The Colorado Avalanche have signed forward Matt Stienburg to a two-year contract. The team did not specify whether the deal is one-way or two-way or the dollar figure attached. Stienburg played most of the 2022-23 season with Cornell University in the ECAC, scoring seven points in 18 games. He missed about half of the season due to an injury sustained in December.
Stienburg also had a short professional stint in which he played four games with the Colorado Eagles, putting up one assist. He played four in the playoffs this year as well, with one point in that span. Stienburg was originally a third-round selection of the Avalanche in the 2019 NHL Draft. He committed to Cornell for the full four years, but unfortunately the 2020-21 season was cancelled due to COVID-19.
The Halifax, Nova Scotia, native is one year removed from the 2021-22 season, when he posted 29 points in 28 games for Cornell, leading the team in points. He briefly became an unrestricted free agent when the Avalanche had not signed him by the August 15 deadline. However, they came back around to sign him just three days later.
Stienburg is not considered one of the best prospects in the Avalanche organization, but he has some upside and still some room to grow at 22 years old. He will likely report to the Eagles next year and try to prove to the organization that they made the right choice in giving him a second chance.
Stienburg will play an important role on an Eagles team that features Jean-Luc Foudy, Ben Meyers, Oskar Olausson and Sam Malinski, who played with Stienburg in Cornell.
Stienburg comes from a hockey family, as his father Trevor Stienburg played 71 NHL games for the Quebec Nordiques 1980s. The older Stienburg was more of a rough-and-tumble player, whereas the younger focuses more on the skill side of the game.
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