PENTICTON, B.C. — It’s been an eventful summer for Winnipeg Jets general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff.
Speculation has raged around extension-eligible star winger Nikolaj Ehlers, a pending unrestricted free agent on the other side of this season. One of the club’s most promising young players, Cole Perfetti, is a restricted free agent and remains unsigned. The club swung a significant mid-summer trade involving Rutger McGroarty, an NCAA standout who had no intention of signing in Winnipeg, to acquire Brayden Yager from the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Every team is busy in the offseason, but it’s been especially loud this summer around a Jets team that racked up 110 points last season, only to be eliminated in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs in five games at the hands of the Colorado Avalanche.
The Athletic caught up with Cheveldayoff at the Penticton Young Stars tournament for a one-on-one interview to reflect on what the organization learned from last season, how the Jets’ various high-end prospects factor into their short-term plans and what the future holds for Perfetti, Ehlers and other Jets stars — including superstar goal scorer Kyle Conner.
This interview has been edited for clarity and readability.
It was a busy summer for you, maybe even an unusually busy summer in terms of some late-summer trades, the Cole Perfetti situation, and some of the speculation around your pending UFAs. With all of that, are you just looking forward to seeing the puck drop?
I think every summer there’s always some sort of speculation, some sort of “where are things going to go.” Every year you have UFAs, and every year you have different things.
We had a unique situation to deal with when it came to Rutger McGroarty, but getting Brayden Yager, we’re ecstatic. With where we’re at, it was ultimately an opportunity to get a right-handed centreman into our organization here, and one who I think fits into our timeline with how we want to augment the group of guys that we have right now.
I’m excited to watch him play. I’m excited to watch Colby Barlow play. I’m excited to watch all the young guys play, and see the steps that Nikita Chibrikov and Brad Lambert have taken. Elias Salomonsson is finally here from over in Europe.
So those are the things that give this tournament that excitement level, you know? We have a new coaching staff with Scott Arniel and some new assistant coaches in Davis Payne and Dean Chynoweth and they’re all here watching. They have a keen interest in seeing some of the younger guys and that’s important for us. It’s important too for our young guys to know that that’s out there in front of them.
So again, everybody has a busy summer when it comes to free agents, and UFAs and RFAs, and for us summer isn’t over yet. We still have some work to get done.
To pivot to those young players, it seems like Lambert and Chibrikov are players in particular with a real opportunity to factor into your organization’s short-term plans at the NHL level. What do you look to see from players at that stage of their career at a prospect tournament like this?
I think you’re looking to see that they’ve taken some steps to add some layers to their game.
They both have high-end offensive instincts and those kind of things, and they came up and got a game in the NHL at the tail end of last year, which we were really excited about giving them that opportunity. But you need to gain the coaches’ confidence. At the next level, that’s the biggest thing. You need that to get the opportunity to let your God-given talent show and continue to grow.
So having layers to your game, getting the puck out, doing the smart things, being able to do the things that maybe don’t get you the attention of a coach sometimes, that’s sometimes the most important thing that young players need to learn.
That was the thought process at development camp. It wasn’t an evaluation camp, but when Scott Arniel came in and talked to the guys, he said, “This is what we want to teach these guys: play on the boards, corner play, the stuff like that, which is going to help them make that leap to the next level.”
With the younger tier of high-end forward prospect at this tournament — and I’m talking about Brayden Yager and Colby Barlow in particular — what would you need to see from them over the next handful of weeks if they’re going to force themselves into the conversation and make it a tough decision for you and your staff to cut them?
They’re going to get a great opportunity at the next level here with the exhibition schedule.
You want them to feel comfortable. You want them to know that there’s opportunities in front of them. But you want them to know that they can go be themselves, go play their game and let it all unfold.
If they spend too much time in their own head wondering about what’s next, that’s not helpful either. At the end of the day we’re going to take our time, and make sure we put them in the right situations to succeed.
That was our mantra. It’s been like that right from Day 1 when we came into the organization. We had Mark Scheifele, who we drafted, and he came into main camp — we didn’t have a rookie tournament that year — and he led our team in scoring, but you could just tell that he wasn’t quite ready yet.
Those are the things you watch and you learn. You need to have a level of patience, even if you’re excited about wanting to accelerate them, and they’re certainly excited about accelerating too beyond their years. I always say though it’s more important that a player gets there for a long time, as opposed to just getting their quickly.
On that theme, you’ve got a guy in Elias Salomonsson who popped over in Europe. He’s got professional experience, but on a different ice surface and there are nuances he’ll need to adjust to. He’s a player who is a little bit older but maybe isn’t accustomed to the North American game. Is there benefit for a player in Elias’ situation to the slow-cooking approach, or do you give a player like that a chance to open some eyes with some key offseason departures on your back end?
Yeah, I think he’ll have a chance.
He came over here last year and had a very good rookie camp and a great experience over here. But we all just felt, including when we talked with his agents, and with the world juniors being over in Sweden last year, and him being on a good team, that instead of trying to put a 19-year-old in the American Hockey League to learn, let’s go let him be a big fish over there. And they ended up winning the championship and he played a big part of it.
He’s coming in here with a high level of confidence in himself and his own game. Arniel was coaching the defense last year at development camp with the Jets, and he came up to me and said, “Are you sure we need to send him back?” And I had to tell him, yes, I’m sure that’s what we’re going to do.
So he’s here now, that’s an exciting thing and he’s going to have a great opportunity.
Bigger picture, Ville Heinola had a great training camp last year, made the team, but broke his ankle in the last exhibition game and didn’t get a chance to play until after Christmas really. We need him to take that next step. Logan Stanley, we need him to take that next step. Those are things we’re looking forward to.
This tournament has now been around long enough that you have an assistant coach on the bench on Sunday in Morgan Klimchuk, who played at this tournament as a player. What does the future hold for the Young Stars tournament from the Winnipeg Jets perspective?
It’s always good when you have enough prospects to field a team and you’re not just filling out the roster with tryout players. In previous years sometimes, when we’ve traded a lot of picks, we haven’t had that same level of prospect depth and had more tryout guys and free agents. This year we’re excited we have some legitimate prospects here to watch and see.
We’re a believer in this tournament. We always have been. It’s a great opportunity for our young players to put the jersey on for the first time. There’s some expectations and there’s, I’m sure, some anxiousness and anxiety too. There’s a head coach sitting in the stands watching them, an American League coach on the bench. It’s that next level.
All of these players have been really good at their own level, but now it’s that funnel up. It’s the first time for some of them when they look around and realize, Everyone around me is as good as me.
When you think about this summer, and how your season ended last year, what did you learn and how did you digest what we saw in the playoffs in the five-game loss to the Colorado Avalanche?
Playoffs are a different animal, obviously. We certainly feel like we left something on the table.
Adam Lowry, I saw, said this summer was too long and that was unexpected. As a group we felt really proud of how we played, getting 110 points. But something that was always preached and talked about in that room was about the style of play, the way to play. And we got away from it against Colorado.
Whether it was because we’d gone in there and beaten them 7-2 or because we’d won the season series, those are questions everyone is asking themselves. To a man, everyone in the exit meetings talked about getting 5 to 10 percent better individually so that collectively as a group we can take that next step.
So there was a slow burn, so to speak, about how something was left on the table.
That was last year. You can have the same team, but you have to put in the work. First you have to eliminate eight teams in your conference to make the playoffs, and then it’s a whole different ballgame.
Cole Perfetti, it’s a situation that’s lingering. It’s common for second-contract guys that these talks get into mid-September without an agreement, and the start of training camp is often a pressure point — player is anxious to play, team wants him with the group. Are you hopeful that will be the case in this instance too?
You’re always hopeful. RFAs are a different animal. And sometimes in the NHL you want those systemic pressure points, because you know when something is going to happen or not. In this case, with RFAs of Perfetti’s calibre, there sort of isn’t. It’s one of those things where you just hope that both sides can grab hold of something, and then something can happen quickly. We’ll see.
There’s been a lot of speculation around some of your pending 2025 UFAs, with the headliner being Nikolaj Ehlers. A lot of speculation around him, but if we were having this conversation 12 months ago, I would’ve framed a similar question in a similar way around Connor Hellebuyck and Mark Scheifele and we know how that played out. Can you provide an update on extension efforts in Ehlers’ case?
There’s always constant communication with different agents and different situations. And every one of them is unique.
Where things are at with Nik, it’s kind of wait-and-see. It may be something we address at the end of the year, it may be something that gets addressed (sooner).
For right now our biggest focus is on winning. There were tons of conversations out there about whether we’d trade him or not trade him, or different things like that, but my sole focus in the summer with regards to Nik — whether it’s with an extension, or without an extension — was, “What is going to be best for the Winnipeg Jets right now?” That’s still the case, and it’s going to be the case going forward.
If there’s not a miraculous Hellebuyck- and Schiefele-style extension, that’s fine. It’s whatever is going to be best for the Jets this upcoming year to try and put us in a position to win.
The other 2025 UFA I want to drill down on is Neal Pionk. He’s been a good top-four contributor for you. He worked through some inconsistency last season, but he’s also had seasons in Winnipeg like in that 2021 campaign where he was the best defender in the North Division. What do you see as his Jets future?
I think he had some tough situations. Last year, going through the death of his best friend hit him very hard. He’s the last person to ever use anything as an excuse, but we have a good relationship and we have great conversations. When we did the deal we did with him, we did it at the last minute.
I don’t have any worries about him with respect to being a Jet. If we can find a way and if he can get his play to where he feels it’s good and we feel it’s good, but he’s one of the most consummate professional out there. He plays the game hard. Two years ago he played with a broken foot for almost the entire year. Those are things nobody knows, he doesn’t tell you, he just goes out there and puts his heart on the line.
You were aggressive a few years ago when you had that contention window, but for the most part, I think it’s fair to say that your actions have been pretty focused on sustainable winning. Year-over-year, be in the playoffs, be in the mix. When you consider that model, how crucial is a unique talent like Kyler Conner — who becomes extension-eligible beyond this season — to your vision of a team that’s in the mix every year?
Very much so. If you look at how he came up through the system, he’s the poster child for player development.
He went to college and had one of the most exceptional years that a freshman can have. He could’ve won the Hobey Baker that year, then turned pro and played in the American Hockey League. It wasn’t a situation where he just immediately dropped into the NHL.
He got his chances, got his feet wet a little bit. Even the next year, I remember Paul Maurice and I were talking and Paul said, “I’d like to send him down.” And I said, “Well Paul, I’m going to tell you something right now, for us to be successful, he’s going to have to be in our mix at some point in time.” By the end of the year he was in our mix and helped us become tremendously successful.
When I look at the long-term vision for the Jets, I’d like to see that long-term vision include Kyle Conner.
(Photo: Bruce Bennett / Getty Images)
