While the three-time Stanley Cup champion would bring name recognition, a winning pedigree and an impressive resume to Vegas, he will be 33 next season, with two more years remaining on a contract with a salary cap hit of $5.75 million annually. And most importantly, there are likely going to be better options available to the Golden Knights, who must select a minimum of three goalies during the expansion draft....
Now that Steven Stamkos has removed himself from the market, teams that had targeted him when the free-agent window opens Friday have to move on to other players. The Red Wings could be looking at forwards Troy Brouwer and Kyle Okposo, MLive.com reported, adding that those two are only part of a group of free agents they’re interested in. The options also includes David Backes, Mikkel Boedker, Loui Eriksson, Andrew Ladd and Frans Nielsen....
Word of the court date was released by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Manitoba. MORE: Patrick Kane’s career in photos | Blackhawks star facing sexual assault allegations Richards, 30, is at a career crossroads. His bloated contract has been a sore point for the Kings, who terminated the deal after reports of his arrest in June. He could face prison time if convicted, Rick Westhead of Canadian media outlet TSN reported via Twitter....
The question had to be asked of Henrik Lundqvist. Kudos to Larry Brooks of the New York Post, who posed it: Do you want to be part of this pending (and perhaps painful) overhaul of the New York Rangers? This is their franchise player, one of the best goaltenders in the world for the better part of a decade, and a guy who’s chasing down a championship with everything he’s got....
Although the NHL swears its lottery system is designed to limit the tendency of a losing team looking to lose more, simply for the sake of gaining a higher pick, all three of Tuesday’s winners leapfrogged teams that finished lower in the standings. NHL DRAFT BOARD: Ranking the 31 prospects in 2019 class The Blackhawks, who owned the 12th-best odds to land in the top three, became the newest example of the fringe playoff team that jumped a bottom dweller via the luck of the draw....
The Penguins have been involved in the Stanley Cup Playoffs for five weeks; they’ve already had four players miss games with apparent or reported concussions, and there could be a fifth, depending on how forward Scott Wilson feels after getting a forearm/elbow in the head near the conclusion of Sunday’s 7-0 victory over Ottawa. MORE: Penguins-Senators Game 5 recap The “hockey play” just won’t go away. It’s madness. At the conclusion of the fifth game in the Pittsburgh-Ottawa series, which put the Penguins within a victory of their second consecutive Stanley Cup Final appearance, Ottawa nobody Tommy Wingels spun his body toward Wilson, who was executing a meaningless clearance of the puck....
Cedric Paquette took a nifty feed from Ryan Callahan and fired a shot past Capitals goaltender Braden Holtby to give the home team a 1-0 lead over Washington just 19 seconds into regulation. GOLDEN STANDARDHow Vegas became the most successful expansion team in sports history Capitals defenseman Dmitry Orlov got caught pinching off the opening faceoff, leading to the play. Paquette’s first goal of the postseason fell six seconds shy of the franchise record for the fastest goal to begin a playoff contest....
The Lightning star, minutes after potting the go-ahead goal midway through the first period, delivered a suspicious blow above the shoulders of Vatanen, sending the New Jersey defenseman flying to the ice and then the locker room. He reportedly did not receive a hearing with the NHL’s Department of Player Safety on Thursday, escaping supplemental punishment. NHL MOCK DRAFT 1.0: Unraveling the mystery beyond Rasmus Dahlin at No. 1...
Mind you, the Flames are facing elimination. Neal has been anything but “The Real Deal,” as he has been nicknamed this year. MORE: Mikko Rantanen ties, wins Game 4 for Avalanche “There’s nothing better than playoff hockey and winning in the playoffs. That’s what I want to do and why I’m here,” the winger said a month ago as he worked on getting healthy following a lower-body injury that kept him out of the lineup for 17 games....
Playing in his first playoff game in seven years (May 22, 2012, with the Arizona Coyotes), Smith turned away all 26 Colorado Avalanche shots en route to a 4-0 victory. “Oh, unbelievable,” Smith said when asked postgame by Sportsnet’s Ryan Leslie about how the win felt. “It’s been a while since I’ve played a playoff game. I didn’t quite remember what it was like but it didn’t take long to figure it out....
Murray backstopped the Penguins in Game 2 of their first-round Stanley Cup playoff series against the New York Islanders, making 31 saves on 34 shots. Perhaps the most impressive of Murray’s saves was one that occurred midway through the second period, with the game 0-0. When Islanders forward Matt Martin suddenly found himself alone with the puck just a few feet from the Pittsburgh net, Murray had to react quickly to prevent New York from taking the lead....
Bruins fans may certainly think so as Toronto’s go-ahead goal was surrounded by some controversy. On the play in question, the game was knotted up at 0-0 with less than 10 minutes to go in the third period. Neither team could get a shot past the other side’s goalie and this game seemed destined for overtime. But when Auston Matthews put a shot in the net late in the third period, he found pay dirt and a 1-0 lead....
A Russian hockey player for the Philadelphia Flyers, Fedotov was detained over suspicions of evading the Russian army, Euro Weekly News reported, citing Russian media Fontanka.ru. “There are sufficient grounds to consider Fedotov an army evader,” the Russian military prosecutor’s office told Fontanka.ru. Authorities met Fedotov at the Kupchino district in St. Petersburg and asked him to head to the Russian military registration and enlistment office, an order to which he complied, according to Fontanka....
Blues Considering Trade Options A recent coaching change did little to improve the struggling St. Louis Blues. In the three weeks since firing Mike Yeo and replacing him on an interim basis with Craig Berube, they’ve won just three of nine games entering Tuesday’s tilt with the Florida Panthers. The Blues woes are generating conjecture over potential roster moves by general manager Doug Armstrong. In his Nov. 27, “31 Thoughts” column, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported the Blues are “open for business,” claiming there were “few things they won’t consider....
The Bruins wasted little time this summer finding a suitable replacement for departed backup goaltender Anton Khudobin. Soon after the unrestricted free-agent market opened on July 1, they inked Jaroslav Halak to a two-year, $5.5 million contract. Halak, 33, was a former starting goalie with the Blues and Islanders. He also has plenty of playoff experience, including carrying the Canadiens to the 2010 Eastern Conference finals. Joe Haggerty of NBC Sports Boston believes Halak will push Bruins starter Tuukka Rask, providing a measure of competition between the pipes that’s been lacking for some time....
The city’s first major professional sports team will be known, officially, as the Vegas Golden Knights. A group of NHL dignitaries, including commissioner Gary Bettman and team owner Bill Foley, made the unveil Tuesday night amid fanfare and some technical difficulties at T-Mobile Arena on the Las Vegas Strip, where the club will play beginning 2017. MORE: Why Quebec didn’t make the cut The party did not go off without a hitch....
Everyone from college stars to KHL players to draft picks are putting pen to paper and moving to the professional ranks in North America. Among the names added are a who’s who of youngsters from the 2020 IIHF World Junior Championship, including the United States’ Trevor Zegras, Alex Turcotte and K’Andre Miller, Canada’s Raphael Lavoie and Russia’s Grigori Denisenko and Alexander Romanov. The St. Louis Blues added 2020 Hobey Baker Award winner Scott Perunovich while the Toronto Maple Leafs signed highly touted forward Alexander Barabanov and the Ottawa Senators nabbed defenseman Artem Zub....
It’ll be a familiar one — either the defending champion or the franchise that has done it a record 24 times. Beginning on Monday, June 28, it’ll be the Lightning and the Canadiens in the 2021 Stanley Cup Final. “They’re going to get the best team that they’ve played against so far and we’re going to get the best team that we’ve played against so far,” said Lightning captain Steven Stamkos after his team advanced....
Murray on Tuesday made Kostka's head the main point of contact, and Kostka, a defenseman for the Tampa Bay Lightning, didn't alter his position immediately before the hit. NHL suspensions for 2013-14 "While we accept Murray's claim that there was no malicious intent on this hit, he is not successful in making a full body check," NHL department of player safety rep Patrick Burke said in a video explaining the suspension....
First, they signed Ben Scrivens to a two-year contract worth $2.3 million annually. Scrivens, at minimum, deserves a chance to emerge as a full-time starter; in 58 NHL games, he has a .921 save percentage. In 2013-14, he has a league-best .934 save percentage in 26 games, and a .940 in seven appearances with the Oilers since they acquired him from the Los Angeles Kings. NHL TRADE RUMORS: Ryan Kesler and the Penguins?...
