Swedish forward Linus Sandin intends to sign with the Philadelphia Flyers when the NHL and IIHF finalize new international transfer agreements, according to Sportsnet's Chris Johnston.
Johnston adds that "it sounds like the IIHF transfer agreements will be/have been extended for a year," but there is no official entry-level contract yet in place.
Sandin, 23, enjoyed a career year for the Swedish Hockey League's HV71 this season. He ranked third in the league in goals (19) and second on his club in points (36) through 51 games.
The 6-foot center is the older brother of Toronto Maple Leafs defenseman Rasmus Sandin.
Find out the latest on COVID-19's impact on the sports world and when sports are returning by subscribing to Breaking News push notifications in the Sports and COVID-19 section.
At least one NHL club has asked its players to be ready to report May 15 to start informal workouts that would precede a training camp lasting up to three weeks, according to the New York Post's Larry Brooks.
However, not every team has reportedly done so.
NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly responded Thursday by saying the league hasn't given its teams any timetables pertaining to the resumption of play.
"I don't know what clubs are telling their players,” Daly wrote to Brooks. “We have not specified or articulated any 'target dates' to our clubs at this point.”
"We're not going to rush anything," commissioner Gary Bettman told Sportsnet's Ron MacLean on Wednesday night.
Last week, the league recommended its players, coaches, and staff continue self-quarantining through April 30. It was the third time that date had been extended beyond March 27. The season was paused March 12 amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Florida Panthers president Matthew Caldwell said Wednesday that the NHL was targeting a return in July.
Earlier in April, Bettman stated teams would need a two-to-three-week training camp before the season could resume.
"We've believed for several years that Elvis Merzlikins was the best goaltender outside the NHL while he was playing in Switzerland and this year he has shown that he has the ability and drive to be a very good goaltender in this league," general manager Jarmo Kekalainen said in a statement. "He is quick, athletic, and driven to succeed."
Merzlikins, 26, has authored a 13-9-8 record with a 2.35 goals-against average, a .923 save percentage, and five shutouts during his first professional campaign. He leads all rookie netminders in all of those categories.
The Latvian puck-stopper failed to pick up a win in his first eight career starts but caught fire after earning his first victory Dec. 31. From that point on, Merzlikins owns a record of 13-5-4 with a 1.97 goals-against average and a .935 save percentage. His stretch of dominant play includes a run of eight straight victories in which he conceded just eight goals while collecting five shutouts.
Columbus also extended goaltender Joonas Korpisalo last week to a two-year deal worth a reported $5.6 million. With the pair locked up, the club has established a formidable tandem for just $6.8 million annually.
Find out the latest on COVID-19's impact on the sports world and when sports are returning by subscribing to Breaking News push notifications in the Sports and COVID-19 section.
The NHL is considering ways it can resume its paused campaign, but Montreal Canadiens forward Brendan Gallagher is already looking ahead to 2020-21.
"For us right now, it always comes back to the same thing," Gallagher said Thursday, according to Sportsnet's Eric Engels. "It's about winning, and if it's going to interfere with our ability to prepare for next year where we have a chance, I'd rather continue my training."
The 27-year-old did, however, clarify that he'd be up for playing out the 2019-20 season if the playoffs include more than 16 teams.
"If it's a situation where maybe you see these scenarios where you have a chance to play and they expand the playoff bracket, obviously you're going to be all for it," he said.
As the league remains postponed amid the coronavirus pandemic, the Canadiens sit 10 points out of both an Eastern Conference wild-card spot and third place in the Atlantic Division.
"I'd rather be here preparing for next year and getting my body ready for whatever you have to do to have a chance to win, and obviously the players that are in contention, they're going to want to go play no matter what," Gallagher said.
The NHL considered hosting games at neutral sites before scrapping that idea in favor of potentially resuming play in up to four league cities.
Florida Panthers president Matthew Caldwell revealed Wednesday that the league is targeting a return in July.
The NHL should be deep into postseason action, but with the start of the 2019-20 playoffs delayed, theScore's hockey editors are picking their favorite Game 7s from years past.
The Sharks were already arguably the Golden Knights' biggest rivals after the two sides met in the second round of the playoffs in 2018. Vegas had home-ice advantage that year, though many still considered the Golden Knights the underdogs since it was their first year as a franchise. However, they managed to defeat the Sharks in six games.
It was a different story the following season. The Sharks had home ice after collecting eight more points than the Knights during the regular season, but many viewed Vegas as the favorite due to Sharks netminder Martin Jones' rough campaign.
The series
The first six games didn't disappoint. San Jose looked unstoppable early, scoring three straight goals to open Game 1 en route to a 5-2 win. The Golden Knights stormed back to win the next three contests by a combined score of 16-6, chasing Jones twice and pushing the Sharks to the brink of elimination.
San Jose wouldn't go down without a fight, though, as it handily won Game 5 and then emerged victorious from an overtime thriller to set up an epic winner-take-all contest.
The series had no shortage of off-ice drama, either. Evander Kane and Ryan Reaves exchanged some classic chirps, and Vegas head coach Gerard Gallant called Peter DeBoer - his eventual successor - "a clown" ahead of the deciding game.
Ethan Miller / Getty Images Sport / Getty
The game
It appeared the Golden Knights had it wrapped up with a 3-0 lead and just over 10 minutes remaining in the contest. However, one of the biggest turning points in playoff history came when Vegas center Cody Eakin shoved Joe Pavelski after the faceoff. Pavelski lost his balance and collided with Paul Stastny, causing him to fall to the ice and suffer a gash to his head. Eakin was handed a five-minute major for the cross-check, though it should've likely warranted only a two-minute minor.
The Sharks rallied behind their injured captain and scored four goals on the ensuing man advantage - two from Logan Couture, one from Tomas Hertl, and one from Kevin Labanc, who assisted on the first three tallies. Joe Thornton's leadership also played a big part.
"You gotta give credit to Jumbo," Couture said postgame, according to The Point Hockey's Sheng Peng. "As soon as we got to the bench (after Pavelski's injury), he said, 'You guys go out and get f------ three goals right now.' When a man who's played 20 years orders you around like that, you gotta go do it. We got four."
However, Vegas winger Jonathan Marchessault would tie it up with less than a minute remaining in regulation to force overtime.
When it seemed the contest was destined for a second sudden-death period, Barclay Goodrow - who barely played in the extra frame - took a slick feed from Erik Karlsson and scored a beautiful winner to send the Sharks to the second round.
The highlight
Relive the Sharks' entire comeback below:
The fallout
The Golden Knights were understandably irate following their collapse.
"It's a f------ joke. It's embarrassing," Marchessault said postgame about the officiating. "That's what it is. It changed the entire outcome of the game, and the season."
It changed the rule book, too. Beginning the following campaign, Section 20.6 stated that referees are allowed to review major penalties and reduce them to minors, though they can't rescind the penalty altogether or change a minor to a major. Call it the Pavelski Rule, if you will.
The NHL, in coordination with ESL Gaming, announced the "NHL Player Gaming Challenge" on Thursday.
The challenge will feature head-to-head battles in EA Sports' NHL 20 between players from all 31 teams.
Even Seattle, the league's 32nd franchise set to take the ice in 2021-22, will be involved, with Seahawks tight end Luke Willson representing the currently unnamed club.
"Over the past several weeks, the NHL, its clubs, and player community have been very active with gaming initiatives in an effort to connect with fans while social distancing - such as charity tournaments, simulated games, and nightly streams," said Chris Golier, NHL vice president of business development and innovation.
"The NHL Player Gaming Challenge presented by Honda will take gaming to another level. We know how competitive our players are, and coupled with the interaction between players, these series of competitions will be extremely fun to watch."
Games will begin on April 30 and run over the course of four weeks. All matchups will be available to watch through Sportsnet, NBCSN, Twitch, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.
Find out the latest on COVID-19's impact on the sports world and when sports are returning by subscribing to Breaking News push notifications in the Sports and COVID-19 section.
Pittsburgh Penguins goaltender Matt Murray is teaming up with local sandwich chain Primanti Bros. to open a $5,000 tab for police officers in need during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"I want to thank the people on the front lines who put themselves at risk every day to keep us safe," Murray said in a statement, per Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
The initiative will begin Thursday.
Murray was drafted by Pittsburgh in 2012. The 25-year-old posted a .899 save percentage in 38 appearances during 2019-20 before the season came to a halt March 12.
Find out the latest on COVID-19's impact on the sports world and when sports are returning by subscribing to Breaking News push notifications in the Sports and COVID-19 section.
Vancouver Canucks netminder and pending unrestricted free agent Jacob Markstrom isn't worrying about his contract status as the NHL's coronavirus-related stoppage persists.
"With all the other stuff, hockey has kind of become not so important with everything going on around the world," Markstrom told reporters on a conference call, according to Sportsnet's Iain MacIntyre. "Obviously, I would have liked to have a long-term deal and know what I’m going to do for the next few years here. But that's not the case right now. Nobody knows what’s going to happen this year. Hopefully, we get back playing. Even next year, and cap hits and all that stuff, hockey is kind of secondary."
While putting pen to paper isn't at the top of Markstrom's mind, the 30-year-old is adamant that he'd like to remain with his current club whenever the time comes.
"In my mind, I want to stay in Vancouver," he said.
"That's my goal. The season isn't over this year, either. I’m still hoping we can come back and play and make a push in the playoffs here. It’s going to be tough to get fans in the building, but give the people and city of Vancouver something to cheer for. That’s pretty much 100% of my mindset. I'm still a Vancouver Canuck and I’m super proud of being it. I have no plans of leaving."
When the season paused on March 12, the Canucks were just outside the playoff picture in the Western Conference. They'd fallen down the standings after Markstrom suffered an injury in February. Before being sidelined, the netminder had posted a .918 save percentage in 43 starts, the best statistical season of his career.
When inking his next deal, Markstrom should be in line for a considerable raise over his $3.66-million cap hit. Vancouver already has $63.4 million committed to its 2020-21 roster, while the league's salary limit has yet to be determined.
The NHL's indefinite hiatus gives us an opportunity to take stock of the league's most fascinating figures. Last week, we explored Auston Matthews' goal-scoring prowess. This week, we tip our cap to Henrik Lundqvist's illustrious career while trying to make sense of its messy ending.
Around this point last year, Henrik Lundqvist was back in his native Sweden, digesting a weird season.
The 2018-19 campaign featured an encouraging first half but a disappointing second one, during which the future Hall of Famer endured one of the toughest stretches of his career. The New York Rangers, the team that drafted him in 2000, were in a state of flux. And so was he.
By September, Lundqvist was refreshed and upbeat during the annual preseason player media tour in Chicago. When asked if he expected to be around for the anticipated "good times" at the end of the Rangers' overhaul (a promising rebuild which began with a famous open letter to fans in February 2018), Lundqvist responded positively.
"I just couldn't picture myself anywhere else, so when they told me what was going to happen, it was like, 'OK, let's battle through it,'" Lundqvist said of his discussions with Rangers management, adding that he was focused solely on the season ahead and not beyond.
Icon Sportswire / Getty Images
Fast forward to today and Lundqvist's future in New York can be described as murky at best. He carries an $8.5-million cap hit, yet he sits behind 24-year-olds Igor Shesterkin and Alexandar Georgiev on the depth chart. Lundqvist, a franchise legend with one year remaining on a seven-year deal, has become redundant.
Lundqvist will undoubtedly be a first-ballot Hall of Famer when he retires. He's arguably the second-best European-born goalie to ever play in the NHL, behind Dominik Hasek. Along with Marc-Andre Fleury, Carey Price, and Roberto Luongo, Lundqvist is firmly in the conversation for the best goalie of the salary-cap era, which goes back to 2005-06. Unconvinced? Here are the cold, hard facts:
Since 2005-06, his rookie year, Lundqvist ranks first in games played (887), second in wins (459), first in saves (23,509), tied for sixth in save percentage (.918, minimum 250 games), and first in shutouts (64).
Lundqvist ranks eighth all time in games played, sixth in wins, sixth in saves, tied for 12th in save percentage, and 16th in shutouts.
He earned his lone Vezina Trophy (while finishing third in Hart Trophy voting) in 2011-12. He's accumulated a total of seven top-five finishes in Vezina voting, including a runner-up honor in 2012-13.
Lundqvist has not only been a durable and tireless netminder but also a remarkably consistent puck-stopper. Goalies can be hot one season and cold the next, but not Lundqvist - for the most part, anyway. He's strung together 12 good-to-great seasons, finishing below the league-wide average in save percentage in just three of his 15 campaigns.
The seventh-round pick (205th overall) by New York enjoyed a long peak. From 2009 to 2013 (the entirety of John Tortorella's solid but unspectacular tenure behind the Rangers' bench), Lundqvist posted a cumulative .924 save percentage and a .611 quality start percentage while racking up 25 shutouts. He was nearly unbeatable at even strength, posting year-over-year save percentages of .929, .930, .933, and .937.
How much heavy lifting was Lundqvist doing for those teams? Let's look at goals-saved above average, or GSAA, for guidance. GSAA is an advanced metric that calculates the number of goals a goalie prevents, using his save percentage and shots faced against the league average save percentage and shots faced. Lundqvist's prime years stack up quite well:
Shortly after Lundqvist's peak, the Blueshirts experienced a run of success. New York lost the 2014 Stanley Cup Final in five games to the Los Angeles Kings and then bowed out in the 2015 Eastern Conference Final in seven against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Overall, the Rangers have made the postseason in 11 of the 14 years that Lundqvist completed.
Lundqvist's individual and team success - despite the missing Cup ring, he owns an Olympic gold medal and world championship gold medal - makes him a true hockey icon. But what takes his status to the next level, in terms of worldwide appeal, is an affable off-ice persona. Lundqvist reached the pinnacle of his profession, and he's also kind and handsome. Multitalented. Fashionable. Charitable.
"His nickname is King," Chris Jones of ESPN wrote ahead of the 2016 World Cup of Hockey. "He has a picture-perfect family and a seven-year, $59.5-million contract. He has fabulous taste in clothes and a body like a mannequin. For a hobby, he decided to learn to play guitar. Now he's good at playing the guitar, because of course he is. I go through the first six stages of grief just thinking about Lundqvist and his gifts. I never reach the mythical seventh stage, acceptance. I just go back to disbelief and start the vicious cycle again."
Jared Silber / Getty Images
The problem is, Lundqvist's off-ice mystique doesn't erase the fact that his last two seasons between the pipes - at ages 37 and 38 - have been trying. His ability to stop pucks hasn't disappeared altogether (his .905 save percentage this year isn't that bad), but there's no question it's diminished. All players have an expiry date, and there's always someone waiting to take your place. In this case, it's Shesterkin and Georgiev.
Shesterkin, a fourth-round pick in the 2014 draft, appears to be the heir to Lundqvist's throne. His transition from the KHL, in which he dominated for three-plus seasons, has been seamless. The Russian first posted a .934 save percentage in 25 games for AHL Hartford and then stopped 395 of 424 shots for a .932 save percentage in 12 NHL contests. The only hiccup was a car accident that sidelined him for six games.
Georgiev, meanwhile, has seen the most action out of New York's three goalies, appearing in 34 games, including 10 of the Rangers' final 20 before the season was paused. He has a .910 save percentage overall and a team-high 17 wins. In other words, excellent, cost-controlled insurance for Shesterkin, who's on track for superstardom.
Lundqvist, who's appeared in 30 games this season, played only five times in nearly six weeks after Feb. 1.
It's always a little awkward when a star athlete's greatness starts to wane. It's infinitely more awkward when that athlete is sidelined in full view of his adoring fans.
The abrupt halt to the season has put the awkwardness on hold, but it also postponed a resolution. So how does this end?
Eliot J. Schechter / Getty Images
Lundqvist is most likely on his way out of the organization despite having one year remaining on his deal, according to Larry Brooks of the New York Post.
"Unless something unforeseeable develops over the next few months, I cannot conceive of Lundqvist returning to the Rangers next season," Brooks wrote on Tuesday.
Rangers general manager Jeff Gorton and head coach David Quinn have leverage, with a potential amnesty buyout possibility and the authority to sit Lundqvist whenever they please. It doesn't benefit anyone to continue using a team icon as the third-string goalie, so something has to give this offseason. Maybe that comes from Lundqvist, who holds the power of a no-move clause - he could loosen his grip on that or even retire after being bought out.
Still, there are Lundqvist's words from six months ago: Can't picture him anywhere else.
