from the CP at TSN,

With Karlsson off the board, any team looking for a No. 1 defenceman has to either hope veteran Alexander Edler doesn't re-sign with the Canucks and win that bidding war or go the trade route. Salary-cap concerns for San Jose, Washington and a handful of other Cup contenders could open the door to some significant player movement even before free agency starts July 1.

"I think there's been more conversation, more communication between the GMs in the last month than maybe ever since I've been a GM," San Jose's Doug Wilson said Monday. "There's so much competition, especially for the high-end player. ... There's a lot of things going on."

Already the Capitals have cleared cap space by trading defenceman Matt Niskanen to Philadelphia for Radko Gudas and used some of it to re-sign winger Carl Hagelin , the Islanders re-signed forward Brock Nelson and Jordan Eberle , the Flyers acquired the rights to pending free agent Kevin Hayes from the Jets and the Rangers traded for Winnipeg defenceman Jacob Trouba .

The trade talk is just heating up ahead of the draft Friday and Saturday in Vancouver. Pittsburgh's Phil Kessel, Evgeni Malkin or Kris Letang and Nashville's P.K. Subbanare among the high-profile players who could be on the move.

"There's a lot of talk," Rangers GM Jeff Gorton said. "There's a lot of different names out there. There's a lot of different ways to improve your team."

Many of those moves will set the table for free agency, where Columbus winger Artemi Panarin, centre Matt Duchene and goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky are the top three players available.

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