Lightning's Hugo Alnefelt: Returning to Swedish club
Rotowire
Alnefelt inked a three-year contract with former club HV71 (Sweden) on Tuesday.
Alnefelt is expected to be a restricted free agent this offseason, so the Lightning could retain his NHL rights by giving him a qualifying offer. Having said that, the fact that the backstop signed a three-year deal would certainly seem to indicate he won't be returning to North America. With AHL Syracuse this past season, the 23-year-old Swede went 14-8-4 with a 2.76 GAA and an .893 save percentage. Alnefelt made one appearance for the Bolts back in 2021-22, and that seems likely to be his only NHL outing for his professional career.
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Lightning's Hugo Alnefelt: Assigned to AHL
Rotowire
Alnefelt was assigned to AHL Syracuse on Saturday.
Alnefelt posted a 17-12-2 record with a 2.77 GAA and a .904 save percentage in 33 games with AHL Syracuse last season. With Andrei Vasilevskiy (back) out for the first two months of the 2023-24 campaign, Jonas Johansson and Matt Tomkins are currently the top two netminders for the Lightning.
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Lightning's Hugo Alnefelt: Thrust up depth chart
Rotowire
Alnefelt moves up the depth chart to the number two spot with Andrei Vasilevskiy (back) on the shelf for 8-10 weeks.
He has one NHL game of experience (2021-22), but he performed well last season in the AHL. Alnefelt gave up five goals at even strength in Tuesday's loss to Carolina, so his preseason is off to a shaky start. Still, general manager Julien Brisbois has his hands tied with salary cap issues until opening day (Oct. 10) when he can move Vasilevskiy to LTIR. Alnefelt could use more reps at the AHL level, and the Lightning have limited options to replace him in their system. They could look at older, free agent veterans like Brian Elliott and Jaroslav Halak to ease the load once they have some salary flexibility.
