Matthew Tkachuk is on his way out of Calgary, and he apparently wouldn’t mind joining the Golden Knights.
The Vegas Golden Knights have a whole bunch of star players on the roster currently. Jack Eichel, Alex Pietrangelo, Mark Stone — the list goes on.
Apparently, there’s another star player not currently on the Golden Knights’ roster who wouldn’t mind getting the opportunity to play in Sin City.
Matthew Tkachuk, a star winger for the Calgary Flames who is a restricted free agent, reportedly told the Flames that he does not intend to sign a long-term deal with the club. And for this reason, the 24-year-old forward is expected to be traded imminently.
According to Jeremy Rutherford and Hailey Salvian of The Athletic, Tkachuk has given the Flames a list of teams with whom he’d accept a long-term contract. Those teams are, in alphabetical order, the Dallas Stars, Florida Panthers, Nashville Predators, New Jersey Devils, New York Rangers, St. Louis Blues and, of course, Vegas.
Tkachuk playing alongside Jack Eichel on the Golden Knights? Now that would be something.
There’s only one problem, though — the Golden Knights have literally no cap space. In fact, they’re $1,394,643 over the salary cap ceiling, according to CapFriendly, and they still need to sign restricted free agents of their own like Nicolas Roy, Nicolas Hague and Keegan Kolesar.
Plus, the Flames are likely hoping for a sizable return from teams looking to acquire Tkachuk — a bigger return than the Golden Knights should even consider. The Golden Knights have a strong team as is, and moving a key player (or possibly multiple key players) to land Tkachuk may not be in their best interest.
But then again, this is the Golden Knights. And the Golden Knights never hesitate to go big.