{"id":415793,"date":"2026-01-18T23:37:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T23:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/415793\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T23:37:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T23:37:09","slug":"golden-knights-to-acquire-rasmus-andersson-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/415793\/","title":{"rendered":"Golden Knights To Acquire Rasmus Andersson \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Golden Knights have acquired defenseman\u00a0Rasmus Andersson<\/a>\u00a0from the Flames pending an official trade call, Darren Dreger of TSN<\/a> reports. In exchange, Calgary receives defenseman\u00a0Zach Whitecloud<\/a>, Vegas\u2019 2027 first-round pick, a conditional 2027 second-round pick, and the signing rights to University of North Dakota defender\u00a0Abram Wiebe<\/a>, per Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If the Golden Knights win the Stanley Cup this year, that 2027 second-rounder will upgrade to a 2028 first-round pick. Calgary is retaining 50% of Andersson\u2019s $4.55MM cap hit in the deal, Friedman adds, bringing his impact down to just $2.275MM on Vegas\u2019 books this season. Vegas\u2019 2027 first-rounder is also top-10 protected, Dreger<\/a> notes.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s far from a stunning move. Andersson was first implicated in trade talks<\/a> nearly two full calendar years ago. Ever since, Vegas has been one of the teams most consistently linked to the right-shot blue liner. That\u2019s only ramped up since this past offseason, when reports indicated Nevada was the Swede\u2019s preferred long-term destination<\/a> and, naturally, would yield a larger return for Calgary because he\u2019d be willing to sign an extension with the Knights. However, any extension won\u2019t be registered today \u2013 David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period<\/a> reports there\u2019s no new contract in place at this time.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>That means Andersson, 29, is still set to reach unrestricted free agency this summer as the top defenseman available \u2013 for now. He is in the final season of the six-year, $27.3MM extension he signed with Calgary in January 2020, coming off his entry-level contract. A second-round pick by the Flames in 2015, his tenure in Calgary ends with him seventh on the franchise defenseman leaderboard in games played (584), sixth in assists (204), and sixth in points (261).<\/p>\n

Back in training camp, it looked like the Flames\u2019 ongoing retool had removed any possibility of their top-four anchor remaining in Calgary. Captain\u00a0Mikael Backlund<\/a> said in August<\/a> that Andersson didn\u2019t want his future to be a \u201cdistraction\u201d but that a trade was inevitable. Talk of separation softened after he reported to camp, with reports indicating he\u2019d reopened extension talks<\/a>. Over the past few days, though, it became clear the Flames had received the type of trade offers they wanted and would pull the trigger on a deal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The other team that was in it to the wire \u2013 as late as this morning<\/a> \u2013 was the Bruins. According to Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic<\/a>, the Flames gave Andersson permission to discuss an extension with Boston, presumably upon which the deal was contingent. They weren\u2019t able to come to an agreement on a contract, though, putting Vegas back in the driver\u2019s seat despite the Golden Knights not being able to talk contract with Andersson\u2019s camp prior to the deal. If Andersson\u2019s long-reported interest in Vegas is true, though, they shouldn\u2019t have much trouble coming to a resolution before July 1.<\/p>\n

The Flames\u2019 retool is only further accelerated by the move. They already owned Vegas\u2019 first-round pick this year as a result of 2024\u2019s\u00a0Noah Hanifin<\/a>\u00a0trade<\/a>, giving them four guaranteed first-rounders over the next two drafts. If the Knights take home the Cup, they\u2019ll have six first-rounders in the next three years.<\/p>\n

Those hopefully high-value draft choices are the principal point of the return for the Flames. Whitecloud\u2019s inclusion in the deal primarily serves as cap management for Vegas, but also gives the Flames a stable veteran option to, in part, replace Andersson\u2019s minutes as they try to avoid overloading their young blue line talent too early in their development.<\/p>\n

Whitecloud, 29, signed with the Knights as an undrafted free agent out of Bemidji State in 2018 and has thus remained in the organization since its inaugural season. The 6\u20192\u2033 210-lb righty has posted some tough numbers this season but has 78 points and a +42 rating in 368 games for his career, serving as their staple third-pairing option on the right side behind\u00a0Alex Pietrangelo<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Shea Theodore<\/a>\u00a0for the past several seasons. With Pietrangelo injured, he\u2019d been averaging 18:46 of ice time per game this season, nearly a career-high.<\/p>\n

Wiebe, 22, isn\u2019t without ceiling, either. The nephew of longtime Blackhawks defenseman\u00a0Keith Brown<\/a> was a seventh-round pick by Vegas in 2022 but has since gone on to put up some solid numbers with the Fighting Hawks. He\u2019s now in his junior season, is an alternate captain, and has scored 48 points with a +13 rating in 102 games on North Dakota\u2019s blue line. He owns a pro-ready 6\u20193\u2033, 209-lb frame, giving him a legitimate shot at being a mobile piece near the bottom of Calgary\u2019s lineup in the next few years.<\/p>\n

For the Knights, acquiring Andersson means they\u2019re back to their ethos of big in-season swings after taking last year off. Their\u00a0acquisition of a high-end right-shot defender was a foregone conclusion ever since it was announced that Pietrangelo\u00a0wouldn\u2019t play this season, with his career likely <\/a>over due to various lingering injuries<\/a>.<\/p>\n

They get a resurgent name in Andersson, who\u2019ll be heading to the Olympics with Sweden. With 10 goals and 30 points in 48 games this season, he\u2019s 20th in the league in scoring among defenders and immediately becomes the Knights\u2019 leader in overall production from the blue line.<\/p>\n

The question becomes how his defensive game will slot in on a Vegas club that\u2019s been above-average in the possession department this year. He\u2019s coming off a -38 rating last season and has posted negative relative Corsi shares at 5-on-5 in nine of his 10 NHL seasons, including this one. Might he be eating into the already sheltered offensive zone minutes that his now-reunited teammate Hanifin has been receiving?<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, it\u2019s nearly impossible to criticize the deal from Vegas\u2019 perspective. They\u2019ve already got a clear path to a deep playoff run through a weak Pacific Division but, with Pietrangelo gone and Theodore and\u00a0Brayden McNabb<\/a>\u00a0missing significant time this year, have lacked the identity that their historically overloaded top-four group has provided. Now, that blue line power is back with Andersson, Hanifin, McNabb, and Theodore comprising one of the most experienced and dynamic groups in the league.<\/p>\n

They also do so while actually increasing their cap space for this season. Whitecloud was signed through next season at a $2.75MM cap hit, so Vegas frees up nearly $500K in space with this deal.<\/p>\n

Image courtesy of Brett Holmes-Imagn Images.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Golden Knights have acquired defenseman\u00a0Rasmus Andersson\u00a0from the Flames pending an official trade call, Darren Dreger of TSN…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":415794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[199083,4047,10669,385,195259,99,6182,1793,199084],"class_list":["post-415793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-abram-wiebe","tag-calgary-flames","tag-newsstand","tag-nhl","tag-rasmus-andersson","tag-sports","tag-transactions","tag-vegas-golden-knights","tag-zach-whitecloud"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}