SAN JOSE — Arizona Coyotes defenseman Matt Dumba said the Sharks were one of the teams he and his agent, Craig Oster, spoke to in the offseason as he weighed where he wanted to play next after 10 seasons with the Minnesota Wild.
“(San Jose was) one of the teams we were talking to,” Dumba said Thursday at SAP Center before the Coyotes played the Sharks. “We had a handful (of teams) that we were just trying to sort out.”
Dumba was allowed to walk as a free agent by the Wild in July after the expiration of his five-year, $30 million contract. Dumba needed patience, as the NHL waited to see where Erik Karlsson would land after he requested to be moved by the rebuilding Sharks.
Dumba would agree to a one-year, $3.9 million deal with the Coyotes as a free agent on Aug. 6, shortly after the Sharks traded Karlsson to the Pittsburgh Penguins for a package that included center Mikael Granlund.
Dumba, 29, said he let Oster handle the business end as he tried to enjoy his summer, but added that it never got to the point where he spoke to Sharks general manager Mike Grier.
“Ended up having a house in Arizona already,” Dumba said, “and it was getting pretty close before the start of the season.”
Dumba has several friends on the Sharks roster, including former Wild teammates Granlund, Nico Sturm, Luke Kunin, Calen Addison, and Kaapo Kahkonen, and fellow Hockey Diversity Alliance co-founder Anthony Duclair.
“Made some really cool connections. Some friends who will be lifelong friends, for sure,” Dumba said. “I don’t live too far from (Kunin) in the summer, me and (Granlund) will be boys for life, Addison stays in Minnesota in the summer. Cool to see how (the Sharks) have kind of collected a crew of my friends.”
Dumba, before Thursday, was averaging 20:01 in ice time per game for the Coyotes, as he had two goals and five points in 30 games.
The Coyotes came into Thursday holding the Western Conference’s second and final wild-card spot with a 16-13-2 record.
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Arizona has made the playoffs just once since the 2011-2012 season, and that was in the bubble in Edmonton when it beat Nashville in the qualifying round and lost to Colorado in what was technically the first round.
“I think we’ve surprised some people but at the same time, I think we’re still under our own expectations and where we figure this team being,” Dumba said. “So it’s a work in progress, which is a really fun part of it too.”
