Gabriel Vilardi, Lukas Dostal Headline 2025 NHL Salary Arbitration Class

As the NHL’s salary cap continues to rise, the number of players filing for salary arbitration continues to fall.

On Saturday, the NHL Players’ Association issued its list of 11 players who have filed for arbitration in 2025. That’s down from 14 in 2024, and continues a downward trend.

This year, the two most prominent names on the list both hail from the Western Conference. Lukas Dostal, 25, is now the Anaheim Ducks’ undisputed No. 1 goaltender after veteran John Gibson was traded to the Detroit Red Wings on June 28. And 25-year-old Gabriel Vilardi is a big center who is coming off a career-high 61 points in 71 games with the Winnipeg Jets in 2024-25.

Both are due for significant raises.

Dostal was primarily an AHL goalie who had played just 23 NHL games when he signed his last contract in 2023 — a two-year deal at a budget cap hit of just $812,500. Since then, he supplanted Gibson in Anaheim and backstopped Czechia to an emotional gold medal at the 2024 IIHF World Championship, cementing his spot as a national hero in his homeland and being named one of the Czechs’ first six players on the roster for the 2026 Winter Olympics.

Dostal posted a 23-23-7 record as the Ducks gained 21 points in the standings in 2024-25, and the team is looking to push for a playoff spot this year with the help of new coach Joel Quenneville and veteran additions Chris Kreider and Mikael Granlund as well as rising-star defenseman Jackson LaCombe. According to PuckPedia, Anaheim also has nearly $29 million in available cap space — more than enough to get Dostal inked to a long-term deal.

Anaheim defenseman Drew Helleson is also among the 11 players who filed. A depth defenseman, the 24-year-old split his time between Anaheim and the AHL San Diego Gulls last season. After spending three years at Boston College, he’s coming out of his entry-level contract which carried a cap hit of $925,000.

Up in Winnipeg, the Jets have close to $20 million available after winger Nikolaj Ehlers elected to take his services to the Carolina Hurricanes earlier this week as an unrestricted free agent.

But GM Kevin Cheveldayoff has some work to do, as Vilardi is one of three Jets who have filed for arbitration. The others are forward Morgan Barron and defenseman Dylan Samberg.

After Vilardi was acquired as part of the return for Pierre-Luc Dubois during the summer of 2023, the Jets inked him to a two-year bridge deal with a cap hit of just over $3.4 million.

Barron, 26, is coming off a two-year deal with a cap hit of $1.35 million. He’s a big-bodied bottom-six player who collected 15 points in 74 games last season.

As for Samberg, the 26-year-old has been drafted and developed by the Jets and has become one of their most important defenders. Though his offense is modest — he hit a career high of six goals last season — his ice time jumped to more than 21 minutes a game, cementing his spot as an important member of Winnipeg’s top four. He’s coming off a two-year deal that carried a $1.4 million cap hit.

AFP Analytics projects a four-year deal for Vilardi at a cap hit of $6.8 million, two years for Barron at $1.56 million and five years for Samberg at $5.2 million. If those projections are close for the reigning Presidents’ Trophy winners, that will eat up about $13.5 million of Winnipeg’s available cap space.

No other team has more than one player up for arbitration. Here’s the list:

• Kaapo Kakko (F) – Seattle Kraken
• Nick Robertson (F) – Toronto Maple Leafs
• Arvid Soderblom (G) – Chicago Blackhawks
• Jayden Struble (D) – Montreal Canadiens
• Conor Timmins (D) – Buffalo Sabres
• Maxim Tsyplakov (F) – New York Islanders

The Kraken also avoided a potential arbitration filing on Saturday when they signed forward Tye Kartye to a new two-year deal with a cap hit of $1.35 million. The Columbus Blue Jackets did the same with a two-year deal for 23-goal scorer Dmitry Voronkov. The cap charge there is $4.175 million.

Players who file for arbitration are now committed to getting a deal done with their current teams. They can still agree to a contract before their scheduled hearing, which will be held between July 20 – Aug. 4 but as of Saturday, they are no longer eligible to sign an offer sheet from another team.

A handful of arbitration-eligible players elected not to file on Saturday — as Jeremy Swayman of the Boston Bruins notably chose last summer. That decision can give a player more contract flexibility: in Swayman’s case, he held out until training camp before inking an eight-year contract, rather than being bound by a one or two-year deal that arbitration would deliver. Players also like to avoid arbitration hearings wherever possible due to the harsh assessments that teams can sometimes deliver while making their cases.

This year, the two most notable names who didn’t file are defensemen Bowen Byram of the Buffalo Sabres and Cam York of the Philadelphia Flyers.

Byram, 24, has been a frequent subject of trade rumors and even a potential offer-sheet candidate — although Sabres GM Kevyn Adams said this week that he would “absolutely” match any offer sheet that might be presented. Byram’s last deal, signed when he was still a member of the Colorado Avalanche, carried a $3.85 million cap hit over three years.

York, also 24, saw his role decrease somewhat under John Tortorella last year, and he was an occasional healthy scratch. He’ll have a new coach, Rick Tocchet, to impress this fall. York’s last deal was a two-year contract at $1.6 million.

To be eligible to file for arbitration, a player must be a restricted free agent and have accrued the required amount of professional experience, which varies depending on the age at which a player signs his first contract. For 18-to-20-year-olds, four years of experience is required before arbitration eligibility begins; the threshold drops for players who sign their first contracts at older ages.

Arbitration awards can be one or two years. If the arbitrator awards a salary of less than $4.85 million, the award is binding. If the arbitration award is greater than that number, the team has an option to walk away. If it’s a one-year contract, the team can immediately decline, making the player an unrestricted free agent. If it’s a two-year contract, they must accept the first year of the deal, but can walk away after that.

There is a strong incentive for both sides to come to terms before the arbitration hearing begins. That’s what happens in most cases — having a fixed arbitration date on the calendar creates a firm deadline for both sides to reach an agreement.

The deadline for team-elected filings for 2025 NHL salary arbitration is Sunday, July 6 at 5 p.m. ET. Typically, there are no more than a handful of filings of this type each year.