Brendan Gallagher Expected To Move On From Habs

It was a very emotional day for Gallagher at the Canadiens locker room clean-up today. As the longest serving Hab, Gallagher not have had an easy year with him having become a healthy scratch late in the regular season before playing just 3 games in the Canadiens 19-game playoff run, but his presence around the team was still very important. What he brought was knowledge and experience that he was able to pass along to the younger players. It seemed that everyone of his teammates appreciated both what he was able to do for the younger guys as well as just what he brought to the organization for 14 years straight.

There wasn’t a player that played with more heart and soul than number 11, as despite his small stature of 5’9, he would play a gritty game of someone that was 6’2 on a nightly basis. What I will always remember of him is how he would be relentless in front of the net and would always push to score goals until the whistle even if bigger defenders were all over him. While, most players highlights are beautiful plays, the truth is that Gallagher’s will include a lot of garbage goals because he would do the dirty work that most skilled players would never do. He made a very successful career on being a grinder that would never give up on any play. He never showed any fear on the ice and showed everyone who saw him play what it means to be the ultimate workhorse in the NHL.

It was that work ethic and drive is what made him become a top 6 forward in his prime that was able to be a 30-goal scorer without ever being the most skilled forward on the team. However that he lacked in skill, he made up for it in work ethic which allowed him to be one the team’s top players for nearly a decade.

Once he started to slow down in his early 30s, he stayed very serviceable for a few years afterwards. It was only during the 2025-26 campaign that the years of battling game in and game out started to catch up to him as his body couldn’t keep up with the speed of the NHL anymore. As a result, he ended up in the spot that he was in come the end of the season and playoff time.

Even though his time with the Canadiens may be up, the footprint that Gallagher left in the organization after being the player that could bring his teammates into the fight on a nightly basis for 14 years will continue to have its presence within the team’s locker room. The reason being is that veteran players who play for a team as long as Gallagher did for the Canadiens will have their habits on how to prepare for a game rub off on the younger players who get to watch him every day.

He will surely be missed in the dressing room but his ways can live on through the younger generation of Habs players that got to learn from him everyday. With that being said, whether he plays for the Vancouver Canucks (as potentially rumoured), or elsewhere for the 2026-27 season he will always be remembered for what he accomplished in the NHL as a hab. Gallagher truly embodied whst it was meant to be a Montreal Canadien.

What are some of your favourite memories of Brendan Gallagher with the Canadiens over the past 14 years?