The 4 Nations Face-Off has hit the halfway mark and with there being no NHL games on the slate, it was a relatively quiet week around the hockey world aside from the four tournament games. Nonetheless, there was still some news of note which is recapped in our key stories.
More International Hockey: We saw the return of best-on-best hockey (at least for four countries) with the 4 Nations tournament and there will be another event next year with the Olympics. Another tournament has been added to the calendar as the World Cup of Hockey will make its return in 2028. The last time this was played was back in 2016 with Canada taking the best-of-three series over Team Europe to win the title. As is the case with the 4 Nations Face-Off, this event will not fall under the IIHF’s umbrella while it remains to be seen if Russia, who has been excluded from international events in recent years, will be allowed to participate in this one.
Extension For Steel: While transaction activity has been extremely limited over the past week, the Stars took care of one of their pending unrestricted free agents, signing center Sam Steel to a two-year, $4.2MM extension. The 27-year-old is in his second season in Dallas, returning despite being non-tendered last summer. Steel hasn’t been able to come close to replicating the type of offensive success that he had at the junior level but he has turned into a reliable checker; he leads all Stars forwards in ATOI shorthanded. The deal represents a nice raise for the 27-year-old as he will go from making $1.2MM this season to an AAV of $2.1MM for next year.
Theodore Exits 4 Nations: Golden Knights defenseman Shea Theodore was pegged to play a significant role for Canada at the 4 Nations Face-Off. However, his tournament lasted only a handful of shifts as he suffered an upper-body injury in the opener and was quickly ruled out for the rest of the event. Subsequently, Vegas announced that the blueliner is expected to be out on a week-to-week basis. The 29-year-old sits fourth among all NHL rearguards in scoring with 48 points in 55 games while averaging over 22 minutes. His exit comes on the heels of Vegas teammate Alex Pietrangelo withdrawing from the tournament to nurse a nagging injury as the Golden Knights will be dealing with a banged-up back end when the season resumes this coming weekend. Theodore’s absence resulted in Dallas defender Thomas Harley being put on standby to join the team, something…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Pro Hockey Rumors…