Preds Focus Turns to High-Scoring Tolvanen for NHL Playoffs
Preds GM Intends to Add Prospect for Predators' Stanley Cup Playoffs Run
The question is no longer if heralded prospect Eeli Tolvanen will play in the NHL this season, but when.
After watching his 2017 first-round pick tear up the elite Russian KHL all season, Nashville Predators General Manager David Poile then witnessed Tolvanen score with even greater frequency for Finland at the recent Winter Olympics. Despite still being two months shy of his 19th birthday, one thing has become clear.
Tolvanen is ready for his next test.
"It is our goal and our hope when his season is over we'll be able to enter into a contract with him," Poile said Monday during his NHL Trade Deadline press conference. "If we were successful in doing that, we would be bringing him over here and he'd be part of our roster possibly before the end of the regular season or sometime in the beginning of the playoffs."
The key phrase is "when his season is over." Tolvanen, who set the KHL record for points by an 18-year-old in January, will play out the remainder of the league's season with Finnish Jokerit before coming stateside.
Jokerit's regular-season concludes Thursday, but the Helsinki-based team could play its final game anywhere from March 7 to April 26 due to the postseason. That timeframe covers a sweeping defeat in the first round as the KHL Western Conference's No. 3 seed to a Gagarin Cup victory following a full seven-game KHL championship series.
The NHL Central Division-leading Preds, meanwhile, expect to begin the Stanley Cup Playoffs on or around April 11.
Poile approached this week's trade deadline with Tolvanen's status in mind. Nashville already planned to sign the un-retiring Mike Fisher to add to its depth. Why trade for scoring firepower at forward when the Predators would eventually sign a player like Tolvanen instead?
"With Tolvanen, I think clearly if everything plays out correctly in terms of his curve of being a top two-line player, I didn't want to be redundant," explained Poile, who opted for a depth trade with Chicago for 23-year-old wing Ryan Hartman instead of adding more star power.
"[A top-line player] was not what we needed. We've already got guys that are doing that, plus Tolvanen coming in."
Tolvanen's résumé is extensive despite his youth. The 30th overall draft pick from last June's NHL Draft became the youngest player in KHL history to notch a hat trick, near the beginning of his remarkable rookie year for Jokerit. The 5-foot-10, 180-pound wing has five league "rookie of the week" honors and won rookie of the month in both September and October before also drawing a league all-star nod.
He needed just 40 games to reach 33 points (17 goals, 16 assists), surpassing Evgeny Kuznetsov who had 32 points (17g-15a) in 44 games in 2010-11 before becoming an NHL All-Star with the Washington Capitals. Tolvanen is up to 35 points with one game remaining in the KHL regular season, and both his 18 goals and 17 assists are league records for an 18-year-old.
Then during his five-game Olympic stay in South Korea, Tolvanen recorded three goals and six assists. His nine points marked the second-best scoring total per game of any player in the tournament and earned him Olympic All-Star distinction.
Should Tolvanen join the Preds before April 22, his 19th birthday, he could become just the fifth player in franchise history to appear in a game - regular season or playoffs - with Nashville at 18 years old.
