29 NHL teams have officially passed up the opportunity to pick up Brandon Prust – free of charge, no less – as the veteran pugilist cleared waivers this morning and is in the process of being assigned to the Utica Comets.

Upon Prust’s arrival in Utica, the Comets will be presented with an interesting and likely uncomfortable situation. A regular winger is going to have to take a seat. So is it going to be a rookie or a veteran?

One hurdle is already out of the way: according to Prust’s agent, Claude Lemieux (yes, that Claude Lemieux), Prust will, in fact, report to Utica.

Lemieux says Prust will report to the Utica Comets if he clears.” #Canucks — NEWS 1130 Sports (@NEWS1130Sports) February 2, 2016

There might have been some small question about this, given his recent history with complaining about things not going his way, but fear not Utica: Prust is on the way.

This might create more problems than it solves, though. The Comets and the Canucks are both returning to full health. With the imminent return of Henrik Sedin, the Canucks have no more injured forwards, which necessitates the demotion of Prust in the first place. The Comets, meanwhile, just saw the return of Ronald Kenins, as well as Mike Zalewski. This leaves Blair Jones as the only remaining injured forward in the entire organization.

First off, this likely signals the end of the road for any Comets forwards on PTOs, like winger Brandon Marino, who has been performing well in the Comets top-six for the past few weeks. Even after that, the Comets are going to have 14 healthy forwards on any given night, barring injury.

Hunter Shinkaruk

Brendan Gaunce

Chris Higgins

Brandon Prust

Wacey Hamilton

Carter Bancks

John Kurtz Mike Zalewski

Alex Grenier

Alex Friesen

Ronalds Kenins

Cole Cassels

Darren Archibald

Joe LaBate

Once Jones returns from injury, things will get even trickier. The Comets also have to worry about another wrinkle, called the Veteran Rule. I wrote on this rule before the season started, and things have changed a little since then.

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Basically, an AHL team is only allowed to dress six skaters who are deemed to have veteran status in each game. At least one of these veterans must be part of a further subcategory known as veteran exempt. The determination is based on professional games played, between the American League, the NHL, and European elite leagues.

A veteran player is one who has played at least 321 professional games, while a veteran exempt player has played between 261 and 320 professional games. These designations are determined by the amount of regular season games played at the beginning of the season, and do not change until the following season. Another way to look at it is like this: the AHL team must dress at least 12 skaters who had played in 260 or less professional games at the beginning of this season.

Here’s a look at this season’s designations:

In other words, the Comets aren’t in any danger at this particular point of going over the veteran limit. This is in spite of the fact that they began the season with five veterans and have since added two more in Chris Higgins and Brandon Prust. This is because Alex Biega and Linden Vey have since established themselves as mainstays on the NHL roster.

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It’s quite likely that the Comets will have another veteran on the way soon enough. With Dan Hamhuis scheduled to return from his long-term injury in the next couple of games, someone is going to have to make room for him. Yannick Weber might be the most apparent option, as a defenceman, but considering that the Canucks are carrying 14 forwards, it’s not out of the question that they could send Linden Vey or Adam Cracknell down to Utica, given that they’ve got six centremen on the NHL roster.

All three of those players would require waivers, and all three would be considered veterans on an AHL roster, pushing them to their limit of six. It’s also possible that the Canucks would look to trade Weber, who has been an outright disappointment this season, but time is running out for that, with Hamhuis’ return likely coming by the weekend.

The Comets are a very young team this year, being led largely by prospects, and, as a result, are capable of taking on a number of older players, like they have in the past few weeks. They’re getting pretty close to their limit though. If they receive injuries to younger players, they will have to be a little more selective in their PTOs from this point on. Danny Syvret, who they had on for 10 games earlier this season, would be considered a veteran (with over 800 professional games played) and, therefore, wouldn’t be able to play again if the Comets did get up to six veterans.

In any case, someone is going to have to sit out this weekend in favor of Brandon Prust. It’s not gonna to be one of their top wingers in Grenier, Gaunce or Shinkaruk, and it’s also probably not going to be Carter Bancks or Wacey Hamilton, whose tenacious attitudes and spark plug playing styles have made them favourites of head coach Travis Green. It’s probably going to be Jon Kurtz, and after that probably a rookie like Cole Cassels or Joe LaBate, who would then rotate in. Blair Jones will eventually complicate this further when he returns. Whoever does get the scratch, at least they’ll have Prust around to help them through it.

Prust went out teaching the kids one last lesson.. Don’t whine about being a healthy scratch @CanucksArmy #Canucks #Prustle — Kevin Doughty (@no_doughty) February 2, 2016

The NHL trade deadline could change a lot of this. If trades are made at the NHL level (Vrbata or Hamhuis, for instance), it’s likely that young players go up to take their places (Shinkaruk, Gaunce, Fedun, or Pedan), but does nothing for the veteran rule.

However, teams could still have some interest in Chris Higgins or Brandon Prust, as they’ve gained an advantage that they didn’t have a few weeks ago: they’ve cleared waivers. With this development, a team could trade for Higgins or Prust and stash them in their minor league system for use later on. For a contending team, having a player like Chris Higgins waiting off of your 23-man roster could be a great asset when injuries inevitably hit during a long playoff run. That’s gotta be worth a draft pick, right?

The Comets are back in action on Friday, so we’ll see what their lineup looks like then.





