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Penguins Sign Mikhail Ilyin To Entry-Level Contract

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The Penguins have reached an agreement with one of their prospects, announcing on Saturday that they signed Mikhail Ilyin to a three-year, entry-level contract.  PuckPedia reports that the agreement will carry a cap hit of $851,667.

The 20-year-old winger was a fifth-round pick by Pittsburgh in 2023, being selected 142nd overall.  At the time, he had primarily played at Russia’s MHL level but in 2023-24, that changed as he put up 12 goals and 17 assists in 64 games with KHL Severstal Cherepovets with his only MHL playing time coming in the playoffs.

This year, it was more of the same.  Ilyin played in 65 games with Severstal and while his goal total dipped to seven, he improved in the assist department as he collected 23 of those.  He played just twice in the MHL, notching four helpers.

It would be surprising if Ilyin was in the plans to play regularly in Pittsburgh in 2025-26.  It’s not often that Russian players play regularly in the AHL either at this stage of their career so it wouldn’t be surprising to see Ilyin loaned back to Cherepovets for next season.

Alexander Petrovic Clears Waivers, Assigned To AHL

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1:20 PM: Petrovic cleared waivers and has been assigned to AHL Texas, the team announced.  Dallas also reassigned goaltender Ben Kraws to Texas.

11:49 AM: The Dallas Stars aren’t done managing their rosters just yet. They’ve placed defenseman Alexander Petrovic on waivers for purpose of assignment to the minor leagues, per PuckPedia. Petrovic appeared in 17 of Dallas’ 18 postseason games. He recorded two points, four penalty minutes, and a minus-one while operating from a bottom-pair role.

Petrovic had only played in five NHL games before the start of the postseason. He spent the rest of his season with the AHL’s Texas Stars – netting 25 points, 66 penalty minutes, and a plus-eight through 58 games. It was a step up in production from the 22 points, 40 penalty minutes, and minus-six Petrovic recorded in 70 games last season. Dallas brought him on their postseason run for the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs as well, though he didn’t manage any scoring in seven playoff games.

The 6-foot-5, 211-pound Petrovic is a seasoned-in vet of the pro leagues. He had an extended run in the NHL from 2014 to 2019, but found more footing in a minor-league role starting in the 2019-20 season. Petrovic moved to Texas in the 2021-22 season and has become a staple of the minor-league Stars’ blue-line. He’ll get a chance to return to his top-end role now that Dallas has been eliminated from Stanley Cup contention.

The Texas Stars are currently down 2-0 to the Abbotsford Canucks in the AHL’s Western Conference Finals. It’s been a tight-fought series, with Game 1 settled in overtime and Game 2 decided by a 1-0 scoreline. It’s also getting chippier by the moment, and adding the hard-hitting presence of Petrovic could be the piece that tilts things back in Texas’ favor.

Seattle Kraken Sign Josh Mahura To Two-Year Contract

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The Seattle Kraken announced they’ve signed defenseman Josh Mahura to a two-year contract through the 2026-27 NHL season. The announcement indicated that Mahura will earn an AAV of $907.5K during the contract, meaning the total deal will be for $1.815MM.

Mahura recently wrapped up his first season with the Kraken. The former Anaheim Duck and Florida Panther became an unrestricted free agent last offseason after the Panthers denied an opportunity to qualify him, allowing him to sign with Seattle on the third day of the free agency period.

Still, he didn’t make the Kraken out of training camp. The team passed him through waivers on October 5th, shortly before the start of the 2024-25 season. Fortunately for the team, Mahura went through unclaimed, giving the Kraken some much-needed flexibility with his one-way contract.

Mahura only had to wait until the third game of the regular season to debut with Seattle, and he enjoyed another two extended stays on the roster after. The Kraken largely used him as a depth option, tallying nine assists in 64 games with a +5 rating while averaging 13:45 of ice time per night. It was Mahura’s highest games played total since 2022-23, when he scored four goals and 16 points in 82 games with Florida.

Seattle will enter the offseason with a largely intact defensive core, so Mahura should expect much of the same next season. He’s a quality option who can play on both sides of the blue line and can hold his own on the defensive side of the puck, as evidenced by his 91.7% on-ice save percentage at even strength.

Avalanche Sign Ilya Nabokov To Entry-Level Contract

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5:19 p.m.: Nabokov won’t be heading to North America quite yet. Rawal reported that although the Avalanche have signed Nabokov to his entry-level contract, he’ll spend the 2025-26 season on loan with KHL Metallurg.

3:02 p.m.: As hinted at yesterday by Evan Rawal of the Denver Gazette, the Colorado Avalanche have followed through in signing their highest-rated goaltending prospect. Colorado announced they’ve signed netminder Ilya Nabokov to a two-year entry-level contract through the 2026-27 season.

The Avalanche selected Nabokov 38th overall in the 2024 NHL Draft, making him the first netminder off the board. He went to an organization that desperately needed him.

Colorado corrected many of their goaltending woes this year by swapping out Alexandar Georgiev and Justus Annunen for Mackenzie Blackwood and Scott Wedgewood. Especially in the Georgiev for Blackwood swap, the Avalanche traded a goaltender with a .874 SV% and 3.38 GAA in 18 games for a netminder that finished the season with a .913 SV% and 2.33 GAA in 37 games in Colorado.

Still, Blackwood’s performance hasn’t diminished the team’s excitement about Nabokov. The Kasli, Russia native compiled a 23-13-3 record in 43 games, boasting a .930 SV% and 2.15 GAA, throughout his draft year with the KHL’s Metallurg Magnitogorsk. That performance in the world’s arguably third-best professional league could have garnered first-round interest in Nabokov.

If the regular season didn’t show his promise, the 2023-24 Gagarin Cup playoffs did. Nabokov backstopped Metallurg to their third Gagarin Cup championship, managing a 16-6-0 record throughout the postseason with a .924 SV%, including four shutouts.

Considering the early-season goaltending struggles, there were some rumblings that the Avalanche could seek to pull Nabokov from the KHL sooner rather than later. Still, the team opted to leave him overseas for the 2024-25 KHL season, and he had another impressive year.

Continuing with Metallurg, Nabokov finished with a 23-17-6 record in 49 contests with a .923 SV% and 2.22 GAA, with three shutouts. Assuming the Avalanche stick with the Blackwood/Wedgewood tandem for the 2025-26 season, Nabokov will likely start with their AHL affiliate, the Colorado Eagles, while being a recall candidate should one of the former succumb to an injury.

Mammoth Sign Gabe Smith To Entry-Level Contract

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The Mammoth announced they’ve signed center prospect Gabe Smith to a three-year, entry-level contract. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Utah selected Smith, who turns 19 in August, as part of their first draft class in franchise history last year. They took the hulking 6’5″, 207-lb pivot in the fourth round from the QMJHL’s Moncton Wildcats.

Smith, while drafted for his upside as a bottom-six checking center, has had something of an offensive breakthrough after returning to Moncton this season. After scoring nine goals and 23 points in 54 games last year, he upped those numbers to 20 goals and 39 points in 52 regular-season appearances with a +23 rating. He’s been on another level with the Wildcats in the postseason, though. He ranked second on the team in playoff scoring with a 6-16–22 line in 19 games, along with a team-high +15 rating, as Moncton won its first QMJHL championship in 15 years. He’s also posted two goals and two assists in three games thus far for the Wildcats at the Memorial Cup.

Needless to say, Smith’s stock has grown tremendously in the 11 months since he was drafted. He’s not a candidate for an NHL job in the fall, though, so his entry-level deal will slide to the 2026-27 season before taking effect. The contract will expire following the 2028-29 campaign, after which he’ll be a restricted free agent.

It’s been a busy week for the Mammoth, who also came to terms with 2023 Coyotes first-round picks Daniil But and Dmitri Simashev on entry-level deals to bring them to North America for 2025-26.

Sharks, Andrew Poturalski To Mutually Terminate Contract

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The Sharks and center Andrew Poturalski are headed for a mutual contract termination, the club announced Friday (via Curtis Pashelka of the Bay Area News Group). He’s presumably been placed on unconditional waivers today, and the termination can proceed if no one claims him in the next 24 hours.

Poturalski has an opportunity lined up outside North America, the Sharks said, presumably in Russia’s Kontinental Hockey League. He told Sheng Peng of San Jose Hockey Now after the season ended that he was frustrated with the lack of NHL opportunities he received in San Jose this year, despite leading the AHL in points, something he’s done three times in the past five seasons. He’ll walk away from the second season of a two-year contract that would have paid him an $800K salary in the NHL and a $500K salary in the minors.

The 31-year-old center has always been a high-end contributor at the AHL level, but after going undrafted, he barely ever got an NHL look. His three games played with the Sharks this season were actually a career high. He’d logged six NHL games entering 2024-25, two each in the 2016-17, 2021-22, and 2023-24 campaigns with the Hurricanes and Kraken.

The 5’10”, 187-lb pivot will thus head overseas, potentially for the remainder of his career, without an NHL goal to his name. He recorded three assists and a minus-six rating in his nine games of NHL action.

In the minors, though, Poturalski has been one of the most dominant players of the last decade. He made his debut with the Charlotte Checkers, then affiliated with Carolina, in the 2015-16 season and has since won two Calder Cups, twice been named a First Team All-Star, and scored the Calder Cup-clinching goal for Charlotte in their 2019 championship win, along with being named playoff MVP. He’s posted a 161-332–493 scoring line in 527 career AHL contests over the last 10 years, including a career-high 30 goals with the San Jose Barracuda this year.

With no NHL future ahead of him this late in his career, he’ll head across the Atlantic in hopes of playing a starring role on championship teams there. He’s likely to land with Avangard Omsk on a two-year deal, Russia’s Match TV reported back in April.

Flyers Sign Helge Grans To Two-Year Extension

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The Flyers announced they’ve re-signed defenseman Helge Grans to a two-year extension. The deal carries a cap hit of $787,500 and is a two-way contract in 2025-26 before becoming a one-way deal in 2026-27, the team said. Grans was a pending restricted free agent after completing his entry-level contract.

Philadelphia acquired Grans, 23, from the Kings in 2023’s three-team deal that sent Ivan Provorov to the Blue Jackets. Los Angeles had selected him early in the second round of the 2020 draft, 35th overall, due to what they thought was a projectable skillset as a fringe top-four piece with a well-rounded game.

It didn’t quite work out that way. Grans had a good first impression in North America in his first AHL season in 2021-22, posting 24 points and a plus-seven rating in 56 games with the Ontario Reign. Grans had just nine points in 59 games the following year, though, and then scored eight in 56 games in 2023-24 after moving to the Flyers’ affiliate in Lehigh Valley.

The 6’3″, 205-lb righty got off to a much better start in 2024-25. He finished the year with 23 points and a minus-two rating in 66 AHL games and climbed up the Philadelphia depth chart, earning his first NHL recall in November. It was the only one he got all year long, but he recorded an assist, five blocks, and four hits in six appearances while averaging 14:28 per game. His possession results weren’t particularly promising, though. He only controlled 44.4% of shot attempts at 5-on-5 despite starting over 60% of his shifts in the offensive zone.

Nonetheless, doling out a one-way structure in the second year of his extension indicates the Flyers anticipate Grans being more of an everyday NHL contributor in the near future. The righty could make the opening night roster next fall in lieu of Rasmus Ristolainen, who’ll likely miss the first few weeks of the campaign while recovering from triceps surgery. Philadelphia is light on other righties in their system outside of Jamie Drysdale and 2023 first-rounder Oliver Bonk, who could also get a look out of the gate with Ristolainen sidelined.

Grans will be a restricted free agent upon expiry. Unlike this summer if he remained unsigned, he’ll have arbitration rights in 2027.

Islanders Sign Kyle Palmieri, Adam Boqvist To Extensions

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The Islanders announced they signed pending UFA winger Kyle Palmieri and RFA defenseman Adam Boqvist to two-year and one-year contract extensions, respectively. Boqvist’s deal carries a cap hit of $850K, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports. Palmieri’s is worth $4.75MM per season for a total value of $9.5MM, Friedman adds. His deal also includes a full no-trade clause in 2025-26 and a 16-team no-trade list in 2026-27, according to PuckPedia.

The two signings are the first of general manager Mathieu Darche’s tenure after they made his hiring official one week ago, succeeding Lou Lamoriello. Lamoriello had held extension talks with both players before the Islanders announced he’d been let go. They hit pause while the organization conducted its GM search, but it appears they were high on Darche’s list to get across the finish line in his first several days on the job.

Palmieri, 34, has spent parts of five seasons on Long Island and will look to extend that number to seven with this new deal. Initially acquired from the Devils at the 2021 trade deadline, he spent about a month testing free agency the following summer before returning to New York on a four-year, $20MM contract.

It was an eye-raising commitment at the time, especially for a player who finished the regular season with just four points in 17 games after his acquisition. It largely worked out in the end, though. Palmieri returned to his ways as a consistent 20-goal winger, putting himself on pace for the mark in his last three seasons with the Isles. He hasn’t missed a game since the 2022-23 campaign and even tied his career-high 30 goals one year ago. He followed that up with a 24-goal, 48-point showing this season, placing him third on the Islanders in scoring and 14th among pending unrestricted free agents.

That makes his price tag a smart one for his relatively projectable goal-scoring touch, although the Islanders would presumably like to decrease his deployment from the 18:31 per game he hit last season, a career high. While a known commodity offensively, he’s never been particularly adept away from the puck, and those concerns perhaps overshadowed his decent production in 2024-25. His -17 rating was a team-low and a career-low. The Islanders also allowed 30.24 shots per 60 minutes with Palmieri on the ice at 5-on-5, the worst figure of any New York skater with at least 200 minutes played, per Natural Stat Trick.

Palmieri should still be able to hover around the 20-goal mark in slightly decreased usage to limit his defensive drawbacks, particularly if Darche’s roster retooling gives him a two-way, playmaking center to partner with lower in the lineup. The new deal is a slight pay cut from his previous $5MM cap hit, a notable factor in the Islanders’ ability to spend this offseason amid the largest year-to-year salary cap jump in history.

As for Boqvist, he lands some stability after a tumultuous 2024-25 campaign. The 2018 eighth overall pick’s offseason began on a sour note when he was bought out by the Blue Jackets with one year remaining on a three-year, $7.8MM contract. He landed with the Panthers on a league-minimum contract to play with his brother, Jesper Boqvist, but managed only 18 appearances in the first four months of the campaign before ending up on waivers.

The Islanders, in need of puck-movers on the back end with injuries to Noah Dobson and Ryan Pulock, took a flyer on the 24-year-old Swede. He was a serviceable depth piece down the stretch, even rotating into the lineup at center at times, recording eight points and a minus-five rating in 17 games. The 6’0″ righty averaged 15:22 per game after the claim.

It remains to be seen whether Boqvist is in the opening night lineup next fall, but he’s likely done enough to at least earn a roster spot and stick around as a healthy extra if the Isles need more scoring punch on the power play. Like Palmieri, Boqvist’s defensive game has been his biggest wart at the NHL level. He’s never been particularly physical, and his play style doesn’t warrant being a good shot suppressor through pure puck possession, but he did have some decent 5-on-5 defense numbers in New York. His 25.99 shots against per 60 minutes ranked ninth on the club out of 26 skaters to play at least 200 minutes, and his 2.40 expected goals against per 60 ranked 10th.

Boqvist will be an arbitration-eligible restricted free agent next summer. The Islanders still have nearly $21MM in cap space after today’s extensions, per PuckPedia.

Photo courtesy of Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images.

Aleksi Heponiemi Signs In Sweden

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While Aleksi Heponiemi remains on the Panthers’ reserve list until next offseason, it doesn’t appear he’ll entertain an NHL return before then. The 26-year-old center signed a two-year deal with HV71 of the Swedish Hockey League today, per a team announcement, essentially confirming Florida will lose his signing rights on July 1, 2026.

Heponiemi, a 2017 second-round pick, once checked out as one of the organization’s top prospects. The Finnish native was named the WHL’s Rookie of the Year in his draft year after posting 86 points in 72 games and took things to another level in 2017-18, leading the league with 90 assists in just 57 games while adding 28 goals for 118 points. But he didn’t immediately join the Panthers’ pro ranks after that, instead opting to return home with Kärpät in the top-division Liiga for 2018-19. He continued to impress there, logging 46 points in 50 games, finally receiving an entry-level contract from Florida at the end of the year.

Upon his arrival in the North American professional ranks, Heponiemi’s development and production cratered. He managed only 14 points in 49 AHL games in his first pro season stateside and managed only six points in 25 NHL games over the following three years. Upon becoming an RFA in 2023, the Panthers still issued Heponiemi a qualifying offer to retain his signing rights, but he was obviously unhappy with his trajectory in the organization and opted to return to Europe instead.

Heponiemi has spent the last two years with EHC Biel-Bienne of the Swiss National League. He’s been serviceable there but not as dominant as he would have hoped. The 5’10” pivot posted a 13-22–35 scoring line in 59 appearances since his arrival, and while Biel-Bienne signed him to a three-year extension last summer, they recently mutually terminated that contract.

He’ll now look to rediscover his game in Sweden, but with his production still yet to rebound to its ceiling, it wouldn’t be surprising to see him not add to his NHL resume down the line. A major resurgence with HV71 could put him on the international free agency radar in 2027, though.

Robert Hagg Signs In SHL

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May 29: Hagg is indeed heading to Brynas on a one-year deal, per a team announcement.

May 17: After seeing very limited NHL action this season, pending unrestricted free agent defenseman Robert Hagg is heading home.  The blueliner confirmed to Expressen’s Gunnar Nordstrom that he will be playing in the SHL next season; SportBladet’s Hans Abrahamsson adds that Hagg is expected to sign a one-year deal with Brynas.

The 30-year-old signed a one-year deal with the Golden Knights last summer but he once again spent the bulk of the season in the minors with AHL Henderson where he had six goals and 21 assists in 54 games, his best offensive showing at that level.  However, his improved play didn’t give Hagg much of an opportunity with Vegas as he suited up just twice with them in late November.

Having cleared waivers for two straight years now while then spending the bulk of those campaigns in the AHL, the writing is clearly on the wall for Hagg.  He’s now viewed as more of a depth defender than someone that can be counted on to be a regular contributor in the NHL.  Accordingly, at this stage of his career, heading back home makes a lot of sense.

If this winds up being the end of the road for Hagg in North America, he’ll finish up with 345 career NHL appearances over parts of nine seasons across six organizations although more than two-thirds of those outings were with the Flyers.  Overall, Hagg has 63 points, 532 blocks, and 1,017 hits at the top level while logging 16:28 per game on average.

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