Philipp Grubauer's Vezina nomination highlights busy Avalanche day

The Avalanche had the rare busy news day today as they practiced for a bit this morning in preparation of Game 2 of their second-round series against the Vegas Golden Knights tomorrow night.

The focus, however, was in net as the expected starting goaltenders for Game 2 both found themselves being named as finalists for the Vezina Trophy, given annually to the league’s best goaltender that season.

Marc-Andre Fleury of Vegas and Philipp Grubauer of Colorado comprised two-thirds of the finalists for the trophy as they joined Tampa Bay’s Andrei Vasilevskiy, who is the frontrunner for the award this year.

Left out in the cold was last year’s winner, Connor Hellebuyck of the Winnipeg Jets, in what was a mild surprise.

It’s a victory for Grubauer, however, as he gets to add one more accolade to his profile as he heads into unrestricted free agency this offseason whenever Colorado’s postseason run ends. From the NHL’s release:

Grubauer, another first-time finalist, shared the League lead with a career-high seven shutouts and ranked second in both wins (30) and goals-against average (1.95) – also personal bests – to help the Avalanche capture the Presidents’ Trophy for the third time in franchise history. He earned victories in 30 of his 40 total appearances (.750), the second-highest winning percentage among goaltenders with a minimum of five games played in 2020-21, behind only Jack Campbell (.773 in 22 GP w/ TOR). Grubauer – who also placed among the League leaders in starts (5th; 39), time on ice (5th; 2,366:52) and save percentage (8th; .922) – is the third netminder in Avalanche/Nordiques history who has been voted a Vezina Trophy finalist (following Patrick Roy: 2x and Semyon Varlamov) and is vying to become the franchise’s first player to win the award. The 29-year-old Rosenheim, Germany, native also is looking to become the second goaltender of German nationality to win the Vezina Trophy, after Olie Kolzig in 1999-00 (w/ WSH).

A good accomplishment for Grubauer.

ELC season ends

June 1 marks the end of the road for many prospects with the organizations that drafted them. It is the deadline at which teams must either sign certain prospects or lose their rights.

That was the case today for 2019 selections Sasha Mutala (5th round) and Luka Burzan (6th round). Neither player was extended an ELC and, meaning they are no longer Avalanche prospects.

For Mutala, he goes back into the draft and is eligible to be selected again. There are several teams already with interest so he’ll be a name we keep an eye on during the draft just to see where he ends up.

Because Burzan is a year older, he now heads into free agency with an opportunity to choose his next destination.

The Avs were pretty active this year in signing players despite passing on both Mutala and Burzan.

Signed during this ELC-signing season were:

Forwards: Alex Newhook, Sampo Ranta, Jean-Luc Foudy, Alex Beaucage
Defensemen: Justin Barron, Nathan Clurman, Keaton Middleton
Goaltender: Trent Miner

While Newhook and Ranta are contributing to the current Avalanche playoff run, that’s five players who should be fixtures for the Colorado Eagles next season with Foudy being the odd-man-out because of his age.

Signing eight players, seven of whom were Avalanche draft picks, to ELCs just means the Avalanche prospect system is now very light on players overall. In fact, the Avs have just 10 unsigned prospects.

Looking ahead to next year, there’s a very real chance Colorado doesn’t sign any ELCs during this period unless they are players like Middleton, who signed an ELC with the Avs this year after being on an AHL deal most of the season.

Colorado is set to lose the rights to two college players, Nicky Leivermann and Tyler Weiss, in August of 2022 while their June 1 players next year are Nils Aman and Shamil Shmakov.

Both Leivermann and Weiss had strong junior years and are trending upward so it remains possible they could sign ELCs while both Aman and Shmakov are considered longshots to get contracts from the Avalanche.

Add in the possibility of the Avs drafting a European player with their first round pick and bringing him to the AHL immediately, a la Mikko Rantanen and Martin Kaut, and the Eagles could be as loaded with prospects next season as they ever have been.