The Florida Panthers traded for their second goaltender in as many days, acquiring Jacob Markstrom in a deal with the New Jersey Devils on Tuesday that all but certainly signals the end of Sergei Bobrovsky's storied run in South Florida.
The Panthers sent Evan Rodrigues, Jesper Boqvist and the rights to pending restricted free agent Ben Steeves to the Devils for Markstrom and winger Angus Crookshank. Florida got goalie Akira Schmid from Vegas on Monday night for a 2028 third-round pick.
“Jacob is an established veteran leader in this league who possesses size and a relentless drive to win,” Panthers general manager Bill Zito said. “We are excited for him to compete alongside our established group and return to South Florida.”
Markstrom at 36 returns to Florida, where he started his NHL career a decade and a half ago. He was one of the top prospects at the position after getting taken with the 34th pick in the 2008 draft and played his first 43 games in the league with the Panthers during their down years, long before becoming a contender again.
Bobrovsky, 37, backstopped Florida to back-to-back Stanley Cup championships in 2024 and ’25 and another trip to the final in ’23. He is expected to be among the top players available when free agency opens Wednesday.
Markstrom is beginning a two-year contract at an annual salary cap hit of $6 million. That was signed in late October by former Devils GM Tom Fitzgerald, who left the organization in April. Moving on from him is the first big roster shakeup for successor Sunny Mehta. New Jersey now has Jake Allen in net and will likely go shopping for his tandem mate in free agency.
Rodrigues, who turns 33 on July 28, gives the Devils another top-nine forward. The Panthers shed his salary of just over $3 million after getting Brady Tkachuk from Ottawa to play with brother Matthew.
In other moves around the NHL:
— The St. Louis Blues put winger Jonathan Drouin on unconditional waivers to buy out the final season of his contract. They got Drouin at the trade deadline from the New York Islanders as part of the return for Brayden Schenn.
— Utah signed goalie Sebastian Cossa to a two-year, $4 million contract after trading a first-round pick to Detroit for his rights.
— Fresh off winning the Cup, Carolina reacquired defenseman Kyle Masters' rights from Anaheim for forward Noah Philp. The Hurricanes sent Masters to the Ducks on Saturday along with a sixth-round pick for the rights to pending free agent John Carlson.
— Vegas, which lost to Carolina in the final, made a one-for-one defenseman swap with Pittsburgh, sending Kaedan Korczak to the Penguins for Parker Wotherspoon. Pittsburgh is retaining half of Wotherspoon's $1 million salary in a cap-saving deal for the Golden Knights.
AP NHL: https://apnews.com/NHL
FILE - Florida Panthers' Evan Rodrigues (17) plays against the Minnesota Wild during the third period of an NHL hockey game, Jan. 24, 2026, in St. Paul, Minn. (AP Photo/Lily Dozier, File)
FILE - New Jersey Devils goaltender Jacob Markstrom (25) makes a save against Boston Bruins forward Alex Steeves (21) during the third period of an NHL hockey game, March 16, 2026, in Newark, N.J. (AP Photo/Noah K. Murray, File)
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkey's president on Tuesday dismissed an Israeli proposal to designate violence against Armenians by the Ottoman Empire during World War I as genocide, and turned the accusation back at Israel by pointing at the deaths of Palestinians in Gaza.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was responding to a measure approved Sunday by Israel's Cabinet. The proposal still requires parliamentary approval and comes amid deteriorating ties between Israel and Turkey.
Turkey has fiercely lobbied to prevent countries from officially recognizing the mass deaths of Armenians around 1915 as genocide, even as Armenians have pushed for it.
Historians estimate that up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely viewed by scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century. Turkey denies that the deaths constituted genocide, saying the toll has been inflated and that those killed were victims of civil war and unrest.
“We pay absolutely no attention to the slanders against our country by this criminal network, which has the blood of 73,000 innocent people of Gaza, mostly children and women, on its hands,” Erdogan said in a televised address following a Cabinet meeting.
“Our history is free from genocide, massacres, oppression and colonialism," Erdogan said.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, whose government is engaged in efforts to normalize ties with neighboring Turkey, declined to respond to the Israeli proposal on Monday, suggesting that the issue should not be turned into a political weapon.
“We see no need to respond because we believe that refraining from entering into the issue of the weaponization of the Armenian Genocide is in the interests of the Republic of Armenia,” state news agency Armenpress quoted Pashinyan as saying.
Turkey and Armenia have no formal diplomatic ties and their border has been closed since 1993. The countries have been engaged in normalization talks in recent years, however, with special envoys meeting to discuss reopening the border and restoring ties.
Israel for years avoided officially recognizing the violence as genocide out fear of angering Turkey, but that relationship has soured over the past two decades, especially as the most recent wars in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran have dragged on.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar, who introduced the proposal, said on Sunday that the “Armenian Genocide remains to this day the subject of an institutionalized campaign of denial and minimization” by the Turkish government, despite overwhelming historical evidence.
Saar noted that Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have previously described the violence against Armenians as genocide. But it has never been formally recognized in a vote by Israel’s Knesset.
He noted that 32 countries, including the United States, Syria and Lebanon, have also classified the violence as genocide.
Israel and Turkey were once close allies, but ties deteriorated after Erdogan, whose party is rooted in Turkey’s Islamic movement, came to power. Relations soured steadily over his outspoken criticism of Israeli policies toward Palestinians.
On Sunday, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry called Israel’s move a “politically motivated” step meant to distract from the country’s own actions against Palestinians and from proceedings at the International Court of Justice over alleged genocide in Gaza. In 2024, Turkey formally joined the ongoing case that was filed by South Africa.
Israel has faced repeated accusations, including from the United Nations and Turkey, that its offensive in Gaza amounts to genocide. Israel, founded in the wake of the Holocaust, denies the accusations.
FILE - Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan listens as Somalia's President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud speaks during a joint news conference in Istanbul, Turkey, on Dec. 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra, File)
