As the NHL drops the puck on the 2024-2025 hockey season, Jewish fans will have plenty to root for.
The season officially began last week with a pair of games in Prague between Jack and Luke Hughes’s New Jersey Devils and Devon Levi and Jason Zucker’s Buffalo Sabres. The main action begins Tuesday, and as of opening night on Oct. 8, 13 openly Jewish players will begin the season on an NHL roster. And with several more prospects waiting in the wings, it’s possible that last year’s total of at least 15 Jewish players in the league will be surpassed.
The 2023-2024 season was a banner year for Jews in the NHL. Edmonton Oilers star Zach Hyman put on a career performance, tallying 54 goals, the third-most in the NHL, plus 16 more in the playoffs. Vancouver Canucks captain Quinn Hughes finished with 75 assists, the third-most in the league. He also earned the James Norris Memorial Trophy, which is awarded to the NHL’s best defender.
During the offseason, Ryan Warsofsky became the first Jewish NHL head coach in three decades, University of Denver star Zeev Buium was selected 12th overall in the NHL Entry Draft and the Hughes trio became the first brothers to grace the cover of a popular NHL video game.
In the Professional Women’s Hockey League, there are at least five Jewish players: Samantha Cogan (Toronto), Aerin Frankel (Boston), Kaleigh Fratkin (Boston), Cami Kronish (Boston) and Abbey Levy (New York). The PWHL preseason begins Nov. 20.
Read on to meet this year’s slate of Jewish NHL players, listed alphabetically.
Jakob Chychrun, Washington Capitals defenseman
Boca Raton native Jakob Chychrun is entering his ninth season in the NHL and his first with the Washington Capitals, who acquired him in an offseason trade with the Ottawa Senators.
Chychrun, 26, who was born to a Jewish mother and has Ukrainian heritage, told NHL.com in 2020 that he celebrated both Hanukkah and Christmas growing up.
“We would always light the candles for each night of Hanukkah,” Chychrun said. “I have a little menorah in my kitchen. So, we still kind of keep the tradition of doing both. My mom likes to light the candles, and we have the Christmas tree up in the house. It’s just nice to get both sides of it and celebrate both.”
Chychrun appeared in all 82 games for the Senators last season, with 14 goals and a career-best 27 assists, equaling his career high of 41 points. He also reached that mark in the 2020-2021 season with the Arizona Coyotes, with whom he spent the first six-and-a-half seasons of his career. Arizona drafted Chychrun 16th overall in 2016.
Adam Fox, New York Rangers defenseman
As star Adam Fox enters his sixth NHL season, the Long Island native has become a beacon of consistency for the Rangers, with whom he has spent his entire career. Fox, 26, a two-time All-Star who won the 2021 Norris Trophy, tallied 73 points last season, following 72- and 74-point campaigns the two prior seasons. He is an alternate captain for the team.
Fox attended a Conservative synagogue growing up and had a hockey-themed bar mitzvah. “There are a lot Jewish residents on Long Island, so it’s cool for me to represent that community,” Fox told JTA in 2022. Last year, he partnered with Brooklyn Bagel and Coffee Company, a local chain, citing his background as “a Jewish Kid from Long Island.”
Mark Friedman, Vancouver Canucks defenseman
Veteran defender Mark Friedman is entering his second season with the Canucks, after a 2023-2024 campaign in which he earned just one assist with no goals in 23 games. Friedman, 28, is a Toronto native with hockey in his blood: His father and uncle both played for a youth team associated with the Philadelphia Flyers — with his grandfather as their coach. Friedman himself later joined the team.
Friedman has played in the NHL since 2019, lacing up for parts of three seasons each with the Flyers and the Pittsburgh Penguins before joining Vancouver last year. He has never played more than 26 games in a single season — and has only 13 career points, a low total for someone with his experience — but appears to have secured a roster spot with the Canucks after a strong preseason.
Jordan Harris, Columbus Blue Jackets defenseman
After three seasons with the Montreal Canadiens, 24-year-old Massachusetts native Jordan Harris was traded to Columbus in August. Harris played 56 games for Montreal last season with three goals and 11 assists.
Harris is the only Black Jewish player in the league, and has worked to promote diversity in hockey. He told JTA earlier this year that he hopes his experience will inspire others. “It’s great to think that maybe there’s some young players out there who hear my story and can relate to it somehow,” Harris said. He played collegiate hockey at Northeastern University with Jewish goaltender Devon Levi.
Jack Hughes, New Jersey Devils center
Jack Hughes, the 23-year-old former No. 1 overall draft pick, is one of the league’s best players. The Devils star tallied 74 points last season to follow up on his 99-point breakout in 2022-2023, a franchise record. Hughes is a three-time All-Star and a Devils alternate captain, and he and his two brothers come from a hockey family that is no stranger to history.
In addition to their video game feat, the Hughes family is the first American family to have three siblings picked in the first round of the NHL draft. Last December, Jack and his brothers became the first trio of Jewish brothers to play in the same NHL game. Hughes’ mother, Ellen Weinberg-Hughes, is Jewish and was herself an accomplished hockey player. Hughes had a bar mitzvah and celebrated Passover growing up.
Luke Hughes, New Jersey Devils defenseman
Luke Hughes, the youngest of the Hughes trio, played his first full season last year, appearing in all 82 games for the Devils. Hughes, 21, scored nine goals with 38 assists and was named to the NHL’s All-Rookie Team while finishing third for the Calder Memorial Trophy, the league’s rookie of the year award. Hughes was drafted fourth overall by the Devils in 2021 after a record-setting career at the University of Michigan.
Quinn Hughes, Vancouver Canucks defenseman
Elder brother Quinn Hughes played all 82 games for the Canucks last season, scoring 17 goals to go along with his 75 assists, good for a total of 92 points, the most of any defenseman in the league. Hughes, 24, is the only Jewish team captain in the league, and was an All-Star last year, when he won the Norris trophy.
Zach Hyman, Edmonton Oilers winger
The Oilers lost the Stanley Cup to the Florida Panthers by one goal in Game 7 last June, but before that, left winger Zach Hyman exploded for 54 goals in 80 regular season games, then led the league with 16 postseason scores. He also tallied 23 assists in the regular season and six more in the playoffs, totaling 99 points across 105 games.
Hyman, 32, is especially vocal about his Jewish identity. The Toronto native is a Maccabiah Games alum who has said he wears No. 18 in part because of its symbolic meaning in Judaism. “I’m Jewish, and in Judaism, 18 is a lucky number; it’s chai, which means ‘life’ in Hebrew,” he told The Athletic in 2021. Hyman has also been involved in the Jewish community in Edmonton, and has spoken out against antisemitism.
“As a grandson of Holocaust survivors and a young Jewish parent, I feel compelled to speak out against the uprising of Anti-Semitism around the world and show my support for Israel and the Jewish community,” Hyman tweeted last October, less than two weeks after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.
Luke Kunin, San Jose Sharks center
Luke Kunin is entering his eighth year in the NHL and his third season with the Sharks. In 77 games last season, the St. Louis native scored 11 goals with seven assists. Kunin, 26, previously spent three seasons with the Minnesota Wild, who drafted him in 2016, and two seasons with the Nashville Predators. He will be an alternate captain this season.
Devon Levi, Buffalo Sabres goaltender
Devon Levi makes a save against Jack Hughes of the New Jersey Devils, Oct. 5, 2024, in Prague. (Ben Ludeman/NHLI via Getty Images)
Goalie Devon Levi played 23 games for the Sabres last season, posting a .899 save percentage while allowing an average of 3.1 goals per game. Levi, 22, is a native of the Montreal suburb of Dollard-des-Ormeaux, which has a sizable Jewish population, and he attended a Modern Orthodox day school.
Levi was a star at Northeastern, where he won back-to-back Mike Richter Awards as the best goalie in NCAA men’s Division I hockey, becoming the first player to accomplish that feat. He finished his college career with a .942 save percentage, third-best all-time in the NCAA. His .952 save percentage in the 2021-2022 college season is tied for second-best in NCAA history.
Jeremy Swayman, Boston Bruins goaltender
After a contentious contract dispute that was resolved only days ahead of the new season, Jeremy Swayman is entering his fifth year in the NHL, all spent in Boston. Swayman, 25, is an Anchorage, Alaska, native who was a star goalie at the University of Maine. Along with his fellow Bruins goalie Linus Ullmark, Swayman won the William M. Jennings Trophy for allowing the fewest goals in the 2022–23 season. Swayman played 44 games in 2023-2024 with a .916 save percentage, and his .933 postseason save percentage was tops among NHL goalies with more than three playoff games.
Swayman, whose father is Jewish, had a bar mitzvah. “He put on the same tallis that I wore at my bar mitzvah that my grandmother had made,” Ken Swayman said during the playoffs. “That was my grandmother’s thing, she had handmade tallits for all our [bar mitzvahs]. Now he’s got the tallit and he’ll give it to his first son and yadda yadda.”
Jake Walman, San Jose Sharks defenseman
After playing in St. Louis and Detroit, 28-year-old Jake Walman has joined Kunin and their coach, Warsofsky, in San Jose. Walman played in 63 games in each of the last two seasons with the Red Wings, earning 18 and 21 points, respectively. The Toronto native has dual American-Canadian citizenship.
Jason Zucker, Buffalo Sabres left winger
With 13 NHL seasons under his belt, 32-year-old Jason Zucker is the elder statesman of the Jewish NHL cohort — beating out Kyman by less than five months. Zucker, who was drafted in 2010, spent the first eight-plus seasons of his career with the Minnesota Wild before stops in Pittsburgh, Nashville and Arizona. He joined the Sabres this summer. In 2018-2019, Zucker won the league’s King Clancy Memorial Trophy for his humanitarian efforts.
Zucker has a Hebrew tattoo on his left forearm and though he never had a bar mitzvah, he celebrated Jewish holidays with his family, telling the Penguins website that he “would do virtual menorah lighting with my family back while I was out of town playing juniors or college.”
Other players to watch
Andrew Cristall during a preseason game against the Boston Bruins, Oct. 5, 2024, in Washington, D.C. (John McCreary/NHLI via Getty Images)
In addition to the 13 players on NHL rosters, several Jewish players are beginning the year in the minor leagues with a shot at returning to the NHL, or making their debut, this season.
- Shai Buium, 21, signed an entry-level deal with the Detroit Red Wings after winning a national title at the University of Denver, where he played alongside his younger brother, Zeev Buium, who was drafted 12th overall this summer. The younger Buium returned to college for this season.
- Andrew Cristall, 19, starts this season in the Western Hockey League after barely missing the cut for the Washington Capitals’ roster. Cristall was drafted in 2023 and said “it definitely means a lot” to be the lone Jewish draftee of his class.
- Cole Guttman, 25, begins the season with the American Hockey League’s Rockford IceHogs, after playing 41 games across the last two seasons with the Chicago Blackhawks. Guttman’s family hails from Hungary and moved to Canada in 1951 from a German displaced persons camp.
- Yaniv Perets, 24, will start the season with the AHL’s Chicago Wolves. Perets, who grew up with Levi in Dollard-des-Ormeaux, made his NHL debut last season with the Carolina Hurricanes, appearing in one game and saving the only shot he faced.
- Chase Priskie, 28, will start the season with the Hershey Bears, the AHL affiliate of the Capitals. Priskie made his NHL debut for his hometown Florida Panthers in 2021. “I’ve been pretty religious since I was a young kid,” Priskie told a local outlet earlier this year. “The everyday teachings [of] Judaism have molded [me into] the person that I am.”
- Max Sasson, 24, is playing for the Abbotsford Canucks, Vancouver’s AHL affiliate. Josh Bloom, 21, is also on the team.
- Ozzy Wiesblatt, 22, is a Calgary native playing for the Nashville Predators’ AHL affiliate.
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The post All the Jewish NHL players to watch in the 2024-2025 season appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
