RALEIGH — The Carolina Hurricanes on Monday tendered qualifying offers to four players and signed another, and the team parted ways with forward Joakim Nordstrom.
Fellow forward Phil Di Giuseppe was also not qualified, but the team then agreed to a one-year, one-way deal worth $750,000 that will keep him in Raleigh for the 2018-19 season.
“Phil is a versatile player who has shown he can contribute in a number of ways on the NHL level,” general manager Don Waddell said in a press release.
A second-round pick out of the University of Michigan in 2012, Di Giuseppe has 13 goals and 37 points in 126 NHL games over parts of the last three seasons with Carolina. He played a career-high 49 games with the Hurricanes last season, registering five goals and eight assists.
The Hurricanes also qualified defenseman Trevor van Riemsdyk and forwards Greg McKegg, Lucas Wallmark and Valentin Zykov.
Nordstrom, who played three seasons with the Hurricanes, came to Carolina as part of the September 2015 trade that also brought Kris Versteeg to Raleigh. Nordstrom was a valuable penalty killer, but he struggled to produce points as the team’s depth improved and he moved into more a checking role.
Nordstrom had just two goals in 75 games last season — the first in the season opener against Minnesota, and the second on Nov. 18, an empty net goal. He had a 48-game point drought after that goal, and managed just three assists — two on March 18 and one on March 30 — in the season’s final five months.
The addition of Jordan Martinook, acquired in the trade that sent Marcus Kruger to Arizona this spring, made Nordstrom expendable.
Conditioning camp begins
The Hurricanes’ prospect conditioning camp is this week, with players arriving Tuesday and culminating with scrimmages on Saturday. Andrei Svechnikov, the second overall pick on Friday at the NHL Draft, will be the showcase star of the week, along with former first-rounders Martin Necas and Jake Bean. Harvard defenseman Adam Fox, acquired as part of Saturday’s blockbuster trade at the draft that brought Dougie Hamilton to Carolina, will also attend.
All six draft picks from last weekend’s draft will be in Raleigh, and all but one player — Finnish goaltender Eetu Makiniemi, who is injured — from the team’s 2017 draft class will be in attendance. The team released a guide to the development camp that includes bios on each player and a schedule of activities, many of which are open to the public.
Gleason back in development role
Tim Gleason, a defenseman played all or parts of nine seasons in Carolin from 2006-15, has been hired as the team’s new head of defensemen development. He takes over for another former player, Glen Wesley, who did not have his contract renewed following the season. Gleason will be charged with working with defensemen in the Hurricanes system.
Gleason played more than 700 games with four NHL teams, the majority with the Hurricanes. A former first-round pick, Gleason was traded from Los Angeles to Carolina as the main return in the deal that sent Jack Johnson to the Kings.
