Florida Panthers‘ 2nd year left wing Tim Bozon(26) has elected to not see about a contract extension as a restricted free agent and opts to join EHC Kloten of NLA for 2017/2018.
The dual US/France citzen played some of his first junior hockey in Switzerland with the team so is familiar.
His dad, former NHL-er Philippe Bozon played in many overseas leagues including the one he’s heading to during his 20-year pro career.
The 6′ 201 lbs. forward appeared in a career high 43 AHL games last campaign scoring new bests 7 goals, 8 assists and 15 points for affiliate Springfield Thunderbirds.
He was also reassigned further down to Manchester Monarchs, where he skated 14 ECHL games.
Originally a Montreal Canadiens 3rd round pick in the 2012 draft (#64 overall) he split his time in similar fashion as he did in his sophomore year with farm club St. John’s IceCaps and their lower affiliate Brampton Beast before being traded before the start of 2016/2017.
Always a prolific scorer in the WHL, he was a point-per-game performer through all of his 4 years but almost didn’t even play his final run as he was attacked by a form of bacteria that put him in a coma for a couple weeks before rebounding to skate virtually the full 2014/2015 calendar for Kootenay Ice.
The still very young 23-old may be leaving North America hockey for awhile but you can always bet if he’s able to connect with an overseas team and catch the attention of a big league club he’ll return to continue pursuing that NHL dream.