Sharks swap goalies with Avalanche as part of multi-player deal

The San Jose Sharks didn’t wait until the NHL trade deadline to deal one of their more prized pending unrestricted free agents to a contending team, sending goalie Mackenzie Blackwood to the Colorado Avalanche on Monday in a multi-player swap that included three draft picks.

The Sharks traded Blackwood, their No. 1 netminder, seldom-used forward Givani Smith, and their own 2027 fifth-round pick to the Avalanche for struggling goaltender Alexandar Georgiev, forward Nikolai Kovalenko, Colorado’s 2026 second-round selection, and a conditional fifth-round draft pick in 2025.

Blackwood, who had his 28th birthday Monday, had been the Sharks’ top goalie since he was acquired from the New Jersey Devils in June 2023 for a sixth-rounder in that year’s draft. In 63 games with the rebuilding Sharks, Blackwood had a record of 16-34-7 and a .902 save percentage.

This season, after beginning the year with a 0-2-2 record, Blackwood had a solid 6-6-1 record and a .916 save percentage in his last 14 appearances. That included a stellar 50-save performance on Saturday in the Sharks’ 3-1 loss to the Florida Panthers.

Georgiev and Kovalenko are expected to join the Sharks in Raleigh, N.C. and be available for their game against the Carolina Hurricanes on Tuesday. The Sharks (10-15-5) entered Monday in 14th place in the Western Conference standings with 25 points, seven behind the Avalanche (16-13-0).

Colorado holds the second and final wild-card spot in the West and has now overhauled its goaltending duo in less than two weeks. On Nov. 30, the Avalanche acquired goalie Scott Wedgewood in a trade with the Nashville Predators for goalie Justus Annunen.

The 28-year-old Georgiev, also a pending UFA, had an 8-7-0 record in 18 games with Colorado this season but also had a mediocre .874 save percentage and one of the worst marks in the NHL in goals saved above expected.

Of the 50 NHL goalies who have played at least 10 games this season, Georgiev, per moneypuck.com, is 49th in goals saved above expected (-9.4) and 47th in goals saved above expected per 60 minutes (-0.599).

By comparison, Blackwood is 17th in goals saved above expected (3.9) and 19th in goals saved above expected per 60 minutes (0.221).

Georgiev is in the final year of a three-year, $10.2 million contract with a $3.4 million cap hit. As part of the deal, Colorado will retain 14% of Georgiev’s contract, so the cap hit for San Jose is $2.924 million.

For now, the Sharks will be carrying Georgiev and Vitek Vanecek. From all indications, top goalie prospect Yaroslav Askarov will remain in the AHL with the Barracuda for at least the time being.

Kovalenko, 25, had eight points in 28 games for the Avalanche this year, averaging 12 minutes of ice time per game in his first NHL season. Kovalenko, whose dad, Andrei, was a longtime winger in the NHL, is in the final year of a two-year, entry-level contract and will become a restricted free agent next summer.

A sixth-round draft pick by the Avalanche in 2018, Kovalenko spent seven years in the KHL — with 141 points in 257 regular season games — before he came to North America in April. After he joined the Colorado Eagles of the AHL, he had three points in four regular season games and one goal in two playoff games.

The Sharks placed Smith on waivers on Sunday as he had zero points in just six games with the team this season. Smith’s last game came on Nov. 25, when he had 6:42 of ice time against the Los Angeles Kings.

Smith, 26, is in the second and final year of a $1.6 million contract he signed with the Sharks in 2023. He has played in 151 career regular-season games in the AHL, the last of which was with the Charlotte Checkers on Dec. 31, 2022.

With Colorado’s 2026 second-rounder in hand, the Sharks now have three picks in the first two rounds of that year’s draft.

The conditions for Colorado’s 2025 fifth-round selection are that the Avalanche will instead transfer the worse of their current fourth-round selections in 2025 (Colorado’s own or Vancouver’s selection) if at least two of these conditions are met:

Colorado advances to the third round of the 2024-25 playoffs, Blackwood wins 25 regular season games from the trade date to the end of this season and/or Blackwood starts 30 NHL regular season games from the trade date to the end of the 2024-25 regular season.

The Avalanche, at 16-13-0, have 53 games remaining.

The Sharks have six other pending UFA’s on their roster, starting with leading scorer Mikael Granlund and top-pair defenseman Cody Ceci. Others include forwards Luke Kunin, Nico Sturm, defenseman Jan Rutta and Vanecek. This season’s trade deadline is on March 7.