Chasing A Championship, The Carolina Hurricanes Extend Valuable Sebastian Aho

Sebastian Aho’s new contract extension won’t kick in until the 2024-25 season. But the Carolina Hurricanes’ top center and the team’s general manager, Don Waddell, both saw the value in getting pen to paper before the team takes another run at the Stanley Cup starting this fall.

“It was a goal of ours as an organization to get this done quickly,” said Waddell on a video call on Wednesday. “Knowing how important Sebastian is to our organization, this is critical for us to get this done this summer. Put it behind us. Nobody has to worry about it.”

With one year remaining before he could sign with any team as an unrestricted free agent, Aho signed the biggest contract in the history of the Hurricanes/Hartford Whalers organization on Wednesday — his 26th birthday. The deal runs for eight years and carries a cap hit of $9.75 million per season, for a total of $78 million.

It’s a tidy raise from Aho’s current contract, which carries a cap hit of just over $8.4 million and has one year remaining. That five-year deal was signed as a rare offer sheet from the Montreal Canadiens, with a total value of $42.295 million, on July 1, 2019. It was matched by the Hurricanes six days later.

At that time, contract talks with Carolina had been progressing slowly. For Aho, signing the offer sheet was more about securing his future for the next five years than it was about wanting to change teams.

“Obviously, I’m thankful for Montreal to offer me this contract,” he said at the NHL’s European player media tour later that summer. “They showed me they wanted me — but at the same time I’m really psyched to play in Carolina. I’m happy.”

Now, the native of Rauma, Finland is under contract through age 34 with the team that drafted him 35th overall in 2015. He could have a rare opportunity to play his entire career with a single franchise.

“Starting from the front office, the organization has taken huge steps over the course of last five years and obviously we feel like we’re building every year,” he said Wednesday. “Roddy (Brind’Amour) as a head coach, he’s the guy I want to play for. All the teammates around me and obviously that amazing fan base made it a pretty easy decision for me — actually the only choice I had in my mind, to make another contract with the Canes.”

In seven NHL seasons, Aho’s 468 points in 520 games already rank him fifth on the Hurricanes’ all-time points list. He has cracked the 30-goal mark four times and peaked at 81 points in 79 games in the 2021-22 season. He also leads the Hurricanes with 58 career playoff points. His 63 playoff games tie him for second all-time with Jordan Staal — behind only Brind’Amour’s 72 games.

The team captain when Carolina won its only Stanley Cup in 2006, Brind’Amour has been the club’s head coach for the last five seasons. He took over as the Hurricanes snapped a nine-season playoff drought, and those 63 playoff games are fifth-most in the NHL over the last five years.

Carolina has won at least one playoff round each year, and reached the Eastern Conference Final last spring for the first time since 2009 before being swept by the Florida Panthers.

The on-ice success has also helped the Hurricanes build a strong and passionate fanbase in what was once considered a non-traditional hockey market. Last season, the team set a franchise attendance record with an average of 19,526 fans per game that was second only to the Montreal Canadiens in the entire NHL.

That average was boosted by the Hurricanes’ first-ever outdoor game, where they welcomed 56,961 fans to the home of the NC State Wolfpack at Carter-Finley Stadium for a 4-1 win over the Washington Capitals on Feb. 18.

Metropolitan Division champions for the last two years, the Hurricanes are coming off regular seasons of 116 points in 2021-22 and 113 points last year, when they finished second only to the record-setting Boston Bruins in the NHL standings.

With a long off-season to-do list, Waddell made re-signing his own free agents a top priority, bringing back captain Jordan Staal for four years at a cap hit of $2.9 million per season, per CapFriendly, as well as goaltenders Frederik Andersen and Antti Raanta and forward Jesper Fast.

On July 1, Waddell also reeled in two prominent free-agent fish, signing top defenseman Dmitry Orlov to a two-year deal at $7.75 million per season and feisty forward Michael Bunting for three seasons at a cap hit of $4.5 million.

After the Hurricanes acquired Brent Burns from the San Jose Sharks in a high-value trade last summer, rumors swirled that Waddell might make a play for Norris Trophy winner Erik Karlsson this year. But the signing of former Hurricane Tony DeAngelo on a one-year deal at a bargain $1.675 million gives the team eight NHL-caliber defenders under contract for next season. And with a full 23-man roster and less than $1 million in cap space still remaining according to CapFriendly’s estimates, any further acquisitions would have to be dollar-in/dollar-out in order to stay cap compliant.

The Hurricanes run a tight ship, financially, and generally prefer to hand out short-term contracts wherever possible. With his new deal, Aho joins two other promising young forwards, Andrei Svechnikov and Jesperi Kotkaniemi, as the only Carolina players under contract for more than four seasons.

The philosophy gives the team flexibility — but also means that Waddell is constantly in negotiation mode. Now that Aho is locked up, he can turn his attention to the other players whose deals are coming due at the end of the 2023-24 season. Defensemen Brett Pesce and Brady Skjei and forwards Teuvo Teravainen and Jordan Martinook are all set to hit unrestricted free agency, while Martin Necas and Seth Jarvis will become restricted free agents.

“We like to keep our best players if we can,” Waddell said. “Unfortunately, there’s a salary cap. We’re fortunate that we can spend whatever the league allows us to spend so we’ve had some initial talks, but we’re not close to anything right now.”