Yet another Trade Deadline has come and gone, and it was quite a busy one with plenty of big names on the move. Declaring winners and losers of the deadline right away can be difficult to do, and hindsight really helps with those decisions. This year, in a buyer’s market, it is easier to declare a team a loser based on returns, but also allows for some very obvious winners,
Here are the top three winners and top three losers from the 2024 NHL Trade Deadline.
Winner: Vegas Golden Knights
- Acquired Anthony Mantha for a second and third-round draft pick
- Acquired Noah Hanifin for Daniil Miromanov, a first, third, and fifth-round draft pick
- Acquired Tomas Hertl and two third-round draft picks for a first-round draft pick and David Edstrom
It has been a long time since there was a team to make such a massive group of additions by the trade deadline. They kicked things off by adding a great two-way, middle-six winger in Anthony Mantha, who will come in and help add to their already deep winger group. They followed that up by adding one of the top available names, Noah Hanifin. The biggest thing about adding Hanifin is that, after winning the 2023 Stanley Cup, many already said that the Vegas Golden Knights had the best defense group in the NHL. Now they add a legitimate top-pair defenseman to play with Alex Pietrangelo. That is a very scary blue line.
They ended the Trade Deadline with a huge, unsuspecting splash by adding Tomas Hertl. Nobody saw this move coming, and with six years remaining on his deal, this is far from a rental. Hertl will slide into the top six when healthy and make an immediate impact.
The reigning Stanley Cup Champions just got significantly better and are, without a doubt, the favorites heading into the playoffs.
Loser: New York Islanders
For the fourth year in a row, deadline day was crickets for the New York Islanders. In other years, that was outweighed by the fact they made moves leading up to the deadline, but this year, they had nothing. The Islanders’ last two trades were acquiring Tyce Thompson and Robert Bortuzzo. There is nothing against either of them, but for a bubble playoff team, these moves aren’t generating much confidence.
Related: 2024 NHL Trade Deadline Tracker
The Islanders currently sit just two points out of a playoff spot, but they have been right on the verge all season, and even if they make the playoffs, there isn’t much confidence in them making any noise there. Going into a Trade Deadline in the Islanders’ position and not making any moves, whether it be buying or selling, is how a team ends up in mediocrity.
Winner: Winnipeg Jets
- Acquired Sean Monahan for a first and third-round draft pick
- Acquired Tyler Toffoli for a second and third-round draft pick
- Acquired Colin Miller for a fourth-round draft pick
There were three goals in mind for the Winnipeg Jets headed into the deadline, and they landed all three. They needed a second-line center and did so by acquiring Sean Monahan, who has fit in pretty well with eight goals in 14 games. His two-way play will help the Jets a lot, and he has earned the trust of head coach Rick Bowness, which can be tough to do. Their second goal was to add more scoring to the forward group, and many believed Tyler Toffoli would be the perfect candidate to come in and help balance their winger group. Kevin Cheveldayoff did just that and acquired Toffoli for what feels like pennies on the dollar. A final goal was to add depth to their defense, specifically someone who could move the puck. The Jets landed the underrated Colin Miller as the clock was winding down.
Outside of goaltending, which is nearly perfect, the Jets improved in every aspect. With the picks they traded away, they were spread out enough that it isn’t going to have a significant impact on any one draft, and they still have plenty of assets to make more deals in the offseason or at the next trade deadline.
This season, an overlooked part of the Jets is that when moving Pierre-Luc Dubois and buying out Blake Wheeler, they still had Mark Scheifele and Connor Hellebuyck in trade rumors. They were adamant that they wanted to re-tool and not just futures. Many fans and media questioned if that was the appropriate direction to take, and here the Jets are, proving everyone wrong.
Loser: Toronto Maple Leafs
- Acquired Ilya Lyubushkin for a third and sixth-round draft pick
- Acquired Joel Edmundson for a third and fifth-round draft pick
- Acquired Connor Dewar for a fourth-round draft pick
Adding physical depth to your lineup is a goal many general managers look at before going into the playoffs, especially when you look at the fact the Toronto Maple Leafs will likely be facing the Boston Bruins. They did that, all three of their acquisitions do add physical depth which is great in a vacuum.
The thing the Leafs needed to focus on was upgrading their defense group. They didn’t do that. What they did instead was add more options. Ilya Lyubushkin and Joel Edmundson are fine defensemen, but when you look at the Toronto team, are they really players that move the needle at all? They should have used their picks and gone shopping for one player who helps at the top of the lineup rather than more players at the bottom of the lineup.
Winner: Carolina Hurricanes
- Acquired Jake Guentzel and Ty Smith for Michael Bunting, a second and fifth-round pick, and three prospects
- Acquired Evgeny Kuznetsov for a third-round draft pick
For the past few seasons, the issue identified with the Carolina Hurricanes has been the high-end offense. While general manager Don Waddell doesn’t traditionally make these big splashes at the deadline, he looked at his team and saw the need to go all in.
Jake Guentzel immediately adds that high-end scoring, and if they stopped with him, they would still be on this list. He is a very talented winger who shows up in the playoffs. He has been one of the best playoff performers over the past decade, and with Carolina right on the verge of a special run, Guentzel may be the piece to push them over the edge.
Adding Evgeny Kuznetsov was a huge surprise, but it is a perfect fit. The Hurricanes needed a center as Jack Drury was playing as their second-line center, and if they were looking to go far in the playoffs, that didn’t instill much confidence. They hoped to find a solution with Jesperi Kotkaniemi, but he has regressed and doesn’t seem to be the fit there either. Kuznetsov hasn’t had a fantastic season, but with proven 80-point potential, this is a risk well worth it for the Hurricanes.
Loser: New Jersey Devils
- Traded Tyler Toffoli for a second and third-round draft pick
- Acquired Jake Allen for a third-round draft pick
- Acquired Kappo Kahkonen for Vitek Vanecek and a seventh-round draft pick
- Traded Colin Miller for a fourth-round draft pick
The New Jersey Devils are having a season to forget. They had huge aspirations for this season, but with injuries and other factors, it looks like they will be missing the playoffs. They ended up as sellers and put a band-aid on a major issue.
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Losing Toffoli and Miller hurt their depth a lot, and the return they got for the two players is pretty disappointing. Toffoli was a great fit for the Devils, but with how the season had gone, they decided to move him for assets. A team that has as much talent as they do selling these players hurts the future. Now, of course, they could have missed out on re-signing them, but for the future of the club, they would be in a better position with these players re-signed.
Swapping goalies around and acquiring Jake Allen and Kappo Kahkonen helps them in the net for sure, but not by much. Allen is going to be around next season and that is a positive, they made a good move there, but if you take just this season away, Vitek Vanecek is the best goalie that was traded at the deadline. Sure, he had a poor season with the Devils, but up until this season, many would prefer Vanecek over anybody else. I don’t think that move will age very well.
Who else was missed? There is an argument for many teams to be in the winner or loser category, but in a buyer’s market, it is hard to establish any major steals of the day as the market was set pretty low for sellers.