New Jersey Devils re-sign defenseman Nick DeSimone to one-year contract
The New Jersey Devils have signed defenseman Nick DeSimone to a one-year, one-way contract extension, the club announced Monday afternoon.
DeSimone, 29, appeared in 11 National Hockey League games with the Devils during the 2023-24 regular season, collecting one goal and two points to go along with a plus-seven rating while averaging 16:29 of ice time per night.
The Devils claimed DeSimone off waivers from the Calgary Flames on January 25. The East Amherst, New York product eventually made his debut with the Devils on March 14 and seldom exited the lineup from that point until the end of the season.
DeSimone was slated to become an unrestricted free agent on July 1. His new contract with the Devils carries a $775,000 cap hit.
We have re-signed D Nick DeSimone to a one-year, one-way deal.
📰: https://t.co/8IfTtXak3P pic.twitter.com/1ppVUcqYqk
DeSimone began the 2023-24 season in the NHL with the Flames, with whom he collected one goal and five points while logging an average of 12:03 per night in 23 games before being placed on waivers.
Over the entirety of the 2023-24 season, DeSimone racked up two goals and seven points in 34 games. He had appeared in just four career NHL games, all with the Flames, prior to last season.
An undrafted player, DeSimone signed his first professional contract with the San Jose Sharks in 2017 after a successful three-year NCAA career at Union College. The 6’2″ right-handed defender played exclusively with the AHL’s San Jose Barracuda before being traded twice in 2021, first to the Vegas Golden Knights and then to the New York Rangers.
DeSimone played with neither Vegas nor New York before signing with the Flames as an unrestricted free agent in July 2021. Although spent most of the following two years in the AHL, DeSimone made his NHL debut with the Flames midway through the 2022-23 season.
Even with DeSimone now under contract for the 2024-25 season, the Devils still have numerous pending free agents left to deal with this summer: RFAs Dawson Mercer, Nolan Foote, Adam Beckman, Santeri Hatakka, Michael Vukojevic, Nico Daws, and Akira Schmid; and UFAs Tomas Nosek, Chris Tierney, Brendan Smith, Kaapo Kahkonen, Kyle Criscuolo, Tyler Wotherspoon, and Keith Kinkaid.