Two days ahead of the NHL’s trade deadline, the Utah Mammoth made a significant move to strengthen their defensive core: the addition of 32-year-old blueliner MacKenzie Weegar. The right-shot defenseman will help the Mammoth in their pursuit for a Stanley Cup.
“It’s a great trade in the sense of adding another great (defenseman) to the already pretty strong defensive core back there,” Bill Armstrong, Utah’s general manager, shared on Wednesday. “He brings a wealth of experience. I think what we love about him is his ability to move the puck. He’s a gamer, someone that shows up every night, plays a physical brand of hockey.
“When you have a d-man like him, that can move a puck back there, it creates offense to your forwards,” Armstrong continued. “They can get the puck in motion and can attack. And we’re a pretty fast team now so this adds another defenseman to our lineup that’s going to make an impact.”
Weegar is expected to make that impact quickly. Although it may take a couple of days for the defenseman to join the team due to visa processing, when Weegar joins Utah he’ll jump into a major role.
“That’s the great thing about him, he’s a top-four (defenseman),” Armstrong explained. “He can play (power play, penalty kill), almost any situation. He can play a shutdown role too. He’s going to be a big asset for us down the stretch.”
The list of positives for Weegar doesn’t stop with his on-ice abilities. The veteran will be a strong presence in the locker room and bring his leadership to this Mammoth team. The Flames alternate captain earned Calgary’s Peter Maher “Good Guy” Award in 2024-25, presented annually to the player who best demonstrates the virtues of sincerity, integrity, dedication, and respect.
“He’s got a great work ethic,” Armstrong said. “Just doing a lot of homework on him, his teammates spoke very highly of him, his former teammates and what he does in the dressing room and leads by example. But he’s got a little bit of fight in him too, which we like. He wants to win; he wants to push this club to the next level. It’ll be exciting when he arrives and actually gets in the lineup.”
Adding Weegar at this point in his career was the right fit for Utah. The Mammoth gained an experienced blue liner who still has term on his contract. Weegar is in the third year of an eight-year contract. It was important for the Mammoth to acquire a player that would help the team in their playoff pursuit this season, and return to be a piece of the core next year.
“When we’re acquiring someone, we’re looking at age, we’re looking at term of contract, and can they move with the club,” Armstrong explained. “We’re not at the point where we’re risking it all for rentals to come in. So, we’re a lot (of) the same, but we’re probably a little bit more aggressive.”
The move to acquire Weegar is one of the most significant moves ahead of this year’s trade deadline. In addition to showing the organization’s buy-in to the hockey world, this acquisition shows how the Mammoth are determined to continue pushing towards the playoffs, and one day, the first Stanley Cup in franchise history.
“They’ve earned our belief,” Armstrong said. “The way that they’ve fought this year and the way that they’ve played, and taking steps to become better. That’s a lot of our players having the belief of showing up to the rink every day to take that next step. They’ve done a good job. We’re in the fight right now. We’re right where we’re supposed to be. It’s nice to reward them and to be able to add to the group. In the past years, when we were building it, we were constantly stripping it down and it’s nice to be on the other side of that of adding a good player into our roster to take that next step.”
