The Islanders announced they signed pending UFA winger Kyle Palmieri and RFA defenseman Adam Boqvist to two-year and one-year contract extensions, respectively. Boqvist’s deal carries a cap hit of $850K, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports. Palmieri’s is worth $4.75MM per season for a total value of $9.5MM, Friedman adds. His deal also includes a full no-trade clause in 2025-26 and a 16-team no-trade list in 2026-27, according to PuckPedia.
The two signings are the first of general manager Mathieu Darche’s tenure after they made his hiring official one week ago, succeeding Lou Lamoriello. Lamoriello had held extension talks with both players before the Islanders announced he’d been let go. They hit pause while the organization conducted its GM search, but it appears they were high on Darche’s list to get across the finish line in his first several days on the job.
Palmieri, 34, has spent parts of five seasons on Long Island and will look to extend that number to seven with this new deal. Initially acquired from the Devils at the 2021 trade deadline, he spent about a month testing free agency the following summer before returning to New York on a four-year, $20MM contract.
It was an eye-raising commitment at the time, especially for a player who finished the regular season with just four points in 17 games after his acquisition. It largely worked out in the end, though. Palmieri returned to his ways as a consistent 20-goal winger, putting himself on pace for the mark in his last three seasons with the Isles. He hasn’t missed a game since the 2022-23 campaign and even tied his career-high 30 goals one year ago. He followed that up with a 24-goal, 48-point showing this season, placing him third on the Islanders in scoring and 14th among pending unrestricted free agents.
That makes his price tag a smart one for his relatively projectable goal-scoring touch, although the Islanders would presumably like to decrease his deployment from the 18:31 per game he hit last season, a career high. While a known commodity offensively, he’s never been particularly adept away from the puck, and those concerns perhaps overshadowed his decent production in 2024-25. His -17 rating was a team-low and a career-low. The Islanders also allowed 30.24 shots per 60 minutes with Palmieri on the ice at 5-on-5, the worst figure of any New York skater with at least 200 minutes played, per Natural Stat Trick.
Palmieri should still be able to hover around the…
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