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Top 25U25: #10 Adam Pelech needs to find a role

After a decent 44-game showing in 2016-17, the New York Islanders relied heavily on Adam Pelech in 2017-18, to very mixed results. Pelech’s 78 games in the NHL this past season established his spot with the Islanders, leading the team to reward him with a contract extension with a cap hit of $1.6 million until the end of the 2020-21 season.

In those 78 games last season, Pelech scored 3 goals and 19 points in an expanded role due to injuries to Calvin de Haan and Johnny Boychuk. Then-head coach Doug Weight used Pelech on every defensive pairing at some point in the season, played him around 20 minutes a night, gave him top penalty kill minutes and also gave him fairly consistent power play time on the second unit, decisions that didn’t make much sense at all.