You don’t undergo a rebuild without being all in on youth, and this upcoming season, the Montreal Canadiens will be the youngest team in the league, according to eliteprospects.com, with an average age of 25.35 years, just ahead of the Chicago Blackhawks and the Buffalo Sabres, who both average 25.73 years.
The Canadiens aren’t the least experienced team; however, they have 6,625 games of experience, while the Sabres have 6,040, and the Blackhawks complete the top three with 6,945 games on the counter.
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Despite their youth, the Canadiens are expected to take another step forward this season, to continue their organic growth, as Jeff Gorton and Kent Hughes would put it. We’ve seen the Habs increasingly focusing on results last season, shifting their emphasis away from development.
It’s a tricky balance to find because, while their young core is gaining more and more experience and starting to crave results, younger or new players are being added, and they will need time to either develop or become familiar with the Canadiens’ system.
While the Canadiens lost three veterans this off-season with David Savard retiring and both Christian Dvorak and Joel Armia leaving as free agents, it won’t result in the line-up being flooded by rookies. Hughes ensured it wouldn’t be the case when he acquired Noah Dobson and Zachary Bolduc.
The blueliner is still only 25 years old, but he already has a wealth of experience with 388 games on the counter. As for Bolduc, he played his rookie season last year and will be expected to take a step up this season. At 22 years old, he’s already just short of 100 games of experience with 97.
Their addition will leave two lineup spots available for rookies, unless Samuel Blais beats the odds and manages to crack the roster. The 29-year-old spent the entirety of the last season in the AHL and is generally pencilled in as the 13th forward, taking over for Michael Pezzetta, who signed a contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs on July 1st.
One of the rookie spots will undoubtedly be filled by Ivan Demidov. Although he’s only 19 years old with only two regular-season games of experience, he played professionally in the KHL last season. It’s not like he was just drafted, and he’s the kind of player who is made to play under Martin St-Louis. The bench boss does ask his players to make a lot of reads on the ice rather than sticking to a particular system at all times, and Demidov’s high hockey IQ and vision mean he should be able to thrive in that environment and hit the ground running, so to speak.
As for the second rookie spot, chances are it will be filled by Oliver Kapanen, who is still considered a rookie in NHL terms, having only played 18 games in the big league so far (once you hit 25, you’re no longer a rookie at the beginning of the next season). Still, he also gained further professional experience in Sweden last season, playing 36 games with Timra IK in the top Swedish league. Under coach Olli Jokinen, the youngster saw plenty of ice time and was utilized in all facets of the game, playing on the man advantage and the penalty kill.
Last season, when he showed up for rookie camp, he looked head and shoulders above everyone else, but the fact that he had already taken part in Timra’s training camp and preseason games had given him a head start. Once the main camp started, and he had to face NHLers, it got harder for him. He still made the team out of camp but was loaned to Timra in early November. He returned for the last six games of the season and was also dressed for three playoff games, scoring only one point in those nine games.
There are a couple of other candidates for the second rookie role, however. The names of Owen Beck and Florian Xhekaj come to mind. Both are 21, but Beck has the inside lane experience-wise, having played 12 NHL games last season, but he was limited to a single assist. Furthermore, he’s also a center and can give a hand at the faceoff dot if needed, something the younger Xhekaj cannot do.
Xhekaj has the edge when it comes to physicality; however, he still has a scoring touch, as evidenced by his 24 goals in 69 games with the Laval Rocket last season. Considering how the Canadiens were man-handled by the Washington Capitals in the playoffs last year, they certainly could use his grit, but chances are, he’s not quite ready for the NHL yet.
The Canadiens may be the youngest team in the NHL, but they are still ahead in the rebuild compared to other teams undergoing the same process…
Photo credit: David Kirouac-Imagn Images
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