{"id":144947,"date":"2025-09-15T05:49:06","date_gmt":"2025-09-15T05:49:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/144947\/"},"modified":"2025-09-15T05:49:06","modified_gmt":"2025-09-15T05:49:06","slug":"late-night-notes-evangelista-canadiens-rookies-cootes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/144947\/","title":{"rendered":"Late Night Notes: Evangelista, Canadiens Rookies, Cootes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Negotiations between winger Luke Evangelista<\/a> and the Nashville Predators have begun to stall per David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period<\/a>, who reports that yearly salary is what\u2019s created the wedge. Evangelista is one of the top unsigned restricted-free agents after players like Connor Zary<\/a> and Marco Rossi<\/a> both found new deals. The 23-year-old Evangelista posted an impressive 10 goals and 23 points in 68 games last season. It was a suitable encore to the 16 goals and 39 points he posted in 80 games of the 2023-24 season.<\/p>\n

A pair of successful scoring seasons would surely make the player\u2019s camp confident in earning a hardy salary. Columbus Blue Jackets forward Cole Sillinger<\/a> recently signed a two-year, $4.5MM contract extension, while New Jersey Devils\u2019 centerman Dawson Mercer<\/a> recently signed a three-year, $12MM contract. Those could be the boundaries for a short-term, bridge contract for Evangelista \u2013 who has certainly proved his can stick in Nashville\u2019s top-nine. Should contract talks continue to stall, the Predators could opt for a one-year, sub-$1MM contract and kick negotiations back to next summer.<\/p>\n

Other notes from around the league:<\/p>\n

The Montreal Canadiens have assigned a group of rookie back to their respective leagues after rookie camp came to a close. In turn, Montreal assigned defensemen Carlos Handel<\/a> to the QMJHL\u2019s Halifax Mooseheads, Andrew MacNiel<\/a> to the OHL\u2019s Kitchener Rangers, and Bryce Pickford<\/a> to the WHL\u2019s Medicine Hat Tigers. Goaltenders Arseny Radkov<\/a> and Mikus Vecvanags<\/a> will return to Russia and Latvia respectfully. The team has also returned a handful of rookie camp invites. All of the moves come as expected, though it rings as exciting news for fans of Medicine Hat and Halifax, as their top defenders return for another season.
\nTop Vancouver Canucks prospect Braeden Cootes<\/a> was absent from the team\u2019s final rookie camp scrimmage on Sunday per Thomas Drance of The Athletic<\/a>.\u00a0Drance later added<\/a> that Cootes was held out for precautionary reasons and will still attend training camp next week. That will keep the reigning 15th-overall pick on track to take his first crack at breaking into the NHL. Cootes had a strong season with the WHL\u2019s Seattle Thunderbirds last year. He dominated the middle of the ice with quick plays all year long, working up to 63 points and 60 games in total. Cootes seems most likely set for a return to Seattle next season, though a strong training camp could earn him the chance at sticking in the pros for nine games.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Negotiations between winger Luke Evangelista and the Nashville Predators have begun to stall per David Pagnotta of The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":144948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[9540,77535,22722,49,48,5718,21374,14929,77536,743,760,448,7586,14116,23871,82,452,25260],"class_list":["post-144947","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-2025-nhl-draft","tag-braeden-cootes","tag-bryce-pickford","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-injury","tag-luke-evangelista","tag-marco-rossi","tag-mikus-vecvanags","tag-montreal-canadiens","tag-nashville-predators","tag-nhl","tag-ohl","tag-players","tag-qmjhl","tag-sports","tag-vancouver-canucks","tag-whl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/144948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}