More than a month into free agency, veteran winger Evander Kane evidently hasn’t had a strong market as he remains without a contract. While NHL opportunities may not have presented themselves yet, it appears at least one KHL team would like to sign him. Sport-Express’ Mikhail Zislis reports that Ak Bars Kazan has shown interest in signing Kane for the upcoming season.
The 35-year-old spent last season in his hometown of Vancouver after the Canucks picked him up from Edmonton with the Oilers looking to shed his $5.125MM AAV. Once it was clear that Vancouver’s season was going nowhere fast, the hope was that they’d be able to flip him at the trade deadline for more than the fourth-round pick they gave up to get him.
Unfortunately, things didn’t go as planned on that front. Kane had a fairly quiet year, recording 13 goals and 18 assists along with 111 hits in 71 games. That was a big drop across the board from his previous year in 2023-24 (he only played in the 2025 playoffs after missing the entire regular season). Unable to move him, Kane played sparingly over the final few weeks although he did get into his 1,000th career NHL game.
Over his career, Kane has been a quality power forward. He has 339 goals and 309 assists to his name along with 1,278 penalty minutes and 2,324 hits in 1,001 career games. Of course, at this stage of his career, he’s not going to be reasonably expected to come in and push for 20-plus goals, a mark he has reached nine times now. Instead, he’d be more of a bottom-six piece but nothing on the contract front has materialized just yet for him to potentially fill that role somewhere.
It’s unclear at this time if the KHL interest is being reciprocated on Kane’s end. His focus at this point is likely securing a contract for a 17th NHL season. But if that opportunity doesn’t come around, it appears as if he has at least one option for the 2026-27 campaign.