Panthers Retain Rights to Artyukhin

Miami - Florida Panthers general manager Tom Fischer has let it be known that the Panthers will retain the HBMHL contract rights to Russian winger Evgeny Artyukhin. The young forward has not played in the NHL since his rookie 2005-2006 season after which his agent said that his request for more money was denied by his NHL Club.

"We will continue to protect the un-carded Artyukhin. Hopefully someone will pull their head out and get this guy back into the NHL," Florida GM Tom Fischer said when asked about keeping the rights to Artyukhin.

Artyukhin, the son of a Greco-Roman wrestling champion, began his career with Vityaz Podolsk in Russia in 1999-2000 spending most of that season with the club's 1st (Farm) League team. In 2000-2001 he became a regular on the team's 4th line at the Upper League level and a fixture on the Russian national team's 1983 born junior tournament teams including the 2001 U-18 World Junior Championships which was scouted extensively by the Tampa Bay Lightning. That summer the team selected him early in the 3rd round of the 2001 Entry Draft. The following season he showed marked improvement in the Superleague notching 15 goals and 22 points in 49 games. At the 2002 QMJHL Import Draft Artyukhin was selected in the 2nd round, 29th overall, by the Moncton Wildcats and made the decision to move to North America. Artyukhin put up modest numbers with Moncton while learning English and how to cope with the smaller rink size. Artyukhin did, however, quickly earn a reputation as a nasty physical player including a suspension for beating an opponent with his own helmet. That year, Artyukhin was selected to play for Russia in the U-20 World Junior Championships in Halifax where the team earned gold with Artyukhin playing a checking line role.