While speaking with The Athletic’s Michael Russo last week, Calgary Flames captain Mikael Backlund was honest regarding the ongoing trade rumors surrounding longtime teammate Rasmus Andersson.
“Yeah, he’s getting traded,” Backlund said. “It’s obvious.”
It is not very often that you hear an NHL player be that transparent about the possibility of one of their teammates being moved. Yet, based on Backlund’s comments, it certainly feels that Andersson will be traded elsewhere at some point as he enters the final year of his contract.
Let’s discuss three teams that stand out as possible landing spots for Andersson.
In late June, TSN’s Pierre LeBrun reported that Andersson only wanted to sign a contract extension in a potential trade if it was with the Vegas Golden Knights. Since then, the Golden Knights have been heavily linked to Andersson as a potential landing spot.
The Golden Knights are well known for making big moves, and it would make a ton of sense for them to bring in Andersson. Considering Alex Pietrangelo has stepped away from hockey to try to recover from injuries and might not return, the Golden Knights certainly could use another effective two-way right-shot defenseman. Landing Andersson would provide them with just that.
The Golden Knights would need to be creative to be able to afford Andersson, considering they’re more than $7 million over the salary cap. Pietrangelo will likely be on the long-term injured reserve, which gives Vegas more cap room to work with, but the team will still only have around $1.16 million in space once that happens.
That said, they have never been afraid to make aggressive moves if it means landing an effective player.
The Dallas Stars have plenty to be optimistic about heading into the 2025-26 season.
They have a strong mix of veteran and young forwards to go along with an elite goaltender in Jake Oettinger. However, after Miro Heiskanen, the right side of their defense is Dallas’ Achilles heel. Acquiring Andersson would be an excellent way to fix this.
Andersson would give their second pairing a massive boost if acquired. However, he could also be an option for their top pairing if Miro Heiskanen moved to the left side or misses time. In either scenario, the Stars’ top four would improve tremendously with an Andersson addition, and Ilya Lyubushkin and Nils Lundkvist down the depth chart.
Similar to the Golden Knights, the Stars would need to move out some salary to make a trade for Andersson work. That is where things could get tricky, as Dallas currently only has a little over $400,000 of cap space. Even if Andersson is still available closer to the trade deadline and the Stars accrue cap space, they still must make more room to acquire the blueliner.
The Boston Bruins could also be a dark horse team to watch when it comes to Andersson. While they re-signed Henri Jokiharju this off-season, they still have not found the best top-four replacement for Brandon Carlo since trading him to the Toronto Maple Leafs. Acquiring Andersson would change that.
Andersson would significantly improve the right side of Boston’s defense. Having a one-two punch of Charlie McAvoy and Andersson would make the Bruins a much more difficult team to go up against. He would also give them another quarterback to work on their power play due to his offensive skills.
The Bruins’ goal is to prove that last season was a fluke and to get back into the playoffs in 2025-26. Acquiring Andersson could help their odds of doing just that.
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