Meet Mikhail Sergachev, Utah Hockey Club’s biggest ‘Harry Potter’ fan

When you get the chance to acquire a top defenseman who’s also a two-time Stanley Cup champion and an Instagram Reels star, you take it.
OK, the Reels thing may not have been quite as relevant as the other things when Utah Hockey Club general manager Bill Armstrong contemplated acquiring Mikhail Sergachev, but it’s notable nonetheless.
When the move was made on the second day of this summer’s NHL draft, the wraparound LED screen at Sphere Las Vegas sent a 3D-looking puck toward the crowd, indicating that a trade had occurred.
Attendance was sparse at that point in the draft, but the die-hard fans who had stuck it out let out a pair of collective “whoas” — once when NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly announced that Sergachev had been traded, and again when he said the receiving team was Utah.
Sergachev, 26, had been gearing up to overtake future Hall of Famer Victor Hedman as the Tampa Bay Lightning’s No. 1 defenseman. He was also two days away from a no-trade clause kicking in on his eight-year, $68 million contract.
He told reporters at a press conference in Utah that he hadn’t anticipated the trade, but when his phone rang while he was taking out his trash that day, he had a feeling he’d been dealt.
“Everybody said great things about Utah,” Sergachev said after mentioning that he’d spoken to Utah forward Clayton Keller and several others about the transition.
Sergachev fits Armstrong’s bill of big, strong, physical players. He stands at 6-foot-3 and weighs 211 pounds and has been known to lay a big hit and even drop the gloves on occasion.
He had the third-most ice time among Lightning defensemen throughout their three consecutive trips to the Stanley Cup Final. He’s known for his two-way play and is effective on all special teams.
Now, as he steps out of Hedman’s shadow, he will have the chance to prove himself as a No. 1 defenseman in the NHL.
It might also be worth noting that Sergachev’s defensive numbers are inflated by having Vezina-winning goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy behind him. With Vasilevskiy in net last season, Sergachev’s +/- was at an even zero. When other goalies were playing, that number dropped to -16.
Utah HC does not have a Vasilevskiy-level goaltender, so Sergachev will have to step up a little more to have high levels of success in Utah.
His expected goal differential was always positive during his days with the Lightning, but it’s nowhere near that of Hedman or other top defensemen.
Sergachev missed more than half of last season with two separate injuries to his left leg, broken up by one game.
First, he missed almost two months after blocking a shot by Colton Parayko in December. When he finally returned from the injury, he played 10 minutes and 22 seconds before a reverse hit from Alexis Lafrenière sent him tumbling backwards awkwardly, breaking his tibia and fibula.
He returned for game four of the Lightning’s first-round playoff series against the Florida Panthers, 80 days after the second injury.
“I didn’t know how much I was going to help the team, and I think I did in the first game,” Sergachev told the press at his end-of-season media availability.
When the injury first happened, Lightning assistant athletic trainer Mike Poirier told Sergachev it would likely take him three to four months to recover, meaning he wouldn’t be back until about the third round of the playoffs. Sergachev told him he’d be back by the first round of the playoffs instead.
“Whenever I’d be depressed, they’d remind me: ‘You told us you were going to make it to the first round, so don’t be a — you know.’”
Sergachev said during that end-of-season press conference that he’d undergo a small procedure to take out some of the hardware holding his bones in place. After two weeks of rehab, he planned to start skating again — sooner than he normally does. He figured he’d had a long enough break during the season.
Sergachev grew up in Nizhnekamsk, Tartarstan, Russia, and was the first Tartarstan native to win the Stanley Cup.
He was drafted ninth overall to the Montreal Canadiens in 2016, but was traded to the Lightning a year later for Jonathan Drouin.
If you need an extra guy in your fantasy football league, don’t ask Sergachev to join — he knows nothing about it. Rugby is too violent, so don’t invite him to that either. If you want a good pingpong match, though, you might not even get to touch the ball.
Sergachev also enjoys playing golf, modeling and jet-skiing — although it might be harder to find time for the latter in Utah.
Oh, and he’s a big “Harry Potter” fan, as he’s made clear on Instagram.