{"id":420812,"date":"2026-01-22T01:15:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T01:15:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/420812\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T01:15:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T01:15:10","slug":"ilya-solovyov-trade-story-and-pronunciation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/420812\/","title":{"rendered":"Ilya Solovyov: Trade Story and Pronunciation"},"content":{"rendered":"

CALGARY, Alberta \u2014 Just go ride the bike. Or go to the gym. The instructions weren\u2019t exactly clear, but in the following hour, everything fell into place as the Pittsburgh Penguins<\/a> acquired Ilya Solovyov from the Colorado Avalanche on Tuesday in exchange for forward Valtteri Puustinen, who had been relegated to the Wilkes-Barre\/Scranton Penguins<\/a> for most of the last two seasons.<\/p>\n

Solovyov is with the NHL club, and the morning skate on Wednesday was his first time on the ice with some of his new teammates. <\/p>\n

First, the Belarusian\u2019s name is pronounced So-lOvy-ov. <\/p>\n

Wednesday morning, he also detailed the life of a hockey player who is about to be traded, but doens\u2019t yet know it.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, I wasn\u2019t expecting anything. It\u2019s probably like every player, except the stars, honestly, that I was on the practice rink yesterday with the team. We had a bunch of meetings. So, the coaches had told me to be ready for the game (Tuesday),\u201d Solovyov said. \u201cI expected to go on the ice, we had an optional ice there, and I expected to go with the goalies, take some shots, you know, like practicing a little bit.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen the head coach came and said, \u2018Hey, the general manager told me you don\u2019t have to go on the ice.\u2019 For no reason. Like, stay away from the ice. Just do the bike, the gym, whatever you want. Focus on recovery.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some 45 minutes later, everything became clear. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then after 40, 45 minutes, (coach) called me in his office, and he and the general manager told me that I have been traded to Pittsburgh.\u201d<\/p>\n

Solovyov, 25, is a big boy. Even sitting in his dressing stall, the 6-foot-3 defenseman looks a little bit sturdier than 208 pounds. He modestly didn\u2019t steer too selfishly into what role he\u2019d like to fill for the team or what traits of his game would be most helpful. <\/p>\n

In that way, the Penguins\u2019 new defenseman was humble, if not shy. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know. Honestly, it\u2019s a hard question. Like, I think I will bring the few shots from the blue line,\u201d said Solovyov. \u201cIt\u2019s 1,000%, and maybe the physicality, (with) strong, hard play in the D zone. And maybe something in the O zone, as well. Who knows?<\/p>\n

Solovyov scored his first NHL goal earlier this season and has three points (1-2-3) in 16 games. The defenseman likely won\u2019t play Wednesday against the Calgary Flames, the team that drafted him in the seventh round of the 2020 NHL Draft. However, his report to the NHL club would indicate that he may be in the lineup eventually. <\/p>\n

The Penguins now have five left-handed defensemen on the NHL roster (Parker Wotherspoon, Brett Kulak, Ryan Graves, and Ryan Shea are the other four). <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tTags: Ilya Solovyov<\/a> Penguins Trade<\/a> Pittsburgh Penguins<\/a> <\/p>\n

Categorized: Penguins Locker Room<\/a> Penguins Trade Talk<\/a> Pittsburgh Penguins<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CALGARY, Alberta \u2014 Just go ride the bike. Or go to the gym. The instructions weren\u2019t exactly clear,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":420813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5113],"tags":[5,11999,4,118,644,1469,100,5216],"class_list":{"0":"post-420812","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh-penguins","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-ilya-solovyov","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-penguins","12":"tag-penguins-trade","13":"tag-pittsburgh","14":"tag-pittsburgh-penguins","15":"tag-pittsburghpenguins"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115936108492639171","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420812","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=420812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/420813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=420812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=420812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=420812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}