Season 12: Geneva Generals

Farm Club: Luxembourg Castles

GM: Dave Franck (5th GM in team’s history)

Coach: Todd Reirden (replaced Mike Babcock after Season 10) (Babcock replaced Brent Sutter after Season 9) (Sutter replaced Guy Boucher after Season 6, who replaced Darryl Sutter before Season 5, who replaced Joel Quenneville after Season 3)

Last season: 21st overall. (Did not make playoffs)

Ins and Outs (Season 11 to Season 12)

Out: Ondrej Pavelic (free agent), James Neal (free agent), Jack Johnson (free agent), Andreas Johnson (free agent), Dave Bolland (free agent), Jamie McBain (free agent), Ben Hutton (free agent), Troy Stecher (waivers), Nathan Horton (retired), Christian Marti (free agent)

In: Roman Josi (free agent), Cedric Paquette (waivers), Beau Bennett (free agent), Viktor Arvidsson (free agent), Jiri Sekac (free agent), Yasin Ehliz (free agent), Vladislav Gavrikov (free agent), Aaron Dell (free agent), Brendan Perlini (waivers), Liam Kirk (free agent), Auguste Impose (free agent)

In Place (Key players signed past Season 12)

Dylan Larkin, LW; Colton Parayko, D; Valeri Nichushkin, RW; Eric Gelinas, D; Victor Rask, C

Three Questions

1. Who are the people who could lift Geneva up this season? New General Manager Dave Franck has placed a lot of faith in a couple of his early free agent signings. Franck won over the Swiss fan base immediately with the signing of Swiss veteran defenseman Roman Josi. Then it was goalie Aaron Dell, a 31-year-old Canadian goalie who has played just 18 games in the league, all of them with Moscow in Season 10. But get this: Dell had a respectable 2.91 goals against average and a very good save percentage of 90.9 that year. A lot of people are excited to see what Dell can do with a bigger chance to play. Josi and Dell both have no movement clauses this season so Franck will be looking for them to pay back his commitment to them with maximum effort. But the pressure will really be on Dell. His backup, young Russian Ivan Nalimov, has played more games than Dell, but his stats have been shaky so far.

2. Where do they need to improve? To be honest, the Generals look pretty solid all up and down the lineup. They are under the owner’s budget and will still be able to send a good first unit – led by Dylan Larkin and Nazem Kadri – on the ice each game with some solid depth behind them. The biggest area of concern is stopping goals. Geneva was worst in the league last year, allowing opponents to score 4.13 goals per game, and they were dead last in penalty killing. Franck has taken some small steps to address those issues. Fortunately, Geneva was able to draft a defenseman they can plug directly into the lineup. Canadian Ryan Graves is big and strong, he likes to play a defensive style, and that is exactly the kind of player his new team needs. And a few free agent forwards who play responsibly in their own end were added too. Fans shouldn’t expect free agent acquisitions Beau Bennett, Jiri Sekac and Viktor Arvidsson to pour in goals for the Generals, because that’s not the kind of players they are. This trio, along with longtime Generals Bud Holloway, Valeri Nichushkin and young Athony Cirelli excel at the grunt work in the corners, along the boards and backchecking. That hard-to-see work will improve the team’s goals against average this year.

3. How will they do when they have possession of the puck? In the EURO League, it seems every mistake and every lucky bounce means the difference between playing in the playoffs and watching them from your living room. Geneva’s forward lines might be a shade – just a shade – less talented than the ones opposing them every game and that might be the difference some games. But with Roman Josi and his puck-moving skill added to the lineup, Generals fans are excited about seeing what Nazem Kadri will do this season. Last season, Kadri pumped in 44 goals, which was a 33 percent improvement over his previous high. He was third in the EURO League in goals. Speedy Dylan Larkin orchestrated a lot of Kadri’s goals. Larkin now has six seasons behind him and he’s only 25 years old. His point total jumped from 40 to 78 last season. So he’s a real handful for opposing defensemen. If the new line combos below Kadri’s line on the depth chart create some chemistry, this team could fly. It is essential that Victor Rask and Rickard Rakell create goals on the second PP unit with Beau Bennett who will also penalty kill on top of seeing second-line minutes.

History

Season Place PTS PP % PK % SPG SAPG GPG GAPG PIM

Season 1 1 123 21.4 83.6 32.16 27.72 3.99 2.77 8.85

Season 2 10 96 18.9 82.8 31.94 29.30 3.39 2.99 10.68

Season 3 17 82 17.1 83.8 29.01 30.28 3.15 3.38 8.83

Season 4 18 80 15.5 83.4 26.29 32.51 2.72 3.28 9.46

Season 5 18 80 15.0 85.1 27.22 32.49 2.85 3.28 6.67

Season 6 17 77 17.5 83.8 27.05 32.67 2.61 3.02 6.61

Season 7 19 70 15.6 78.3 27.17 31.44 2.90 3.61 8.06

Season 8 13 87 16.9 83.3 26.72 30.84 2.89 2.90 7.61

Season 9 4 102 18.3 85.3 29.22 31.41 3.51 3.04 8.43

Season 10 21 67 14.3 79.1 28.50 30.45 3.18 3.73 9.00

Season 11 21 64 16.0 77.8 26.09 31.49 3.01 4.13 7.70

Top Draft picks

Season 1: Kari Lehtonen, G, current age 39. Games played: 439; Save Pct. 89.4

Season 2: none

Season 3: none

Season 4: Frederik Andersen, G, age 32. GP: 469; save pct. 91.2

Season 5: Sergei Mozyakin, C, age 29. GP 552; Pts 481; -51

Season 6: Victor Rask, C, age 27. GP 340; Pts 131; -34

Season 7: Colton Parayko, D, age 27. GP 403, Pts 168, -40

Season 8: Connor Brown, RW, age 26. GP 324, Pts 54, +1

Season 9: Alexei Bereglazov, D, age 21.

Season 10: Ty Dellandrea, C, age 20.

Season 11: Anthony Cirelli, C, age 22. GP 75; Pts 16; +4

Season 12: Ryan Graves, D, age 24.

Trade History

Season 1 (picks without years listed are from initial draft)

Traded Round 15 pick (used to draft Ryan Ellis) , Round 25 pick (Ben Lovejoy) and 2013 Round 1 pick (Jason Krog) to Paris for Dennis Wideman

Traded Round 8 pick (Olli Jokinen), Round 10 pick (Petr Sykora) and 2013 Round 2 pick (Ryan Murray) to Dublin for Round 7 pick (Chris Kunitz), Round 22 pick (Bryan Allen) and $250,000

Traded Round 17 pick (Tomas Kopecky) and 2014 Round 1 pick (Michael Stone) to Bratislava for Round 8 pick (David Desharnais) and Round 19 pick (Greg Zanon)

Traded Round 13 pick (Marcus Kruger) and Round 14 pick (Mark Scheifele) to Athens for Round 9 pick (Nick Foligno)

Traded Alex Chiasson to Minsk for Vernon Fiddler and $1 million

Traded Brian Dumoulin to Minsk for Round 21 pick (Raffi Torres)

Traded Matt D’Agostino, 2014 Round 2 pick (Andrei Loktionov) and $250,000 to Oslo for Justin Williams

Traded 2013 Round 3 pick (Scott Glennie), 2014 Round 3 pick (Tommy Wingels) and $1.5 million to Bern for Nicklas Backstrom (goalie)

Season 2

Traded Justin Williams, Ryan Malone and Jeff Woywitka to Prague for Thomas Vanek and Mike Weaver

* seem to missing one trade in this period

Season 3

Traded Michael Del Zotto to Minsk for Valeri Nichushkin, Ilya Nikulin and Sergei Kostitsyn

Season 4

Traded Kari Lehtonen to Edinburgh for Ondrej Pavelec, 2016 Round 1 pick (later traded to Bratislava – Morten Madsen) and 2017 Round 2 pick (Michael Hutchinson)

Season 5

Traded Chris Kunitz and 2016 Round 1 pick (Morten Madsen) to Bratislava for 2016 Round 1 pick (Bud Holloway)

Season 6

After Season 6 started: Traded Sergei Mozyakin to Belfast for Nazem Kadri, Vladislav Kamenev and 2020 Round 1 pick (Niclas Almari)

Signed Chris Butler (free agent)

Season 7

After season started: signed James Reimer (free agent), Andrej Sekera (free agent)

Season 8

Season 9

Season 10

Traded 2021 Round 2 pick (Bode Wilde) to Helsinki for Jack Johnson

2022 Round 3 pick (later traded to Stockholm (Matias Macelli)) to Helsinki for James Neal