Two Habs Players Make NHL All-Rookie Team

There have been multiple times that Habs rookies made the all-rookie team, which includes the 2025 Calder Trophy winner Lane Hutson, last season. However, the last time the Habs had 2 first-year players make the all-rookie team was back in 1985-86, when Patrick Roy and Kjell Dahlin were named to the squad. Before that, the Canadiens had 2 players make the All-Rookie Team in both 1982-83 (Mats Naslund & Dan Daoust) and 1984-85 (Chris Chelios & Steve Penney). With that being said, the Habs have not had this good young talent noticed around the league since the mid-1980s.

For Ivan Demidov, being on the All-Rookie team for the 2025-26 season was always expected from the moment he hit the ice to start his first full NHL season. The skilled winger didn’t disappoint as he finished the year with 19 goals and 43 assists for 62 points to lead all rookies in points. However, when it came to the Calder Trophy, he was beaten out by New York Islanders defenseman Matthew Schaefer, who took the league by storm and nearly took his team to the postseason at just 18 years old.

Nonetheless, Demidov had an amazing rookie season in which he helped many teammates around him play better. This was especially the case when it came to fellow rookie Oliver Kapanen, who scored 22 goals and 37 points while pretty much relying on Demidov to get his goals. Kapanen finished 7th among rookies in points and was 3rd in goals. If not for Demidov, his numbers would have been much lower, as all he had to do was get open in front of the net and be fed with incredible passes to score his goals.

Alex Newhook was another player who had a lot of success with Demidov from the moment that the Russian phenom hit the NHL ice. It started immediately in the first period of Demidov’s first game when he set up Newhook for a goal in front of the net in his 2nd ever NHL shift at the end of the 2024-25 season. Then, it continued into the 2025-26 season when the duo played really well together when Newhook was healthy, which led to many connections on goals.

The final linemate that had success with Demidov was Juraj Slafkovsky. At one point during the season, they formed the Habs’ most dangerous even-strength duo on a 2nd line with Kapanen. They seemed to make incredible passes to each other that nobody else could make. Unfortunately for Demidov, Slafkovsky would play the majority of the season on the top line instead with Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield, as they needed their missing piece. Even though they didn’t play most of the year together, the Slafkovsky and Demidov duo is a duo that should be revisited again in the future.

Finally, Demidov’s likely best chemistry came with Hutson, who plays a very similar skilled game to him, but rather on defence. There have been times when Demidov and Hutson would make such magical plays together that led to dangerous scoring chances. The chemistry between these two will only grow over the next few years.

While Demidov’s rookie season was amazing to watch, Dobes’ was even more spectacular mainly due to how much he exceeded the expectations that were given to him. Dobes was only expected to be the Habs backup netminder, but he continued to gain the trust of his coaches to the point where he got himself into a tandem with Samuel Montembeault after starting the year 6-0.

Unfortunately, the start of November was very rocky after receiving his first loss of the season, and the struggles continued for the majority of November. Luckily for Dobes, Montembeault was playing even worse, and he still got his fair share of games, which eventually allowed him to bounce back in December. He would, however, have a few weeks where he was pushed aside in hopes of Montembeault re-finding his game and Jacob Fowler getting some NHL action for development reasons.

The positive for Dobes was that he would get a chance to run with the starting job after the Olympics and he would never look back. In 14 games between February 28th and April 9th, Dobes would have an 11-3 record alongside a 2.20 GAA and .926 save percentage as he stole the job from a struggling Montembeault for good. He would finish the season as a whole with a 29-10-4 record with a .901 save percentage and 2.78 GAA. His 29 wins gave him the 4th most among rookie goalies in Habs history. Dobes also had 8 more wins than any other rookie goaltender during the 2025-26 season, making his spot on the all-rookie team well deserved.

In terms of the total votes, Demidov received a unanimous vote by writers who had a say in the All-Rookie team getting all 195 possible points. Meanwhile, Dobes received 151 of the 195 votes to beat out Jesper Wallestadt.