Saturday at 5 p.m. was the deadline for the Penguins to sign a pair of right-handed defense prospects in Thimo Nickl and Nolan Collins to entry-level contracts in order to retain their exclusive signing rights. They didn't sign either, making both prospects free agents.
It was known well before the season ended that Nickl wouldn't be signing an NHL contract. The 22-year-old native of Klagenfurt, Austria agreed to a contract for next season with his hometown Klagenfurt Athletic Sports Club in the top Austrian league back in February.
Nickl was originally a 2020 fourth-round pick of the Ducks. When the Penguins had no intention of signing forward prospect Judd Caulfield out of the University of North Dakota in the spring of 2023, Ron Hextall traded Caulfield's rights to the Ducks for the rights to Nickl, who at the time was playing in the second-tier Swedish league. Nickl made the move to North America this season and signed an AHL-level contract with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. He spent the entire year in the ECHL with the Nailers, scoring two goals and 19 assists in 66 games. He recorded no points in nine playoff games before Wheeling was knocked out in the second round of the playoffs.
Collins, 20, was the Penguins' sixth-round pick in 2022. He spent the last three seasons with the OHL's Sudbury Wolves. He recorded six goals, 20 assists and a plus-20 rating in 65 games this year, and was scoreless and a minus-2 in two playoff games. He recorded eight goals and 22 assists and a plus-11 rating in 63 games in 2022-23, and missed the Wolves' entire postseason that year due to injury.
Collins was limited in both of his development camps and missed both Prospects Challenge tournaments during his two years in the Penguins organization, first with a shoulder injury and then with a wrist injury. He never had the opportunity to make an impression on the Penguins' brass while in Pittsburgh.
