Former AHL mainstay Andy Welinski has found his next opportunity in the hockey world after retiring from his playing career in 2025. The 2011 third-round pick will join the USHL’s Waterloo Black Hawks as an assistant coach per Ryan Kennedy of The Hockey News. He will operate behind recently-promoted head coach Brett Olson on a Waterloo bench that saw 2025-26 head coach Scott Gordon join the KHL’s Traktor Chelyabinsk and assistant coach C.J. Eick leave to join Colgate University.

Welinski played through 10 seasons in the AHL between 2016 and 2025. He totaled 153 points in 327 games in that span, including a career-year in 2017-18 marked by 10 goals and 34 points in 51 games with the San Diego Gulls. Welinski also had multiple runs with the Anaheim Ducks between 2017 and 2021. He combined for  six points in 46 games at the top level. Often a defensive stalwart, Walinski ended his career with 24 games in Germany’s DEL – the same league that new coworker Olson closed his career in, though their German stints came three years apart from one another. Welinski should help hone the Waterloo blue line which features Ducks draft pick Jimmy Rieber and notable 2027 NHL Draft prospect Caleb Deanovich.

Other notes from around the hockey world:

• Former Montreal Canadiens draft pick Jacob Olofsson has called his playing career to a close at the age of 26 after receiving word that he would not be extended by IF Bjorkloven, per Andreas Larsson of Sweden’s Hockey Sverige. Olofsson never broke free from the Swedish ranks despite a second-round selection in the 2018 NHL Draft. He totaled 26 points in 99 SHL games and 132 points in 271 HockeyAllsvenskan games – Sweden’s second-tier pro league – during a pro career that spanned nine seasons. Bjorkloven earned promotion to the SHL for the 2026-27 season after winning the Allsvenskan title with a 34-8 record last year. Olofsson contributed 25 points in 49 games to their league-leading campaign.
• Philadelphia Flyers winger Nikita Grebenkin has changed his agency representation per NHL.com’s Kevin Kurz. The gritty forward will now be represented by Newport Sports Management, moving on from his work with Dan Milstein of Gold Star Hockey. Grebenkin scored 14 points in 55 games in his rookie NHL season last year. He is one of five Russian NHL talents represented by Newport, alongside Vasily Podkolzin, Ilya Lyubushkin, Alexey Toropchenko, and Andrei Kuzmenko.