{"id":398719,"date":"2026-01-09T02:28:58","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T02:28:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/398719\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T02:28:58","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T02:28:58","slug":"pittsburgh-penguins-reassign-ville-koivunen-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/398719\/","title":{"rendered":"Pittsburgh Penguins Reassign Ville Koivunen \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Pittsburgh Penguins <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/penguins\/status\/2009263993664192836\" rel=\"nofollow\">announced<\/a> today that winger <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/k\/koivuvi01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=www.prohockeyrumors.com&amp;utm_campaign=2026-01-08_hr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Ville Koivunen<\/a> has been reassigned to the team\u2019s AHL affiliate, the Wilkes-Barre\/Scranton Penguins.<\/p>\n<p>The move does not come as a major surprise as Koivunen has been a healthy scratch twice in the Penguins\u2019 last three games. The 22-year-old winger, who was acquired by the Penguins as part of the 2024 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/g\/guentja01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=www.prohockeyrumors.com&amp;utm_campaign=2026-01-08_hr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Jake Guentzel<\/a> trade, entered the season as a key player to watch in Pittsburgh. He scored 21 goals and 56 points for the AHL Penguins last season, and also managed seven assists in eight NHL games, the first NHL games of his career.<\/p>\n<p>Koivunen entered the season ranked as the No. 2 prospect in Pittsburgh\u2019s system <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.eliteprospects.com\/news\/prospect-pool-rankings\/elite-prospects-2025-nhl-prospect-pool-rankings-no-18-ranked-pittsburgh-penguins\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">according to Elite Prospects<\/a>, who wrote that \u201che could ascend to a top-nine or even top-six role, becoming one of the keys to the Penguins\u2019 rebuild.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That ascension hasn\u2019t happened so far in 2025-26. While he remained a lethal offensive weapon at the AHL level, scoring a whopping 11 points in just six games at that level, he\u2019s struggled to make his mark at the NHL level the way he did in his short cameo last season.<\/p>\n<p>One week ago, <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/6931834\/2026\/01\/01\/penguins-midseason-report-cards\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">The Athletic\u2019s Josh Yohe wrote<\/a> that Koivunen \u201chas been quite disappointing,\u201d adding that \u201che isn\u2019t ready for prime time just yet.\u201d The 22-year-old has managed just five points in 27 games this season, averaging 12:41 time on ice per game.<\/p>\n<p>Reassigning Koivunen back to the AHL gives the player an opportunity to receive a more significant level of playing time. He\u2019ll play a leading role in Wilkes-Barre\/Scranton, rather than a minimal one in Pittsburgh.<\/p>\n<p>In addition, getting the chance to once again play at the AHL level should help Koivunen rebuild some confidence in his scoring abilities, and that could allow him to hit the ground running the next time he\u2019s called up to Pittsburgh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pittsburgh Penguins announced today that winger Ville Koivunen has been reassigned to the team\u2019s AHL affiliate, the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":398720,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5113],"tags":[401,5,4,118,1469,100,5216,4429],"class_list":{"0":"post-398719","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh-penguins","8":"tag-ahl","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-penguins","12":"tag-pittsburgh","13":"tag-pittsburgh-penguins","14":"tag-pittsburghpenguins","15":"tag-ville-koivunen"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115862789414065172","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=398719"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398719\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}