Lightning forward Nick Paul will be staying in Tampa Bay for the long haul, as the team signed Paul to a seven-year contract extension Friday worth an average of $3.15 million per year.
Paul played in 21 regular-season games and made 23 appearances in the Stanley Cup playoffs for the Bolts after he was acquired from Ottawa in March. He ranked third in the NHL for penalties drawn during the Lightning's run to the Stanley Cup Final, where they fell to the Colorado Avalanche.
He scored his first two career playoff goals in Game 7 of Tampa Bay's first-round matchup against the Toronto Maple Leafs. The second of those goals was the series winner.
"They want to win. They will do whatever it takes," Paul said earlier this week of the Lightning. "Whatever the team needs. The organization is unbelievable. Not just how they treat their players, but how they treat the families. Everything about this organization is first-class."
General manager Julien BriseBois highlighted Paul's strong playoff performance when talking about his future with the team.
"I think him getting to play in the NHL playoffs, which he hadn't done before, allowed him to showcase how much of a gamer he is, and, if anything, that's probably the quality that stands out to me," BriseBois said. "He's a gamer, he fought through a lot of injuries for a long time and was still playing at a really high level all the way up to that Game 6 of the Stanley Cup finals. It was really impressive."
Paul, 27, was drafted by Dallas in 2013 and spent his first six-plus seasons playing for the Senators.
(Photo: Dan Hamilton / USA Today)