He’s big and he’s staying around
The Penguins got another free agent piece of work wrapped up today with the announcement that Joona Koppanen is back with the organization for a third season.
The Penguins have re-signed forward Joona Koppanen to a one-year contract.
The contract will run through the 2025.26 campaign and carries an average annual value of $775,000 at the NHL level.
Details: https://t.co/31cBdesfNo pic.twitter.com/fO4fMSYi1t
— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) June 17, 2025
From the team:
The Pittsburgh Penguins have re-signed forward Joona Koppanen to a one-year contract, it was announced today by President of Hockey Operations and General Manager Kyle Dubas.
The contract will run through the 2025-26 campaign and carries an average annual value of $775,000 at the NHL level.
Koppanen, 27, spent the 2024-25 season with Pittsburgh and the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins of the American Hockey League. The 6-foot-5, 215-pound forward suited up in 11 games with Pittsburgh, scoring one goal and averaging 13:23 minutes per game. He also played 56 games with WBS where he scored eight goals, 15 assists and 23 points.
The Tampere, Finland native recently completed his eighth year (2017-25) of professional hockey in North America, with stints in both the NHL and AHL. Koppanen has played a career total of 20 NHL games, split between Pittsburgh and Boston, recording two points (1G-1A). He has also played in 359 games in the AHL with Providence and WBS scoring 53 goals, 84 points and 137 points.
It’s always interesting to see which depth players are prioritized for signing. Last week it was Boko Imama, and now Koppanen. Both fit the role of the deep reserve, 15-16-17th type forwards within the organization to see as the season drags on an injuries pop up.
Koppanen played four games with the NHL club in 2023-24, and 11 more in 2024-25 (all of which came after March 18th in the final month of the season).
Wilkes-Barre can only dress a handful of “veterans” so bringing Koppanen back has to hurt the numbers game for other impending free agent vets like Marc Johnstone and Jimmy Huntington way down the organizational ranks. There’s only so many spots for these types of players within the roster and 50 NHL contract limit and the Pens wanted to bring Koppanen and his big frame back for one more year.