Andre Vasilevskiy isn’t pretending to have answers on Nikita Kucherov. He’s just waiting, like everyone else in Tampa Bay, to see whether the Lightning and their star winger can find a way through a messy contract standoff.
Kucherov’s public trade request on Oct. 30 sent a jolt through the hockey world after he and Lightning management couldn’t agree on a possible extension. Vasilevskiy said the news caught him off guard, even if he had a little more warning than most.
“I mean, it was a surprise for all of us; maybe I was more prepared for that than other people, but it is still a big surprise for all of us,” Vasilevskiy told Joe Smith of The Athletic. “Again, there’s still a lot of time until July 1. So we’ll just wait and see and we’ll hope that something will change.
“Anything is possible nowadays,” he added. “I’m not familiar with all the details of what’s going on between the two sides.
I understand both parts of that deal and I don’t want to get too much involved. I just hope that at the end of the day they will figure it out and both parties will be happy.”
Kucherov later pointed to “poor communication” and “respect” as the reasons he wanted out of Tampa, and he said there have been only two conversations with Lightning management about an extension since he became eligible to sign on July 1 this past summer.
Julien BriseBois pushed back quickly after the request became public, issuing a statement that said the team “unequivocally” has “no intention of trading Nikita.”
For now, Kucherov remains on track to become an unrestricted free agent after this season, the final year of the eight-year, $76 million deal he signed in 2018. The Russian star has spent that contract helping Tampa Bay win two Stanley Cups, leading the NHL in scoring three times and winning Hart Trophies in 2018-19 and 2025-26.
Vasilevskiy knows the stakes from a teammate’s perspective, but he also has his own future to think about. His contract runs through next season, and he said he wants to finish his career in Tampa Bay.
“To be honest, I don’t know if I’m worth $25 million, so I think my contract won’t be as high,” Vasilevskiy joked. “I mean, it’d be great if it will.
Obviously my goal is to stay here. If I retire here, in this city, it will be my second biggest accomplishment after the Stanley Cup.
Because it’s like, how many goalies played for one team ever? Only a few.
That’s definitely one of my biggest accomplishments. It’s my goal for sure to stay with this team.
“I think it’s just so cool when you’re drafted and you play your full career for one organization. It says a lot about you as a person, as an athlete, obviously.
That means they feel you were such a big piece of that organization, of that team, that they basically, it’s stuck with you for 20 years. So, yeah, that’ll be something to me for sure; it will mean a lot.”
The 13-year Lightning veteran is already a two-time Vezina winner, a two-time Stanley Cup champion and the 2021 Conn Smythe Trophy winner.
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