The Wild made a minor league trade on Thursday, picking up defenseman Will Butcher from Pittsburgh in exchange for forward Maxim Cajkovic.
Wild trade for former Hobey Baker Award winner Will Butcher
Acquired from the Penguins organization, Butcher has played 275 NHL games with Buffalo and New Jersey.
The Minnesota Star Tribune
January 26, 2024 at 2:45AM
Butcher will report to Iowa in the American Hockey League.
In 14 games with the Penguins’ AHL affiliate this season, Butcher had three goals and four assists after signing a one-year, two-way contract last summer.
A native of Sun Prairie, Wis., the 5-foot-10, 190-pound Butcher has logged 275 games in the NHL with New Jersey and Buffalo, scoring 16 goals and adding 98 assists for 114 points after getting drafted in the fifth round (123rd) by Colorado in 2013. Butcher, 29, won the 2017 Hobey Baker Award while at the University of Denver.
Cajkovic, 23, was acquired by the Wild in the Pat Maroon trade with Tampa Bay last offseason and played mostly in the ECHL this season, posting 12 goals in 20 games; he skated five games with Iowa in the AHL, chipping in a goal and two assists.
The forward and new father needed a reset after a 2023-24 season in which he scored only five goals while starting a five-year, $10.5 million contract.
