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Hurricanes Reunite With Chicago Wolves for AHL Affiliation

Originally posted on The Hockey Writers | By Zach Martin | Last updated 5/3/24

There’s been a plethora of news coming out of the Carolina Hurricanes camp over the past week. Between the Hurricanes defeating the New York Islanders in Round 1 of the 2024 NHL Playoffs to Frederik Andersen being named a finalist for the Bill Masterton Memorial Award, there has been a lot going on for the team. However, more news dropped on Thursday afternoon (May 2) when it was announced that Carolina will have an American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate next season after not having one for the 2023-24 season. What makes it more interesting, they reunite with a former team they were affiliated with before this season started who decided to go independent. Enter, the Chicago Wolves.

No Longer Lone Wolves

It was made official after speculation that the Hurricanes would reunite with the Wolves of the AHL to become their affiliate starting at the beginning of the 2024-25 season. The deal is set to run through the 2026-27 season making this agreement last for the next three years. What makes the deal interesting is the Hurricanes will oversee the Wolves’ hockey operations decisions. This means that Carolina will have more of an influence on what the AHL team does, which was a point of contention between the two sides before the split after the 2022-23 season.

Between 2020 and 2023, the Wolves went 106-54-11-10 as the Hurricanes’ affiliate. That also includes a 50-16-5-5 record on the way to their 2022 Calder Cup championship, their fifth, which included now-Hurricanes backup Pyotr Kochetkov along with Jalen Chatfield, Stefan Noesen, Jack Drury, Ronan Seeley, and Ryan Suzuki. The Wolves during the 2022-23 season went independent and ended up finishing the season 23-35-7-7 with 60 points. It put them last in the Central Division and missing the Calder Cup Playoffs.

Bringing the two sides together will make it easier for the Wolves to be competitive in bringing playoff hockey back to Rosemont, IL, along with developing players for the Hurricanes. This season, Carolina had to loan their prospects all around the AHL to teams like the Springfield Thunderbirds, Charlotte Checkers, and even the Wolves. Furthermore, there were guys even in the ECHL and overseas in Europe mainly in Finland or Sweden. Since the two are back together, expect all of their recent signees over the past few months like Jackson Blake, Bradly Nadeau, etc. along with their overseas players to come back to North America to play for the Wolves.

When asked about reuniting with the Wolves, Hurricanes general manager Don Waddell stated, “We’re excited to reestablish our AHL affiliation with Chicago, and thankful that we could find a solution which worked for both clubs. Many of our prospects have already had success with the Wolves, both individually and as a team, and we’re happy to have secured a consistent environment for their development.” It will be a huge help for both sides as they look to bring the 32-32 alignment of the NHL and AHL back together along with developing the prospects in a joint effort.

Even the Wolves’ general manager Wendell Young commented on the arrangement stating, “We’re looking forward to being affiliated again and moving forward. It’s for the benefit of the Chicago Wolves, the Carolina Hurricanes and the American Hockey League that we have 32 NHL teams and 32 AHL affiliates. It’s good to be partnered with the Hurricanes.” It’s good to see the two sides realign and hopefully be able to win titles together respectively in the AHL and NHL.

See You Soon October 2024

The first game for the Wolves back under the Hurricanes umbrella will be on Oct. 12 at Allstate Arena. It’ll be an interesting summer to watch to see which prospects will be joining the Wolves. There is a good chance a lot of the college guys that the Hurricanes signed will most likely start in Chicago, but depending on how training camp goes this fall, some could be in Carolina. Either way, it’ll be a relief to have an affiliate for the Hurricanes to send their prospects to so that development can be done. Plus it’ll be nice for the Wolves to get high-end talent to make another Calder Cup Playoff run again. One has to ask if they’re a Wolves fan, is it October yet?

This article first appeared on The Hockey Writers and was syndicated with permission.

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