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Devils Activate Zack MacEwen

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The Devils announced that they have activated right-winger Zack MacEwen from long-term injured reserve. To open a roster spot for him, Brian Halonen was assigned to AHL Utica yesterday. MacEwen will play in tonight’s matchup with the Islanders, head coach Sheldon Keefe confirmed.

MacEwen, 29, was acquired from the Senators for Kurtis MacDermid in the final days of training camp. He was waived the following day and was reassigned to Utica, but got a recall back to the NHL roster before playing a game in the minors. MacEwen then sustained an upper-body injury in his season debut against the Lightning on Oct. 11, leaving him out indefinitely.

While not an earth-shattering move, the Devils could use the help at the bottom of their lineup. Evgenii Dadonov remains on long-term injured reserve after sustaining a fractured hand way back in the season opener, and they’re also slated to be without Connor Brown for the fifth straight game due to an undisclosed injury. New Jersey’s other fourth-line options in Brown’s absence, Halonen and Juho Lammikko, have combined for one goal in 15 games.

MacEwen won’t be a fix to the Devils’ tertiary scoring issues, but he does offer much more physicality and experience than either Halonen or Lammikko. Now in his eighth NHL season, MacEwen has 17 goals and 34 points in 238 career appearances to go along with 323 penalty minutes. He’s routinely had decent enough possession impacts for his limited roles, averaging 9:20 of ice time per game for his career, and has a decent minor-league scoring record.

Oilers Place Ryan Nugent-Hopkins On IR; Activate Mattias Janmark

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The Oilers announced Monday that they’ve placed forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins on injured reserve and activated Mattias Janmark in his place. The team also increased their LTIR pool by $1.3MM by shifting winger Kasperi Kapanen from standard to long-term injured reserve, putting them within reach of compliance when they activate Zach Hyman from LTIR as expected in the coming days.

Nugent-Hopkins’ injury, which head coach Kris Knoblauch said won’t keep him out longer than the week required for IR, comes as the Oilers are reeling from a 9-1 loss to the Avalanche on Saturday. The 32-year-old has been the least of Edmonton’s worries through their 6-6-4 start, though. His -11 rating and declining possession metrics through 16 games are something of a concern, but he’s third on the team in scoring with five goals and 11 assists for a point per game. He’s averaging 18:49 of ice time per game and picking up the slack left by depth names like Trent Frederic, Isaac Howard, Matthew Savoie, and David Tomasek, who have a combined nine points despite all being expected to see tryouts higher up in Edmonton’s lineup to help replace the names they lost to last offseason’s cap crunch.

It wasn’t clear when exactly Nugent-Hopkins got hurt, but it most definitely happened during that Colorado drubbing. He played a season-low 14:50 in that game, in which he was held off the scoresheet and posted a -4 rating.

Janmark, who turns 33 in December, is entering his fourth year in Edmonton after initially signing as a free agent in 2022. The 2013 third-rounder had just two goals in 80 games last year but has found a consistent home on the Oilers’ penalty kill. He and Nugent-Hopkins formed the nucleus of that group last year, at least in the forward department, on a unit that finished right around league average at 78.2%. The Oilers have gotten off to a fine start shorthanded without him, killing at an 81.8% rate for 12th in the league. With that in mind, it would be understandable if the Oilers were hesitant to give a regular role to someone with just six goals in the last two seasons, given their existing depth scoring issues.

Still, the Hyman, Kapanen, and Nugent-Hopkins injuries figure to give Janmark a chance at capturing consistent minutes again. Kapanen had two assists through his first six games before sustaining an undisclosed injury in mid-October that has him out week-to-week.

Rangers Activate Vincent Trocheck

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11:43 a.m.: Trocheck has been formally activated from LTIR, and Rempe has been shifted there in the corresponding move, per Mollie Walker of the New York Post.

9:51 a.m.: Rangers center Vincent Trocheck is expected to come off long-term injured reserve and return to New York’s top six when they face the Predators tonight, according to this morning’s line rushes (via Vince Z. Mercogliano of The Athletic). The Blueshirts are currently using about $100,000 of Trocheck’s $3.768MM LTIR pool after recalling top prospect Gabriel Perreault yesterday, so they’ll need to make a corresponding transaction. That could easily mean shifting Matt Rempe from IR to LTIR, since he has already missed 18 days and seven games of the 24 and 10 required, and he remains out indefinitely.

Rempe notwithstanding, Trocheck’s activation gives the Rangers a healthy forward group for the first time since their second game of the season. Trocheck left that contest against the Sabres early and was quickly labeled week-to-week.

His absence was essentially a death knell for the Rangers, whose limited bottom-six scoring depth made it imperative that their first and second lines operated at maximum capacity. He’d started the first game-and-a-half as their top-line center between Alexis Lafrenière and Artemi Panarin, a role filled by Mika Zibanejad shifting back to center after starting the year on the wing. That domino effect led to training camp tryout success story Conor Sheary being immediately overtaxed in second-line duties alongside J.T. Miller and William Cuylle.

The results have been disastrous. The Rangers have been shut out five times in seven home games and are scoring just 2.19 per game overall, second-worst in the league ahead of only the Flames. Only Panarin has produced at more than a 41-point pace with 10 in 16 appearances. They’re hoping a new-look offense, fueled by Trocheck and Perreault’s season debut, can help reverse that trend starting tonight.

Trocheck will reprise his role between Panarin and Lafrenière. At the same time, Perreault bumps Sheary back down to the bottom six, according to Mercogliano – the latter slots in on the left wing with Zibanejad and Miller.

Only now will Trocheck get his season started in earnest. He’s looking for a rebound after a semi-underwhelming offensive showing in 2025-26. He finished top 20 in Selke Trophy voting for the second year in a row, but his 59 points in 82 games were his lowest total since signing his seven-year, $39.375MM contract with the Rangers in free agency in 2022.

Sabres’ Jiri Kulich Diagnosed With Blood Clot, Out Indefinitely

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Sabres center Jiri Kulich will miss a “significant amount of time” after a blood clot was diagnosed during an unrelated injury absence, head coach Lindy Ruff told reporters today (per Joe Yerdon of Bleacher Report). Ruff demonstrated optimism about Kulich being able to play again this season, but wouldn’t commit to it, leaving the door open to Kulich’s IR stint being permanent for the balance of the campaign.

They’ll have a better estimate of Kulich’s return timeline based on how his treatment progresses in the next three to four weeks, Ruff said. That’s normal for clotting issues. The Penguins recently had the same thing sideline rookie Filip Hallander and immediately gave him a three-month timeline.

Kulich had already missed three games with a facial injury and was placed on IR late last week as Buffalo tries to manage a crushing amount of injuries to its forward group. Five regulars – Kulich, Zach Benson, Justin Danforth, Joshua Norris, and Jason Zucker – are currently on injured reserve with none expected back in the short term. Understandably, the team’s offense has faltered. Their 2.67 goals per game are sixth-worst in the league, and they’re averaging just 1.75 per game over their last four outings.

Kulich’s long-term health now takes the forefront, though. The 21-year-old had played in 12 straight to begin the year and was frequently serving as their top center between Benson and Tage Thompson. He’s notched three goals and five points with a -4 rating while averaging a career-high 16:22 per game. The No. 28 pick in the 2022 draft is in just his second season as a regular but has managed an 18-11–29 scoring line through his first 75 career games.

With both of Thompson’s usual linemates out of commission, he’s seen Ryan McLeod and Alex Tuch elevated to ride shotgun. That trio practiced together again today, although Buffalo is off until Wednesday after losing 6-3 to the Hurricanes on Saturday.

Casey Mittelstadt Out Week-To-Week

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Bruins center Casey Mittelstadt is nursing an apparent knee issue and has already missed one game, but head coach Marco Sturm said this morning he’s been downgraded to week-to-week (via Steve Conroy of The Boston Herald). They’re hoping he can get some light skates in later this week, but he’ll need something of a lengthy ramp-up period before he’s ready for game action again.

Mittelstadt, who turns 27 later this month, was acquired from the Avalanche last season and has had pedestrian output in a middle-six role since. He’s made 33 appearances since the surprise deadline deal, posting an 8-7–15 line with a -17 rating. In 2025-26, he’s already been a healthy scratch once and has seen his ice time drop to 14:32 per game. It’s his first time below 15 minutes since the 2019-20 campaign.

The eighth overall pick of the 2017 draft, Mittelstadt is now with his third club. The 6’1″ pivot spent parts of seven seasons with the Sabres before being included in a pair of notable change-of-scenery moves – first to the Avalanche for Bowen Byram at the 2024 deadline and again to the Bruins for Charlie Coyle last year. He flashed legitimate second-line ceiling with Buffalo, rattling off back-to-back 50-point seasons in his final two seasons there, but his offensive production since hasn’t warranted that type of deployment.

In fact, Boston has shifted Mittelstadt to the wing. That’s where the good news lies: he’s spent most of the year as a wingman for Viktor Arvidsson and Pavel Zacha, and that trio has churned out the best two-way play of the B’s’ frequently-used line combos. Of their three to log 50 minutes together, the Arvidsson-Zacha-Mittelstadt unit’s 50.0 xGF% is the best, per MoneyPuck. He’s got an even rating for the year as a result.

The Bruins now find themselves down two top-six pieces long-term in Mittelstadt and Elias Lindholm, who’s out week-to-week with a lower-body issue. The team has performed better than expected offensively this year, ranking 12th in the league with 3.29 goals per game, but that figure is down to regress thanks to those absences and a 12.2% shooting rate that’s bound to cool off.

Call-up Alex Steeves found himself in Mittelstadt’s slot on the second line when he made his Boston debut against his former team, the Maple Leafs, on Saturday. He didn’t record a point but could get a second look there in Boston’s rematch with Toronto tomorrow.

Predators Recall Joakim Kemell

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The Predators announced they’ve recalled right-winger Joakim Kemell from AHL Milwaukee. He’ll be on hand for this evening’s game against the Rangers. Nashville has an open spot on the active roster, so no corresponding move is needed.

The Preds haven’t had an extra forward on hand since fellow recent call-up Zachary L’Heureux sustained a lower-body injury in practice over the weekend. With the team’s confirmation that he’ll miss four to six weeks with a lower-body injury, Nashville needed another option on hand in case of further injury. Nashville can move L’Heureux to injured reserve at any time if they need to, but since they were operating with an open spot anyway, there’s no rush.

His absence opens the opportunity for Kemell’s second stint on the roster this season after he initially broke camp with the club. The 5’11” righty was the 17th overall pick in 2022. He had already broken into a regular role with Finland’s JYP organization as a teenager. He continued there in his post-draft season before Nashville brought him to North America late in the spring of 2023. Kemell’s results in the AHL have been something of a mixed bag, particularly on the defensive side, but he’s still one of the team’s highest-ceiling scoring prospects. Nonetheless, his stock has dropped – Elite Prospects ranked him 14th overall in the Nashville system during the offseason. They credit his strong all-around offensive mindset, but he hasn’t yet shown the explosiveness in the pros to compete for a top-six job, and his utility beyond being a tertiary offensive contributor and power-play specialist is questionable.

That makes this season a big one for Kemell, now 21, to prove he’s still on track to warrant a first-round pick. Cracking the opening night roster was a good first step, but he only played in two of Nashville’s first four games before they sent him to Milwaukee for more consistent playing time. He’s only scored once through six games, but has added five assists to average a point per game. He’s posted similar stat lines in his two full seasons on the farm, logging a 16-25–41 scoring line in 67 appearances in 2023-24 and a 19-21–40 line in 65 games last year. His NHL sample has yet to yield a point in four career appearances.

It remains to be seen how much playing time Kemell will get on this recall. He’s best suited for a top-nine job, but his options there are limited. Rookie Matthew Wood has all but locked down a spot, scoring three goals and seven points through 10 games. Unless the Preds shift Steven Stamkos back to center and demote the struggling Fedor Svechkov to fourth-line duties, it’s hard to see Kemell getting significant playing time.

Maple Leafs Suspend David Kämpf Without Pay

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Nov. 9th: Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported yesterday on the network’s “Saturday Headlines” segment that one of the key issues regarding a potential contract termination for Kämpf has been his signing bonus.

Kämpf was paid a $1.325MM signing bonus earlier this year, and Friedman reported that the NHL and NHLPA are currently “involved” in discussions over whether Kämpf would need to return a portion of that signing bonus in the event of a contract termination.

Friedman noted that “the hope” from each side is that Kämpf’s situation would be sorted out by Monday, but the signing bonus issue could be something that prolongs the process. There does not appear to be any concrete rule regarding what to do with a player’s signing bonus in the event of a mutual contract termination. What to do with that money is typically decided between a player and his contracted team on a case-by-case basis, often with the involvement of the NHL and NHLPA, as is the case in this situation.

Nov. 8th: According to TSN’s Darren Dreger, Kämpf and his agent, JP Barry, are exploring all of their options and will decide on Monday. Given that a trade is highly unlikely at this point, Kämpf and the Maple Leafs are likely to agree to a mutual contract termination by the end of the weekend, despite reports indicating otherwise.

Nov. 6th: The Maple Leafs have suspended center David Kämpf without pay for departing their AHL affiliate while on assignment, PuckPedia reports. As such, the $1.25MM cap charge Kämpf incurred while in the minors is temporarily struck from their books until the situation is resolved.

Recently, there was talk of a potential mutual contract termination between Kämpf and the Leafs. The 30-year-old has not suited up for Toronto this season after clearing waivers and heading to the minors late in training camp. He initially accepted the assignment, but the defensive specialist only registered one assist and a -1 rating in four games before leaving the team late last month. Today, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reported there’s been “pushback” against a contract termination.

That’s not particularly surprising. Doing so would mean Kämpf walking away from the remainder of his $1.075MM salary for this season, plus the $1.325MM signing bonus and $1.075MM base salary he’s owed for 2026-27 before he becomes an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season. He’s only just past the halfway point of the four-year, $9.6MM extension he signed with Toronto in 2023.

Others have taken the contract termination approach in the past few years, most notably Brandon Saad, Conor Sheary, and Filip Zadina, in order to remove their albatross contract as an obstacle toward returning to an everyday NHL role. In the vast majority of cases, it’s worked out, at least in terms of the player being able to find an everyday role again. Recouping the money they surrender by doing so doesn’t always happen, though.

It’s not as if Kämpf is completely dead weight. He’s still a serviceable fourth-line piece who can contribute two-plus minutes a game shorthanded. He did fall out of a regular role on a deeper Toronto forward group last season, though. His 59 appearances in 2024-25 were his lowest since the COVID-shortened 2021 season, and he scored five goals and 13 assists with a -1 rating. He’s 51.4% on faceoffs for his career, and while he doesn’t have a history of strong possession impacts, he started over 70% of his shifts in the defensive zone at even strength in all of his four years as a Maple Leaf so far.

Sabres Recall Zac Jones

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The Sabres announced that they’ve recalled defenseman Zachary Jones from AHL Rochester. Jones will replace rearguard Rasmus Dahlin on the active roster as he heads to the non-roster list following today’s news of an indefinite leave of absence.

Jones, 25, has parts of five NHL seasons under his belt but hasn’t yet appeared for Buffalo this year. He was briefly rostered for a couple of days last month but didn’t get into a game. The lefty debuted with the Rangers back in 2020-21 and languished in a fringe press box/minor-league role for essentially his entire tenure. He never logged more than 46 appearances in a campaign, that career-high coming last season, and was finally non-tendered by the club last summer.

Despite looking like he could at least be a reliable No. 7 option in New York, the market for Jones wasn’t very strong. He accepted a high-paying two-way deal from Buffalo ($950K NHL/$550K AHL) and cleared waivers at the beginning of the season. Aside from that two-day call-up in October, he’s spent the season in Rochester with mixed results. Jones has always been viewed as an offensively talented rearguard who was considered enough of a defensive liability to keep him out of an everyday role. Nothing he’s done in Rochester has changed that perception. He’s off to an electric start on the scoresheet with a league-leading 13 assists but has a -4 rating, tied for second-worst on the team.

That dichotomy will keep him from being an NHL regular, but he remains an intriguing call-up option if a team needs a puck-mover in sheltered minutes. With Buffalo’s offensive heartbeat on the blue line in Dahlin now unavailable, bringing up an offensive-minded name from the minors is a natural choice. Jones, a 2019 third-round pick, has a 4-24–28 scoring line in 115 career appearances while averaging 15:54 of ice time per game.

Wild Activate Mats Zuccarello

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The Wild announced they’ve activated winger Mats Zuccarello from injured reserve. The top-six fixture will make his season debut in a couple of hours against the Islanders. They’ve been operating with an open roster spot for quite some time, so no corresponding move is required.

Minnesota didn’t hold a morning skate before today’s game. That’s to be expected on the second half of a back-to-back with travel – they lost to the Hurricanes 4-3 in Carolina last night. As such, it’s unclear where Zuccarello will slot into the lineup, but it’s assumed he’ll reprise his familiar role on the top line with Kirill Kaprizov and Marco Rossi.

Zuccarello had a lower-body issue pop up in the closing weeks of the offseason and wasn’t cleared to participate at the beginning of training camp. The initial expectation was that he’d miss the start of the regular season, and that was confirmed when the Wild said in late September that he’d be out for a minimum of seven to eight weeks. That makes his recent progress and today’s activation around a week and a half ahead of schedule.

His return is of special note for a Wild club that’s been looking to add an impact scoring winger on the trade market. They’re off to a sluggish 5-7-3 start, due mostly to uncharacteristically poor defensive play. They’re bottom-five in the league or close to it in most metrics – 29th in goals against per game (3.67), 29th in penalty killing (68.8%), 26th in shots against per game (30.1), and 29th in expected goals against per game at 5-on-5 (2.47).

Zuccarello won’t have much of an impact there, but the Wild are hoping he can at least help them outscore their problems. Fellow aging veteran Marcus Johansson stepped into Zuccarello’s top-line home to start the year and performed admirably, rattling off six goals and seven assists for 13 points in 15 games. The Wild hope he can keep some semblance of that momentum up as he shifts down into a second-line job with Matt Boldy and Joel Eriksson Ek – the former of whom is clicking at a point per game – to boost the depth output from their middle-six.

Now in his age-38 season, expectations for Zuccarello should start to be tempered. He’s still been a minutes-muncher for the Wild as he ages, averaging 19:39 per game last year, but he can’t keep that workload up forever. His 0.78 points per game last season were his lowest since 2019-20 and a 14% dropoff from the year prior. If that decline ends up being linear and Zuccarello only operates at around a 55-point pace this year, Minnesota’s search for another top-nine piece will only intensify.

Predators Place Cole Smith On Injured Reserve

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The Predators announced they’ve placed winger Cole Smith on injured reserve. The placement is retroactive to Nov. 1, his most recent appearance.

Smith left that night’s game against the Flames with an upper-body injury early and didn’t return. The next day, the team announced he’d be out for three to six weeks. That renders the minimum absence of the IR placement ineffective, as he’s technically eligible to return on Nov. 10 against the Rangers but won’t be available until later in the month at the earliest.

As such, today’s move has less to do with Smith’s injury and is more about opening up a roster spot. After recalling Zachary L’Heureux from AHL Milwaukee earlier in the week, the Preds didn’t have an open one. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Nashville use Smith’s spot to recall a defenseman. Adam Wilsby has missed the last five games due to a lower-body injury and is close to returning, according to Alex Daugherty of The Tennessean. However, with Wilsby still on the active roster and unavailable, the Predators don’t have an extra rearguard available.

Before his injury, Smith was having a good start in a fourth-line role alongside Michael McCarron and Ozzy Wiesblatt. The 30-year-old had three goals through 13 games while averaging 13:26 of ice time per game, including a spot on their top penalty killing unit. Despite a -2 rating, his underlying numbers with McCarron and Wiesblatt at 5-on-5 were excellent. The trio has controlled 64.3% of expected goals and 57.6% of shot attempts, which are spectacular numbers given their role as defensive specialists.

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