tampa Bay lineup, where he’s recorded nine points, eleven penalty minutes, and a minus-four. Atkinson may need to fill Chaffee’s depth role in Tampa Bay’s Thursday finale against the New York Rangers. Chaffee has 12 goals and 18 points in 66 games this season.
  • Speaking of Chaffee, Florida Panthers winger Jesse Puljujarvi is set to have a DoPS hearing for an illegal check to the Lightning forward’s head on Tuesday. Puljujarvi hasn’t yet received any discipline from DoPS in his eight-year NHL career. He’s playing with his fourth NHL club in the last three years in Florida, and has one goal and 15 penalty minutes in five games. Puljujarvi earned his call-up to the Panthers lineup after recording 12 points in 20 games with the AHL’s Charlotte Checkers. He’ll be one of many options the team has as they enter the postseason, though any lineup role would be minimal.

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