General manager Bill Armstrong is seeing exactly what he hoped he would see from Utah Hockey Club after the 4 Nations Face-Off break. With defensemen John Marino, Sean Durzi and forwards Logan Cooley and Dylan Guenther all healthy, Utah took three of four games on its most recent homestand to pull within striking distance of the final wild card spot in the Western Conference.
Utah's young but maturing group is learning how to play and win meaningful games in the heat of a playoff race.
"We're putting ourselves in a good position," Armstrong said. "Since the break, it's been awesome because every game is like a game seven. It's been a blessing for the group, having to stay in the battle and play playoff hockey every single night."
Armstrong wants to see more of what this current group can do now that it has its full complement of key players for the first time this season. For that reason, he does not anticipate any major moves before the NHL trade deadline, which arrives at 1 p.m. MT on Friday.
"I don't think we're a buyer, I don't think we're a seller," he said. "We're somewhere in between.
"We're always looking to improve the team through trades and acquisitions, but at the end of the day, we're also in a period where there's a lot of guys that have to develop in front of us before we go chasing rentals."
Armstrong and his staff have conducted deep examinations of previous NHL teams' rebuilds. He knows the general timeline for emerging from a rebuild into playoff contention. He also knows the subsequent timeline for graduating from playoff contention to Stanley Cup contention. He believes the latter is the time when GMs should chase rentals in an effort to solidify a team that is one or two pieces away from serious Cup contention.
"We're not in the window that Colorado is in and we're not in the window that Dallas is in," he said. "We're in a different window. Ours is about playing the guys that we have and letting them develop in front of us."
With only six NHL teams more than six points out of a playoff spot as of Tuesday morning, Armstrong said the market still has not been set because so many teams still believe they have a chance to make the playoffs. Even so, he does not anticipate adding a major piece to bolster the team's ranks — unless another GM makes him an offer he can't refuse.
"If we can make dynamic changes and add a dynamic piece, we're all for that," he said. "We've got the assets to do that.
"But I'd like to see this group fight together, and I think they've earned that right. I think we lead the league in man-games lost on defense, and yet we were able to kind of battle through that and find ways to win and stay in the hunt. I think it's good for this group to stay in battle together."
Utah only has one game remaining before the trade deadline — Thursday at Detroit — so there is little that could change Armstrong's mind over the next three days.
When the trade deadline arrives, the players who are on expiring contracts (or in some cases, those with one additional year left on their contracts) are the ones whom Cup-contending teams typically target in trades. The contracts for forwards Alex Kerfoot, Nick Bjugstad and Michael Carcone expire after this season, making them unrestricted free agents. The same is true for goaltender Karel Vejmelka, and defensemen Olli Määttä, Ian Cole, Robert Bortuzzo and Nick DeSimone.
Again, Armstrong does not anticipate a flurry of moves, but he cannot predict what opportunities the next few days will present, or what offers will be laid before him.
"We're looking to upgrade every day," he said. "But people have to remember that a lot of our work was done in the summer when we added Kevin Stenlund and John Marino and Mikhail Sergachev and Ian Cole, and then we added Olli Määttä and Nick DeSimone during the season. So I think it's one of those things where a lot of our grocery shopping was done early and that has put us where we are.
"Obviously, our job on the management side is to improve the team. We try to do that every day, and it's heightened right now because it's the deadline. We'll see what's out there, but for the most part, I think this group has earned the right to stay together."
