On the Chicago Blackhawks …
Mike Kelly: Sometime this week the Chicago Blackhawks are expected to announce a two-year contract extension for Erik Gustafsson.
The pending RFA is making $650,000 this season, and the extension is expected to be worth between $2.2 and $2.5 million.
On the St. Louis Blues …
Jeremy Rutherford: Blues GM Doug Armstrong recently said that he had no plans on trading center Paul Stastny up until just before the trade deadline and their collection of losses. On the Thursday before the deadline, Armstrong approached Stastny and told him it was a possibility.
Jeremy Rutherford: GM Armstrong said he wasn’t going to give up Robert Thomas, Klim Kostin, Tage Thompson or Jordan Kyrou for a top-six forward that would be a 12-18 month stop gap.
On the Washington Capitals …
Chris Nichols of FanRag Sports: Elliotte Friedman was on the NHL network and was talking about the Washington Capitals and how they may not have done much before the trade deadline, but it wasn’t from lack of effort.
said they made runs at defensemen Ryan McDonagh and Erik Karlsson.
“Now, if you look at their cap setup – I have no idea how they were going to do it. Sometimes you kind of figure out what the return is. I’m not so sure here. But I do think, especially after Pittsburgh got Derick Brassard, that on the Saturday they made pitches for both McDonagh and Karlsson.
“They didn’t get it done, but I think they tried.”
On the Florida Panthers …
Matthew DeFranks of the Sun Sentinel: The Panthers were interested in Ryan McDonagh and Max Pacioretty at the deadline, but wouldn’t move their top prospects.
“We gave it our best shot on a couple deals,” Tallon said. “Obviously, it takes two to tango. We made some legitimately strong, solid offers and, at the last minute, we just were not able to get it done. Frustrating, but we protected a lot of our good young assets. A lot of the teams wanted our top players and we weren’t willing to do that but we were close on a couple of really good deals.”
Teams asked for Henrik Borgstrom, and they were reluctant to move prospects Owen Tippett, Aleksi Heponiemi, Adam Mascherin and Jonathan Ang.
