Evgeny Kuznetsov’s winding road with the Washington Capitals has reached the end. The Capitals traded the 31-year-old center to the Carolina Hurricanes on Friday, at the NHL’s trade deadline, and received a 2025 third-round pick in return.
Washington retained 50 percent of Kuznetsov’s $7.8 million salary cap hit in the transaction. Kuznetsov’s contract runs through next season, so $3.9 million of Kuznetsov’s salary will remain on Washington’s cap next year. After also retaining salary on the trades of winger Anthony Mantha and defenseman Joel Edmundson, the Capitals have now used all three salary retention slots. Mantha and Edmundson’s contracts end this season, meaning Kuznetsov’s is the only one that will remain on the books into next year.
The trade deadline is 3 p.m. Eastern on Friday.
Kuznetsov was cleared to resume practice after a stint in the NHL’s player assistance program last Saturday. The Capitals placed him on waivers the same day. When he cleared waivers, he was assigned to the Hershey Bears, Washington’s American Hockey League affiliate. Kuznetsov reported to Hershey, Pa., for practice Tuesday and joined the Bears for their road trip to Charlotte on Wednesday.
“I think we’re open to anything that gives him an opportunity to continue his career the way he wants to continue it,” Washington General Manager Brian MacLellan said Saturday, after placing Kuznetsov on waivers. Six days later, the result was a trade that ends Kuznetsov’s 11-season tenure with the Capitals.
As part of the follow-up care stage of the player assistance program, Kuznetsov has not yet been cleared to resume game action.
At the high points of Kuznetsov’s time in Washington, he was a driving force, and his star turn during the 2018 playoffs helped lift the Capitals to a Stanley Cup triumph. But since that run, Kuznetsov’s time in Washington has been rocky.
In 2019, he tested positive for cocaine while representing Russia at the IIHF World Championships, resulting in a four-year ban from international competition, and was later suspended three NHL games for “inappropriate conduct.”
Kuznetsov looked resurgent in the 2021-22 season, recording 78 points in 79 games. But a downward trend returned last season, leading to a report by a Russian TV outlet last March that Kuznetsov had requested a trade. It didn’t get any easier for Kuznetsov this season.
In December, he was a healthy scratch for a game against the Arizona Coyotes. Kuznetsov scored in his first game back from being scratched, but he tallied just one more goal after that before entering the program. In total this season, he recorded just six goals and 11 assists for 17 points in 43 games.
Across his 723 games in Washington, Kuznetsov scored 171 goals and totaled 568 points.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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March 09, 2024 at 01:41AM
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Evgeny Kuznetsov heads to the Hurricanes as the NHL trade deadline arrives - The Washington Post
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