Tampa Bay Lightning sign Michael Eyssimont to two-year contract extension

The Tampa Bay Lightning have signed center Michael Eyssimont to a two-year contract extension with an $800,000 cap hit.

Eyssimont was set to become a Group VI unrestricted free agent due to being at least 25 years old with more than three professional seasons but less than 80 NHL games played. He was in the final year of a two-year contract with a $750,000 cap hit. It’s not confirmed if the contract is one-way or two-way.

Eyssimont is coming off a solid rookie season in the NHL, with 5 goals, 10 assists, and 15 points in 54 games with the Winnipeg Jets, San Jose Sharks, and Tampa Bay Lightning, with a goal and an assist in 15 games with the Bolts. He had another goal and assist in three games for the Lightning in their first round series against the Toronto Maple Leafs, and also spent nine games in the AHL this season, where he had two goals, seven assists, and nine points in nine games.

Eyssimont was a fifth round draft pick of the Los Angeles Kings in 2016, and has spent six professional seasons with the Kings, Jets, Sharks, and Lightning organizations in his career. He joined the Jets in 2021 as an unrestricted free agent, where he played a season and a half before he was claimed on waivers by the Sharks, who then dealt him at the deadline in exchange for Vladislav Namestnikov.

It’s the first extension of the offseason for the Lightning, who’s season got cut shorter than usual after they were eliminated in the first round by the Maple Leafs in six games. They had finished third in the Atlantic Division with a 46-30-6 record, 13 points behind the Leafs for second and 37 behind the Boston Bruins for first.

The Lightning will once again have plenty of decisions to make this offseason to keep a majority of this group together. They’ll have about $2 million in cap space this offseason after the extensions to Mikhail Sergachev, Anthony Cirelli, and Erik Cernak kick in, and have to worry about Ross Colton and Tanner Jeannot as restricted free agents, and Alex Killorn, Ian Cole, Pierre Edouard-Bellemare, Corey Perry, and Brian Elliott as unrestricted free agents.