Adin Hill was traded to the San Jose Sharks by the Arizona Coyotes on Saturday for goalie Josef Korenar and a second-round pick in the 2022 NHL Draft.
San Jose also received a seventh-round pick in the 2022 draft.
“We acquired a goaltender that we’ve really had our eye on for a while,” Sharks general manager Doug Wilson said.
“We were ideally looking for somebody with size. He certainly has that at 6-foot-6 and athletic ability. … [His competitiveness] is a big part of it, too. I think he might have faced some of the toughest shot quality of any goalie in the League last year and he did very well during that.”
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Hill was 9-9-1 with a 2.74 goals-against average, a .913 save percentage and two shutouts in an NHL career-high 19 games (17 starts) for the Coyotes this season. The 25-year-old can become a restricted free agent July 28.
“We haven’t (had any contract talks),” Wilson said. “We just acquired his rights so we haven’t had any opportunity to have those conversations. He doesn’t have a long history in the League yet, which is good when it comes to doing contracts. We’ll be fair with him and we’ll find something that will work. I don’t anticipate any problems in that area. I think he’s excited about the opportunity we present to him, and we’ll find something good that fits for both of us.”
Selected by Arizona in the third round (No. 76) of the 2015 NHL Draft, Hill is 19-21-4 with a 2.79 GAA, a .909 save percentage and three shutouts in 49 NHL games (41 starts).
“I think it’s a good opportunity for me,” Hill said. “Obviously, in Arizona we had [Antti] Raanta and [Darcy] Kuemper, who were kind of slated ahead of me, and being the younger guy, a lot of times I was kind of moved around on the practice spot or whatever. But yeah, I’m happy to have bigger role and play some hockey.”
Korenar signed a one-year contract with the Sharks on Tuesday after making his NHL debut for them this season, when the 23-year-old was 3-5-0 with a 3.17 GAA and an .889 save percentage in 10 games (seven starts).
Korenar can become a restricted free agent after next season.
“We are very pleased to acquire Josef,” Coyotes general manager Bill Armstrong said. “He is an athletic goaltender who played very well in the Pacific Division. … We look forward to continuing to watch him develop.”
Arizona on Saturday acquired forward Andrew Ladd, a second-round pick (No. 60) in the 2021 NHL Draft, a second-round pick in the 2022 draft and a conditional third-round pick in the 2023 NHL Draft from the New York Islanders.
Ladd has two seasons remaining on the seven-year contract he signed with the Islanders on July 1, 2016.
“I think it’s really good for us as an organization,” Armstrong said. “The past regime that was here had some picks stripped because of some testing that they did. For us, that was one of the frustrating things of being here, is that, you know, you want to move ahead and you can’t because you can’t really pick. So now we’ve really put ourselves in good shape in that sense, and now we’ve got the opportunity to pick players.”
The Coyotes forfeited a first-round pick (No. 11) in the 2021 draft and a second-round pick in the 2020 NHL Draft as a result of violations of the NHL Combine Testing Policy during the 2019-20 season under former GM John Chayka.