LAS VEGAS — It was a busy day, but Rickard Rakell remains with the Penguins.
They also hung onto Matt Grzelcyk, Erik Karlsson and Bryan Rust, among others.
But with four relatively minor deals before Friday’s trade deadline, Kyle Dubas and the Penguins were still able to add to their pile of picks and prospects, while also bringing in a couple of NHL players to help them get through the rest of this season.
The last-place Penguins acquired two second-round picks along with a third as they said so long to Anthony Beauvillier and Cody Glass and rerouted Luke Schenn.
After Friday’s trades, Dubas and the Penguins have now amassed 30 picks over the next three NHL drafts. They will have at least 10 selections in this year’s draft.
Dubas said the Penguins now plan to shift “a little from asset collection” to starting to bolster the NHL roster but he cautioned the process “will still require patience.”
“If there are opportunities to use the excess capital that we’ve accumulated, whether it’s cap space or draft picks to add players to the program to help propel it ahead, we won’t hesitate to do that,” Dubas told reporters back in Pittsburgh on Friday.
On deadline day, the most significant news was the big move Dubas didn’t make.
He said there was “lots of interest” around the NHL in Rakell. But for now he resisted the urge to trade his leading goal-scorer and one of Sidney Crosby’s wingers.
Dubas called the 31-year-old “a big part of our program” and said that keeping Rakell was “definitely the right thing to do as we measured it up against everything.”
“When you have [a player] signed and they want to be a part of the community, they want to be part of the program, they know the path that we’re on and they want to be a part of helping to bring the team back to being in contention, I would say that you don’t just push that out the door because [fans or media want it],” he said.
The Penguins also retained Grzelcyk, who Dubas said garnered some interest ahead of the deadline, but not enough to incentivize him to deal the pending free agent.
As for higher-profile players such as Karlsson and Rust, Dubas said he didn’t receive an offer that led to him approaching any of them about waving a no-trade clause.
Regarding Karlsson in particular, Dubas said “there was no discussion” about trading the former All-Star defenseman, who has not met expectations with the Penguins.
“He’s not a player that we would look to just move along,” the team president said.
The Penguins started off Friday by shipping Beauvillier to the Washington Capitals. They received a 2025 second-round pick for the winger — a big victory for them.
Given that he was on a one-year contract, Beauvillier was a virtual lock to be dealt by Dubas and the Penguins before Friday’s 3 p.m. deadline. The 27-year-old ended up being an excellent signing for Pittsburgh, purely based on this trade return.
The Penguins acquired another second-round pick — this one in 2026 — plus a 2027 fourth from Winnipeg in exchange for Schenn. The 35-year-old defenseman was part of Wednesday’s deal with Nashville and never played a game for Pittsburgh.
Dubas traded Glass and minor-league forward Jonathan Gruden to the New Jersey Devils. The Penguins received a 2027 third-round pick and forward prospects Chase Stillman and Max Graham. Stillman was drafted 29th overall four years ago.
The Penguins acquired Glass last summer, in that deal receiving a second-round pick from Nashville to take on his contract. Glass showed promise in spurts, but he wasn’t as impactful as hoped and had been recently relegated to a fourth-line role.
Following Friday’s wheeling and dealing, the Penguins have a total of 18 picks within the first three rounds over the next three drafts. No other NHL team has more.
“I don’t know if it’s feasible to expect that we can use all those draft picks, to use every one of them and then expect all of them — in sequence — to become part of the club,” Dubas said of that draft capital. “We’ll have those assets available for trade.”
In their fourth and final move Friday, the Penguins sent a 2025 fifth-round pick to the Toronto Maple Leafs for defenseman Conor Timmins and winger Connor Dewar.
Timmins, 26, is a righty and a former Soo Greyhound. He has played 142 games split among three teams and spent the last three years with the Leafs. He has five career goals, 39 points and a plus-12 mark. He’s listed at 6-foot-3 and 213 pounds.
Dewar is a 5-foot-10 depth forward. He has tallied 46 points in 221 career games.
Both of those newcomers will be restricted free agents at the end of this season.
“For the new players coming in — Connor Dewar, Conor Timmins, Tommy Novak — it’s a great opportunity to assert themselves to the coaching staff and our staff for where they want to be next season,” Dubas said. “They’re all under team control.”
Dubas said that even though for his players this has become another lost season, he expects the Penguins to compete the rest of the way, calling it an “opportunity.”
And his message to Sidney Crosby and his other core players — and the fan base in Pittsburgh, too — is that he plans to continue to methodically rebuild the roster.
Dubas said it will not happen overnight. But he believes they’re on the right track.
“What I want to do is temper the expectation that we are going to use all these right away this summer [on win-now moves],” he said. “We’re going to survey the landscape as urgently as we can each day to find moves that can best help propel the team ahead. If there aren’t moves available, we will execute on these picks.”
Around the boards
The Penguins on Friday signed defenseman Ryan Shea to a one-year extension with a salary of $900,000 for next season. ... Stillman will report to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the American Hockey League. ... Graham will be sidelined by a knee injury for the rest of this season but the Penguins expect him to be healthy in the fall.
First Published: March 7, 2025, 4:32 p.m.
Updated: March 8, 2025, 5:00 p.m.
