Canadiens’ roster picture becoming clearer as final decisions loom
Even in a loss in their final pre-season game on Saturday night, the Canadiens learned what they needed to learn to make their final roster decisions. Eric Engels has more.
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The Montreal Canadiens were able to squeeze some answers out of their final pre-season game in Ottawa on Saturday night.
They weren’t likely to get much else in not dressing most of their core players against a Senators side missing top-enders Brady Tkachuk, Tim Stutzle, Claude Giroux and David Perron.
Surely, Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis would’ve liked to have seen his full lineup take one dress rehearsal before the big show gets underway at the Bell Centre Wednesday. He’d have certainly appreciated getting an idea of how cohesive his team might appear before putting it out against the Toronto Maple Leafs and Boston Bruins in back-to-back games to open the regular season.
But as St. Louis said prior to bringing a mixed bag of NHL and AHL talent from Mont-Tremblant Que., to Ottawa, “The way things have gone so far in the league in pre-season, I think there are many teams who would also take less risk, and that’s what we’re doing.”
With a rash of serious injuries suffered by established NHLers in both conferences over the past two weeks, who can blame them for leaving their stars at home?
Health was the priority for both teams in this last game — especially after losing Patrik Laine and David Reinbacher to the long-term injury list within the span of five minutes of a prior meaningless game — and both the Senators and Canadiens preserved that on this night.
The visiting team would’ve taken much more than that at Canadian Tire Centre, but at least it got that and a bit of clarity ahead of having to finalize its decisions for the regular season.
Even in a 4-2 loss that brought them to 2-4-0 in the pre-season, the Canadiens learned what they needed to learn.
The outcome — of both this game and the exhibition schedule — means nothing. The Canadiens discovering that Kaiden Guhle will be ready to play at full capacity when the puck drops in an upcoming game of significance means a lot.
The defenceman was appearing in his first contest on Saturday after undergoing an appendectomy at the start of camp and he didn’t appear even a beat out of rhythm. Guhle was fast, physical, and in the type of form he needs to be in to resume his role as the team’s primary shutdown defenceman.
More was revealed to the Canadiens, with Adam Engstrom proving he can be an option for the team at some point this season.
The Swedish defenceman, who was drafted 92nd overall by the Canadiens in 2022, may not be starting in the NHL this October, but he took yet another step towards having a bright future in this league over his 19:59 against the Senators.
The management team thought Engstrom would be a player when he arrived ahead of camp, and now that it’s over they know he’ll be one. Especially after watching him play brilliantly with the puck — not only on the play to set up Christian Dvorak’s goal but in general — and block three shots without it.
Never mind that Engstrom was minus-three in this game. Two of the Senators goals came on turnovers that had nothing to do with him, he had his man covered on another Michael Amadio potted with a high-slot tip, and he only lent credence to the notion he’ll fare well in this league someday soon.
The Canadiens know they have an NHLer in 2021 first-rounder Logan Mailloux but probably learned over the course of this camp something that was only reinforced in this final exhibition game — that he also needs seasoning in the American Hockey League before taking a full-time spot in their lineup.
One player who looks ready to be in the NHL right now is Emil Heineman.
The 22-year-old was arguably Montreal’s best player in this game, and that was after already leaving a strong impression over the first 15 days of camp.
“I think he’s right in there,” St. Louis said on Saturday morning, after he was asked about Heineman’s standing in the race to a roster spot. “I think he’s taken a step. The way he moves on the ice, everything just looks better than before. I think it’s the maturity, the one year under his belt in North America. You saw his tools last year, but I feel like everything is more connected with how he’s using his tools. So, to me, that’s just maturity.”
It’s what Heineman needed to show to force the brass into a difficult decision — to potentially keep him over a more experienced player like Alex Barré-Boulet, who (unlike Heineman) needs to pass through waivers to be sent down.
What the Canadiens saw on Saturday from a player of theirs who can only stay or be sent to Sweden also provided some clarity. Because even if Oliver Kapanen didn’t factor into the goals his team scored, he used his smarts, his strong positioning and his quick hands and feet to continue leaving the same strong impression he has since first arriving in Montreal two weeks ago.
“He’s shown that he can do a lot of different things on the ice, and I feel like he’s got a pretty good foundation of being a 200-foot player,” St. Louis told reporters who attended Saturday’s game. “I think he’s shown that pretty consistently through camp.”
Inconsistency of certain other players might muddy the process a bit for St. Louis, executive vice-president of hockey operations Jeff Gorton and general manager Kent Hughes over the next 24 hours.
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Arber Xhekaj was having an up and (mostly) down camp before scoring a goal, decisively winning a fight over Zack McEwen and playing a really strong game on Saturday. Jayden Struble started a bit slowly in the first week but played an excellent game Wednesday against the Senators. And Justin Barron probably had his least impressive performance in Ottawa after stringing together several solid ones.
St. Louis, Gorton and Hughes are going to have a tough time deciding which two of the three dress against the Leafs in Game 1 of the season.
They’ll also have to figure out whether they should be concerned about what they’ve seen from Joshua Roy — the sophomore who had an impressive rookie season and followed it up with an ordinary camp that ended poorly against the Senators.
We wouldn’t have put Roy in a race with Kapanen, Heineman and Barré-Boulet, but he may have played himself into one with his performance.
We won’t have to wait long to find out.
“Camp is over,” said St. Louis. “We’re going to make our decisions and get going Monday.”
The Canadiens will then have 48 hours to sort out some other things. Like special teams.
Their power play went 0-for-30 and minus-1 in pre-season, and the penalty kill struggled mightily as well.
Granted, we never really saw all the components of the Canadiens’ units play in a game, so there’s only so much stock we can put into all of that. But they clearly have some riddles to solve in both departments before the puck drops on Wednesday.
That day can’t come soon enough.
“It was a pretty turbulent pre-season, and not just here but across the league,” said St. Louis. “I’m happy it’s over and we’re starting for real.”
