On the Vegas Golden Knights, Calgary Flames, Minnesota Wild and the New York Islanders …
Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet: The Vegas Golden Knights have been watching KHL forwards Evgeny Dadonov and Vadim Shipachyov. Shipachyov is thought to be looking for around $5.5 million a season, with Dadonov looking for around $3.5 million a season.
Ohio State’s Josh Healey had interest from all four Western Conference teams at one point. Healy has a short list of team, and the Calgary Flames could be on it.
Two other college free agents that are getting some interest are Minnesota-Duluth defenseman Neal Pionk and Union’s Mike Vecchione.
Luke Kunin is expected to leave Wisconsin and sign with the Minnesota Wild.
Gary Bettman said “assume we’re not going to the Olympics” which is better than “We are not going.”
Nick Kypreos reported that the New York Islanders and Barclays Center are negotiating a lease extension before 2018-19.
On the Vegas Golden Knights …
Chris Nichols of FanRag Sports: Elliotte Friedman was on NHL Network talking about the Vegas Golden Knights. Friedman notes that they are looking at some European free agents and wonder if they’d be interest in a big named NHL free agent like Alexander Radulov.
“But I wonder if a guy like Alexander Radulov would look at a place like Las Vegas. His initial ask to Montreal was a long term deal – six-to-eight years – and even though he said the eight-year thing wasn’t true, I do wonder if maybe the agents threw it out there as a feeler without Radulov knowing about it. That often happens.
“But I think you have a situation where you can paint a canvas – it’s blank. It’s almost like you have a wasteland there right now and you get to make a beautiful picture out of it. And I wonder if a guy like Radulov, if he hits free agency, if that’s the kind of guy Las Vegas would go after.
“It’s hard to find scoring, and it’ll be really hard to find scoring in this draft. He might be a guy that you could get simply for the money.”
