The NHL's & NHLPA's new Collective Bargaining Agreement doesn't begin until following the 2025-26 season. However, there are a few things that both sides have agreed upon, effective immediately.
The playoff salary cap change requires every team's game roster to be compliant. Teams can still exceed the cap in the postseason, but this disallows teams from placing players on long-term injured reserve, acquiring talent, and fielding a game roster that wouldn't have been allowed had it been a regular-season game.
The Islanders are likely to be in an evaluation period for the first half of the season before general manager Mathieu Darche makes any drastic moves. However, going after players with high AAVs likely isn't in the cards for the 2026 NHL Trade Deadline; who knows where the Islanders will be standings-wise at that time?
While the Islanders may not be going big-game fishing, this new rule change actually may help them in the trade market.
Pending unrestricted free agent forwards Anders Lee ($7 million) and Jean-Gabriel Pageau ($5 million), along with defenseman Tony DeAngelo ($1.75 million), have cap hits that are not particularly high.
Although teams looking to bolster their roster while keeping an eye on their pending playoff cap hits could spend a little more to get the opposition to retain, having valuable players who don't break the bank could be very beneficial.
Let's dive into the contract news, that's effective on Sept. 15, 2026 -- a year from now.
Currently, teams can offer their own free agents eight-year extensions, with a maximum of seven years if they reach free agency.
But, teams and players will have until Sept. 15, 2026 to get contracts done under those maxes.
Once we reach that date, pending free agents can only sign a max of seven years with their respective clubs and six if they hit the market.
Looking at the Islanders' books, they have a few pending free agents, but no pending UFAs that would require lengthy deals, if brought back like Jean-Gabriel Pageau and Anders Lee.
It's too early to tell what kind of player Maxim Shabanov will be, the 25-year-old they signed out of Russia. He's a pending RFA, but if he has a fantastic season and proves, maybe, just maybe, he could be Kirill Kaprizov-esque, and the Islanders want to go the max with him -- eight years -- it might make sense.
That's a conversation for way down the line.