{"id":575460,"date":"2026-05-15T10:36:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T10:36:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/575460\/"},"modified":"2026-05-15T10:36:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T10:36:18","slug":"transaction-notes-ritchie-panocha-dubinsky-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/575460\/","title":{"rendered":"Transaction Notes: Ritchie, Panocha, Dubinsky \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former NHL forward <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/r\/ritchbr01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=www.prohockeyrumors.com&amp;utm_campaign=2026-05-14_hr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Brett Ritchie<\/a> has <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/vlcizilina.hockeyslovakia.sk\/sk\/article\/vlci-pridavaju-nhl-silu-do-ziliny-mieri-brett-ritchie\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">signed a contract<\/a> for the 2026-27 season with Vlci Zilina, a club in the Slovakian Extraliga. The 32-year-old is a veteran of nearly 400 NHL games, playing in the league from 2014-15 through 2022-23. Ritchie last appeared in the NHL with the Arizona Coyotes, arriving there in a mid-season trade from the Calgary Flames. It was <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nhl.com\/news\/ritchie-brothers-in-trade-between-calgary-flames-arizona-coyotes-341792438\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">in that deal<\/a> that Ritchie was actually traded for his brother, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/r\/ritchni01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=www.prohockeyrumors.com&amp;utm_campaign=2026-05-14_hr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Nick Ritchie<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Since playing out 2022-23 with the Coyotes, Ritchie has continued his professional career in Europe. As most veteran NHLers who elect to try their hand in Europe do, Ritchie began in one of the continent\u2019s top leagues: the KHL. He signed with Dynamo Minsk, but played in just 14 total games and scored just three points. The following year, he signed in Slovakia, but ended up splitting 2024-25 between that league and the German DEL. This past season, Ritchie began the year in Austria before transferring to Sheffield in the British EIHL, where he scored 12 goals and 22 points in 24 games.<\/p>\n<p>Other notes on player movement from around the hockey world:<\/p>\n<p>Buffalo Sabres prospect <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hockeydb.com\/ihdb\/stats\/pdisplay.php?pid=264785\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Norwin Panocha<\/a> has changed clubs, <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/iserlohn-roosters.de\/2026\/05\/13\/norwin-panocha-wechselt-zu-den-roosters\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">signing with<\/a> the DEL\u2019s Iserlohn Roosters. The 6\u20192\u2033 defenseman was a seventh-round pick by Buffalo at the 2023 draft, selected out of Eisb\u00e4ren Berlin\u2019s junior ranks. Panocha spent 2023-24 and 2024-25 split between three North American junior leagues, namely the QMJHL, WHL, and USHL. He split this past season between the DEL with Berlin and second-division DEL2 on loan to Lausitzer F\u00fcchse. <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/puckpedia.com\/team\/buffalo-sabres\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Per PuckPedia<\/a>, the Sabres hold the exclusive rights to sign Panocha through June 1 of next year, but it appears unlikely at this stage that he\u2019ll earn an entry-level deal.<br \/>\nThe Laval Rocket <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rocketlaval.com\/en\/press-release\/aiden-dubinsky-contract-2026-2027-season\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">announced yesterday<\/a> that defenseman <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hockeydb.com\/ihdb\/stats\/pdisplay.php?pid=237894\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Aiden Dubinsky<\/a> has been signed to a one-year AHL contract for next season. Dubinsky was playing on a tryout deal with the Rocket before their season ended at the hands of the Toronto Marlies in the AHL playoffs. The Rocket signed Dubinsky, 22, out of the University of Wisconsin. He skated in 39 games for the Badgers this past season, scoring six points.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former NHL forward Brett Ritchie has signed a contract for the 2026-27 season with Vlci Zilina, a club&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":575461,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[401,62567,64321,229,9027,5,4,64322],"class_list":["post-575460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ahl","tag-aiden-dubinsky","tag-brett-ritchie","tag-buffalo-sabres","tag-del","tag-hockey","tag-nhl","tag-norwin-panocha"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116578155452416936","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575460","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=575460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575460\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/575461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=575460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=575460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=575460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}