Islanders sign goalie Ilya Sorokin to 1-year bridge deal

Not only did he sign his ELC with the New York Islanders but Ilya Sorokin has now signed a 1-year extension.

We were wondering why the New York Islanders hadn’t officially announced that Ilya Sorokin had signed his one-year ELC with the team. Now we know why. They were waiting to let everyone know that they had extended Sorokin past his ELC.

On Tuesday, the Islanders announced that Sorokin has signed for a single year deal for the 2020-21 season. According to Elliotte Freidman, that deal was 50 percent signing bonus and 50 percent salary ($1 million each) giving him a $2 million cap hit.

We went from maybe not getting Sorokin at all because of the NHL’s arbitrary decision to not allow current year deals for unsigned draft picks, to not only getting him to sign his ELC but to a one-year extension to boot.

Signed.

Just to clear everything up. On Monday Sorokin signed a one-year ELC with the Islanders for the 2019-20 season. That deal expires this season and only allows him to participate in Phase 3 and follow the team to Toronto for Phase 4 (he can’t actually play in a game) of the return to play plan.

He was going to need a new deal to play for the 2020-21 season. That’s what the Islanders announced this morning. He’s not only signed for 2019-20 but for a year beyond that.

The cap hit is a fair amount for both sides. Sorokin was making roughly $1.4 million USD in the KHL last season. So he gets a sizeable raise in this deal. For the Islanders, they don’t have to break the bank while they assess their prized asset.

Good things keep happening for this franchise.

After nearly six years of waiting for Ilya Sorokin to move to North America and sign just one contract with the New York Islanders, he’s signed two in less than 24 hours keeping him with the team through the 2020-21 season. Today is a good day.