Penguins, Sabres Swap Bennett MacArthur, Colton Poolman
The Penguins traded winger Bennett MacArthur to the Sabres on Friday in exchange for defenseman Colton Poolman, both teams confirmed. The swap of minor-leaguers comes in conjunction with a corresponding trade between Pittsburgh’s and Buffalo’s AHL affiliates in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton and Rochester, which saw 25-year-old winger Jagger Joshua head from WBS to the Sabres’ system for future considerations.
MacArthur’s short stint in the Penguins organization comes to an end with the move. An undrafted free agent signing by the Lightning in 2022, the 23-year-old spent most of his time in the ECHL before the Bolts traded him to Pittsburgh for Lukas Svejkovsky last June. Svejkovsky and Tampa Bay have since mutually terminated his contract.
As he had in Tampa, MacArthur failed to crack the AHL roster in the Penguins organization. He’s spent the entirety of this season on assignment to ECHL Wheeling, where he’s struggled immensely with only three goals and seven points in 28 appearances. He had 32 points in 55 games for ECHL Orlando and Allen last season while under contract with the Lightning.
MacArthur will report to the Sabres’ AHL affiliate in Rochester for now, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see him assigned to their ECHL affiliate in Jacksonville in short order. The Prince Edward Island native will be a restricted free agent this summer and has no points in six career AHL games with the Syracuse Crunch.
Coming to Pennsylvania is Poolman, the younger brother of LTIR-bound Avalanche defenseman Tucker Poolman. The 29-year-old inked a two-way deal with Buffalo over the summer after four seasons in the Flames organization but hasn’t established himself as a regular in Rochester, logging just one assist and a -2 rating in five appearances thus far.
He heads to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton in search of more playing time, while the Pens organization hopes he can rediscover the strong stay-at-home play he exhibited with the Flames’ AHL affiliates in Stockton and Calgary. He’s two years removed from a career-high 14-point, +18 rating season in 64 games.
Hurricanes Activate Jack Drury From Injured Reserve
The Hurricanes took center Jack Drury off injured reserve on Friday, according to the team. Carolina reassigned winger Juha Jaaska to AHL Chicago in a corresponding transaction. Their active roster count remains at 23.
Drury, 24, has been out since Dec. 10 after undergoing hand surgery as a result of a blocked shot in the first period of a game against the Sharks. Head coach Rod Brind’Amour told reporters one week later that his surgery would keep him out for at least four weeks. Instead, Drury returns to the active roster two and a half weeks after surgery and three and a half weeks past the initial injury.
The Hurricanes only placed Drury on injured reserve on Monday when they needed roster space to recall defenseman Riley Stillman in the wake of Shayne Gostisbehere‘s upper-body injury. Since the placement was retroactive to the date of his initial injury and he’d already been out for more than seven days, Drury was eligible to come off IR at any time.
Drury skated in 28 games for Carolina before landing on IR, posting three goals and six assists for nine points with a +4 rating. He averaged 13:09 per game, a career-high aside from a two-game stint in 2021-22, and is on pace to win a career-best 56.4% of his draws.
Carolina will have Drury back in the lineup tomorrow when they host the Wild, presumably in a fourth-line role between Jackson Blake and Eric Robinson. He’s spent the vast majority of the season with at least one of that pair on his wings.
Meanwhile, Jaaska returns to the AHL after making his NHL debut in last night’s win over the Panthers. He logged 13 shifts for 8:21 of ice time, shifting to center and winning four out of five draws while recording three hits.
The Hurricanes signed Jaaska, 26, to a one-year entry-level contract worth $850K back in April after he spent the previous nine seasons with Finland’s HIFK. He has seven goals and nine assists for 16 points in 25 AHL games this season.
Bruins Sign Mark Kastelic To Three-Year Extension
The Bruins signed depth forward Mark Kastelic to a three-year, $4.7MM extension on Friday, according to a team release. The deal carries a $1.57MM cap hit and keeps him in Boston through the 2027-28 campaign.
With the signing, Kastelic earns the most lucrative contract of his career and will earn seven figures per season for the first time. The 25-year-old was in the final season of a two-year, $1.67MM extension he signed with the Senators in 2022 before they traded him to the Bruins in the Linus Ullmark deal last June.
The Phoenix native has been a good fit in Boston, already setting a new career-high in assists with seven through 39 games. His 11 points are also tied with his previous career high, set in Ottawa in 65 games in 2022-23, and he’s averaging a career-best 11:27 per game while winning 55.2% of his faceoffs.
Kastelic, a natural center, stands at 6’4″ and 227 lbs and has been one of the league’s most physical players. He leads the league outright with 76 PIMs and ranks second with 151 hits, on pace to record a whopping 317 over a full season.
That physicality has led to some pretty spectacular defensive numbers for Kastelic. He’s centered a fourth line between Cole Koepke and John Beecher for a good portion of the campaign, a unit that’s controlled 65% of expected goals in 168 minutes together, per MoneyPuck. Among forward lines with at least 150 minutes of ice time this season, that Koepke-Kastelic-Beecher line has yielded just 1.25 xGA/60, the best in the league by a significant margin.
It would be shocking if that play keeps up on a year-to-year basis, but it’s still rightfully earned Kastelic a multi-year commitment to stick with a situation that’s been a win for both sides so far. Kastelic avoids reaching restricted free agency next summer and will walk to unrestricted free agency upon expiry in 2028.
Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.
Maple Leafs Reclaim Dakota Mermis Off Waivers From Utah
Jan. 3: The Maple Leafs reclaimed Mermis off waivers from Utah on Friday, PuckPedia reports. The team later announced that he’s been reassigned to the AHL, indicating they were the only team to submit a claim.
Jan. 2: The Utah Hockey Club placed defenseman Dakota Mermis on waivers on Thursday with intent to assign him to AHL Tucson, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports.
The placement could spell the end of Mermis’ brief tenure in the Beehive State. The club claimed him off waivers from the Maple Leafs on Dec. 12 when Toronto was attempting to sneak him to their AHL affiliate on a permanent assignment after a weeks-long conditioning stint.
Mermis, 30, ended up playing just one game for Utah, logging a -2 rating in 10:47 of ice time against the Ducks on Dec. 22. He was a healthy scratch on eight other occasions before landing on the waiver wire today.
When they claimed Mermis, Utah needed some veteran help to offset injuries to Robert Bortuzzo and Maveric Lamoureux on the back end, in addition to previous IR placements for Sean Durzi and John Marino. With Bortuzzo set to return tonight against the Flames after missing nearly a month with a lower-body injury, though, Mermis’ services as a healthy extra were no longer needed.
Bortuzzo was on IR, so Utah needs to open up a roster spot for his return. Mermis can’t clear the roster until tomorrow, so they’ll likely place netminder Connor Ingram, who’s been out since Nov. 18 with an upper-body injury, on IR retroactively to accommodate Bortuzzo’s activation.
Mermis inked a one-year, one-way deal with the Leafs in free agency but never suited up for them thanks to a jaw injury he sustained in training camp. If Toronto wants him back and is the only team to submit a claim, they may send him directly to the AHL without placing him on waivers again.
Now in his eighth NHL season, Mermis has accumulated 12 points and a +3 rating in 75 career games. A career-high 47 of those appearances came last season with the Wild, just the second time in his career he logged double-digit games and mostly avoided AHL assignments.
Maple Leafs Place Auston Matthews On IR
Jan. 3: Rifai is back to the minors today, the team announced. Ekman-Larsson is fully recovered from his illness, so Rifai’s services as a healthy extra are no longer needed. There’s no corresponding move, so the Leafs free up a roster spot.
Dec. 31: The Toronto Maple Leafs needed available depth before their matchup against the New York Islanders this afternoon requiring a formal roster move. The team announced they’ve placed Auston Matthews on injured reserve (retroactive to Dec. 20th) and recalled defenseman Marshall Rifai from their AHL affiliate, the Toronto Marlies.
Hindering any new concerns regarding Matthews’ injury, the Maple Leafs also announced defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson and forward Pontus Holmberg won’t play today because of the flu. Matthews is eligible to return from the injured reserve at any point but two additional players sidelined necessitated a formal roster move.
There’s no expectation Matthews has suffered a setback in his road back from an upper-body injury. He’s missed five straight games after missing nine earlier in the year but has recently returned to skating.
Still, there should be some concern about Matthews’ constant slate of injuries this season. He’s still been his normal self when healthy scoring 11 goals and 23 points in 24 games this year but his availability is important first and foremost. Thankfully for Toronto, they performed well without their captain this season as they’re one win away from tying the Florida Panthers for the lead in the Atlantic Division.
Although he didn’t suit up in his first go-around, the roster move is the second time Rifai has enjoyed an NHL call-up this month. He’ll likely know by warm-ups if he’ll be in the lineup tonight but Toronto still has six healthy defensemen without Ekman-Larsson.
The Harvard University alumnus has been a serviceable defenseman for the Marlies for the past three years and made his NHL debut with the Maple Leafs last year. He’s registered eight goals and 39 points in 150 career games for AHL Toronto.
Senators Reassign Nikolas Matinpalo
The Senators announced Friday that they’ve reassigned defenseman Nikolas Matinpalo to AHL Belleville. With no corresponding transaction, Ottawa’s active roster is now at 22 players.
Matinpalo, 26, had been on the Senators’ roster since last weekend. He’s been around as an extra option on and off over the past few weeks with Artem Zub sidelined with a foot fracture, but after the Russian veteran returned to action last night against the Stars, his services are no longer needed.
Now in his second season in North America, Matinpalo made his season debut on this latest recall, skating 10:24 and taking a minor penalty in a win over the Wild on Dec. 29. The stay-at-home defender has spent most of the campaign in Belleville, where he has two goals and five assists for seven points with 10 PIMs and a minus-four rating.
Checking in at 6’3″ and 212 lbs, Matinpalo arrived in Ottawa in the summer of 2023 as an undrafted free agent signing from Finland’s Ässät. He skated in four contests for the Sens last year in a depth role, logging a plus-one rating and a pair of shots on goal while averaging a paltry seven minutes per game. He was quite effective in a shutdown role in the minors, posting a team-high +15 rating in 67 games for the B-Sens along with 14 points.
Matinpalo became waiver-eligible this season. Since he’s been rostered for under 30 days and played fewer than 10 NHL games since clearing during the preseason, he doesn’t need them again for today’s transaction.
Maple Leafs Sign Philippe Myers To Two-Year Extension
The Maple Leafs signed defenseman Philippe Myers to a two-year, $1.7MM extension on Friday, per a team release. The deal carries an $850K cap hit for the 2025-26 and 2026-27 campaigns while keeping him off next summer’s unrestricted free agent market. It’s paid entirely in base salary each season with no signing bonuses, per PuckPedia.
Myers, 27, has skated in a semi-regular role for Toronto over the last month and a half. After serving as a scratch in all but one of the Leafs’ first 23 games, he’s played in 10 out of 16 contests since the beginning of December, including a five-game run at the beginning of last month and suiting up in both of their wins against the Islanders over the past few days.
It’s the most extended leash the 6’5″ righty has seen at the NHL level in over two years. He played in 11 games with the Lightning over the first two months of the 2022-23 campaign before they waived him and assigned him to the AHL for the remainder of the season, and his five games with Tampa in the 2023-24 campaign came over multiple short-term call-ups.
Myers has skated almost exclusively alongside Morgan Rielly in his 11 appearances this season, posting two assists and a +1 rating while averaging 17:08 per game. The duo has worked quite well together, controlling 59% of expected goals – tops among Leafs pairings with at least 50 minutes together, per MoneyPuck.
Early on, Myers has shown he can be the fringe top-four option he once was in the early days of his career with the Flyers, at least when used with a more offensively-inclined partner. Toronto’s front office evidently agrees, opting to keep him around as an affordable depth option for the next two seasons.
Weighing in at 219 lbs, Myers has been one of the Leafs’ most physical options on the blue line as well. His 9.23 hits per 60 minutes rank second among Toronto defenders, just behind Simon Benoit‘s 9.54.
At the very least, Myers has seemed to establish a floor as a reliable extra defender and will look to stick around as a roster fixture after spending parts of the last four seasons in the minors. A multi-year, one-way commitment is a big step toward solidifying that.
It’s also a good return on investment for Toronto, who inked him to a one-year, one-way deal worth $775K over the summer despite him spending all but a handful of games last season in the AHL. He has logged three games for the AHL’s Toronto Marlies this season, posting a +2 rating, but they came on a conditioning stint in November, not a full-on demotion.
Myers becomes the seventh defenseman under contract on a one-way deal next season for Toronto, joining Rielly, Benoit, Chris Tanev, Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Jake McCabe, and Marshall Rifai. He’ll be a UFA upon expiry in 2027.
Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.
Snapshots: Landeskog, Francis, Hurricanes, Maccelli
Avalanche winger Gabriel Landeskog skated before practice today, notes Aarif Deen of Colorado Hockey Now. The captain hasn’t played since the sixth game of the Stanley Cup Final back in 2022 due to continued knee trouble including a cartilage transplant in May 2023. While this isn’t the first time Landeskog has taken to the ice before practice, it’s the first time he has done so since mid-November as he suffered a setback at that time. There remains no timetable for him to return but Landeskog has noted a few times this year that he hopes to get back into the Colorado lineup at some point this season.
Elsewhere around the hockey world:
- The University of Minnesota-Duluth announced (Twitter link) that Ducks prospect Will Francis had a relapse of his leukemia which is why he has been limited to just three games so far this season. Francis was initially diagnosed with it in 2020 and had a relapse in August 2023, leading to a bone marrow transplant back in April. Francis is hoping to return to the team next month. PHR wishes Francis well in his continued battle.
- The Hurricanes announced that defenseman Riley Stillman has been sent back to AHL Chicago. The 26-year-old has been sent back and forth this season but hasn’t seen any action with Carolina. Stillman has four points in nine contests with the Wolves. Meanwhile, Carolina has also recalled goalie Dustin Tokarski, defenseman Ty Smith, and winger Jackson Blake from Chicago, per the AHL transactions log. The three were papered to the minors on Wednesday.
- Utah announced (Twitter link) that winger Matias Maccelli was scratched from tonight’s game against Calgary due to an illness. After putting up 57 points last season, the 24-year-old has struggled mightily offensively this year, potting just three goals and seven assists through his first 37 outings. There was some good news on the health front, however, as Clayton Keller returned after missing Tuesday’s game to an illness himself.
Golden Knights Place Ivan Barbashev On IR, Recall Tanner Laczynski
The Vegas Golden Knights have moved forward Ivan Barbashev to injured reserve, retroactive to December 16th, per Danny Webster of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Barbshev has missed Vegas’ last six games with an upper-body injury, after leaving the team’s December 15th matchup at the end of the first period. He didn’t appear to sustain a noticeable injury, leaving the question of where or how Barbashev suffered his now multi-week injury up in the air. A retroactive IR placement will allow Vegas to activate Barbashev as soon as he returns to full health.
In the mean time, the Golden Knights have also brought forward Tanner Laczynski back to the NHL roster. The move comes just four days after Vegas moved Laczynski back to the minor leagues, ending his previous recall at 11 days. Laczynski stepped into his first five games of the season before being sent down. He didn’t manage any scoring, but did record six penalty minutes and a -1, while serving on Vegas’ fourth line. They were Laczynski’s first five games as a member of the Golden Knights. He spent the first three seasons of his NHL career with the Philadelphia Flyers, who drafted him in the sixth round of the 2016 NHL Draft. Serving primarily as a depth fill-in, Laczynski totaled 38 games with the Flyers – 32 of those coming last season, when he netted the first four points of his NHL career. He’s otherwise been a career minor-leaguer, combining for 94 points across 111 games, and five seasons, in the AHL.
Laczynski has performed well enough to hold down Vegas’ fourth line, but the Golden Knights are still sincerely missing Barbashev’s production. The bulky Russian has 30 points, split evenly, in 31 games this season – placing Barbashev in a three-way tie for second on the team in scoring, alongisde Mark Stone and Shea Theodore. Barbashev is on an 82-game pace of 79 points, which would smash his previous career-high in scoring: 60 points set with the St. Louis Blues in 2021-22. He’ll need to return soon to continue chasing that milestone, but should immediately step back into the top-six when he is healthy again.
Predators Recall Spencer Stastney, Ozzy Wiesblatt
The Predators recalled defenseman Spencer Stastney and right-winger Ozzy Wiesblatt from AHL Milwaukee on Thursday, per the AHL’s transactions log (stick taps to Nick Kieser of 102.5 The Game). Nashville had a pair of open roster spots, so no corresponding transaction is necessary.
Stastney, 25 on Saturday, returns to the NHL after suiting up in 20 regular-season and three playoff games for the Preds last season. He wasn’t at this season’s training camp due to personal reasons, though, an absence that stretched until late November.
Upon his return, the Preds sent Stastney to Milwaukee to get back up to game speed. There, the 2018 fifth-round pick has three assists and a +2 rating through 10 games, not quite matching the impact he had last season with 20 points and a +27 rating in only 44 AHL appearances.
In his NHL minutes last season, Stastney showed he could be a capable bottom-pairing presence. He posted a pair of goals and assists with a +9 rating, averaging just south of 16 minutes per game and blocking 29 shots.
Checking in at 6’0″ and 183 lbs, Stastney controlled 51.9% of shot attempts and 59.3% of expected goals when he was on the ice at even strength last year. They’ll be looking for him to do more of the same in a bottom-pairing role while Jeremy Lauzon and Adam Wilsby sit out with injuries.
If Wiesblatt draws into the lineup tomorrow against the Canucks – not a given since Nashville has 12 healthy forwards without him – it would mark his NHL debut. A first-round pick of the Sharks in 2020, the Preds acquired him in exchange for pending RFA Egor Afanasyev in June. Afanasyev opted not to sign with San Jose and head overseas, while Wiesblatt inked a two-year, two-way extension in November in addition to playing out the final season of his entry-level contract this year.
The 22-year-old hasn’t been an offensive factor like the Sharks initially hoped in the minors, and that hasn’t changed much this season. Wiesblatt has been just fine, posting 14 points and 45 PIMs in 27 games for Milwaukee. That 0.52 points per game pace is a career-high in the minors for Wiesblatt, who’s now in his third AHL season.
Neither Stastney nor Wiesblatt will need to clear waivers if they’re sent back down to Milwaukee.