Canadiens’ Patrik Laine to miss 3-4 months

The Montreal Canadiens will be without a key goal-scoring threat for a significant portion of the regular season.

On Saturday afternoon, the Canadiens announced that winger Patrik Laine will miss an estimate of three to four months recovering from surgery to address a core muscle injury. The surgery was performed at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City by Dr. Mark Zoland.

Laine, a 27-year-old forward who was the No. 2 overall pick in the 2016 NHL Draft by the Winnipeg Jets, is in his second season as a member of the Habs.

Last year, Laine appeared in 52 regular season games, finding the back of the net 20 times and dishing out 13 assists for a total of 33 points. Of his 20 goals, a whopping 15 came on the power play, which put him fourth in the NHL in that regard behind only Jake Guentzel, Leon Draisaitl and Brayden Point, all of whom played at least 71 games.

Through his first five games this year, Laine was not able to muster much in the way of offensive production with just one assist to his name to go with a minus-3 rating through five appearances.

Laine made his way to Montreal in the 2024 off-season in a trade with the Columbus Blue Jackets that sent Jordan Harris the other way. Laine is in the final year of a four-year contract he signed with the Jackets that pays him an average of $8.7 million on an annual basis.

While Montreal will miss Laine’s production on the power play, the Habs have plenty of depth for their 5-on-5 units. The third line is currently comprised of Josh Anderson, Jake Evans and Brendan Gallagher while the fourth-line wing spots are manned by Kirby Dach and Zach Bolduc.

The Canadiens visit Vancouver on Saturday night before finishing off their Western road trip in Seattle on Tuesday.