Who is Nikita Tryamkin?

Good news for the Vancouver Canucks fans: as announced on Avtomobilist Ekaterinburg official site, the KHL team allowed Nikita Tryamkin to move to the NHL even if his contract is still active.

“The contract with Nikita Tryamkin will run out on April 30^th, but the defenseman asked the club to allow him to terminate it earlier to report to North America,” the Ekaterinburg’s team official site reported.

Avtomobilist just ended their season with a 4-2 loss in the KHL playoff first round against Metallurg Magnitogorsk, who won the Gagarin Cup a couple of seasons ago.

“The club decided to accept his alumni’s request, therefore he’ll spend the rest of the season in Canada. We will retain the KHL rights on him. We wish good luck to Nikita.” The news come after the Canucks General Manager announced that they were interested in bringing Tryamkin over a few days ago.

This will be a new challenge for Tryamkin, who spent his whole career in his native Ekaterinburg. A graduated of the Spartakovets hockey academy (like former NHL stars Alexei Yashin and Nikolai Khabibulin), Tryamkin started making a name for himself in the MHL, the Russian junior league. Thanks to his size and imposing presence at both ends of the ice he was a junior all-star and climbed up until the Avtomobilist Ekaterinburg top pairings.

Tryamkin has progressed significantly in the last couple of seasons, and this year he averaged 17:41 of average time on ice, which became more than 21 in the six postseason games. In 53 regular season games, Tryamkin scored four goals and 11 points, adding one helper in six playoff games. In last year’s playoffs, he averaged only nine minutes a night. In his four KHL seasons, he had a total of 188 games, nine goals, and 28 points.

Tryamkin was also a member of the Russian national team that grabbed the bronze medal at the 2014 WJC in Malmo, Sweden. Some six months later, he was drafted by the Vancouver Canucks in the third round, with the 66^th overall pick.

Being 6’8″, 230 lbs., size is the first thing that the Canucks will get to appreciate regarding Tryamkin, but he can also add a good vision of the game, a good slapshot, and good use of his body. On the other hand, he should work on his skating and positional play, other than trying to get less PIMs. He can also guarantee a good deal of experience, considering that he spent four seasons in the KHL and participated to the 2014 WJC and the 2016 Spengler Cup. Tryamkin will turn 22 the next August 30^th.

The Canucks are certainly looking forward some plays like this: