New York Rangers sign defensemen Connor Mackey, Nikolas Brouillard to one-year contracts

The New York Rangers have signed defensemen Connor Mackey and Nikolas Brouillard to one-year contracts, the club announced Saturday afternoon.

Mackey, 26, appeared in 30 NHL games with the Calgary Flames and Arizona Coyotes during the 2022–23 regular season, collecting three goals and seven points while averaging 14:03 per night.

Brouillard, 28, has yet to make his National Hockey League debut. The St. Hilaire, Quebec product collected six goals and 39 points in 72 games with the AHL’s San Diego Gulls in 2022–23 season.

Both Mackey and Brouillard will earn a $775,000 salary when up in the NHL with the Rangers in 2023–24. Both players signed two-way deals to join the Rangers as unrestricted free agents.

Mackey is a six-foot-two left-handed defenseman from Tower Lakes, Illinois. Brouillard also shoots left, but he’s only five-foot-eleven and from St. Hilaire, Quebec.

The Flames originally signed Mackey as an undrafted free agent out of Minnesota State University – Mankato in 2020. He appeared in 19 games over parts of three seasons with the Flames, but spent most of his time with the team’s American Hockey League affiliate in Stockton, California.

This is Brouillard’s first NHL contract. He spent three seasons with the Gulls after joining them in 2020 on the heels of a three-year tenure with McGill University in the Canadian collegiate ranks.

Mackey and Brouillard are both depth options for a Rangers team that projects to contend for a top playoff spot again next season. They’ll compete for spots against the likes of Erik Gustafsson, Ben Harpur, Braden Schneider, Zac Jones, Matt Robertson, and Ty Emberson.

The Rangers finished third in the Metropolitan Division with a 47–22–13 record and 107 points during the 2022–23 regular season. They fell to the New Jersey Devils in six games in the first round of the 2023 Stanley Cup Playoffs.