NHL Rumors: Canadiens GM Kent Hughes Will Shop For A Center This Offseason

The Montreal Canadiens were a team that many had their eyes on during the NHL Trade Deadline back on March 7th. The expectations were that GM Kent Hughes could sell pieces like Jake Evans, David Savard, Joel Armia, and Christian Dvorak off.

However, with the Canadiens playing themselves into a playoff position, GM Kent Hughes’ strategy was to stand pat and not make any moves—not even trade his pending UFAs—because of how valuable they were going to be down the stretch as the push to the playoffs was on.

The Canadiens caught the attention of many when they removed Jake Evans from the trade board and signed him to a new four-year extension. The asking price for Evans was a second-round pick, but Evans took a discount to stay with Montreal. He understands his role with the team and felt staying with Montreal was the best option for him, even though he could have gotten more on the open market. 

Thus, the Canadiens keeping Evans changed the entire trade market for centers as the prices went up for Brock Nelson, Casey Mittelstadt, and Scott Laughton. Teams like New Jersey, who were in on Evans, had to pivot to other players.

This move by Montreal changed not only other teams deadline plans, but their own.

Kent Hughes Did Not Get Asking Prices He Wanted

But Montreal took a major depth center off the board. So, once the deal for Evans was done, the Canadiens would have to move their other players a lot. Those deals were not there according to Dave Pagnotta of the Fourth Period who was on TSN Radio in Montreal. 

I don’t think so. Didn’t seem like the offers that were coming in and trickling in for (David) Savard and (Joel) Armia were obviously substantial, or else they would have done it. I don’t think (Christian) Dvorak generated much interest at all. The Canadiens could have retained one more guy from a salary perspective. But again, what’s the incentive? They waited it out in terms of selling off guys. They waited out as either pay us the premium or we’re going to keep these guys going because we want to play meaningful hockey down the stretch.

Again, whether publicly stated or not, as Full Press Hockey has stated, the Canadiens wanted to play meaningful hockey this season. That has been the goal since the offseason. Neither executive vice president Jeff Gorton nor GM Kent Hughes ever said making the playoffs was a must this season. They always said we will stick to the plan. But this team is doing what it said it would do: play meaningful hockey in the spring.

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Having experienced guys like Armia, Savard, and Evans on the team will help the young guys. Whether they make the playoffs or not is immaterial. The fact that the Montreal Canadiens are in this spot is outstanding, considering nobody thought they would be here to begin with.

Canadiens To Make Moves In The Summer, Center is the Target

But Kent Hughes has always been a general manager who gets things done in the offseason or at the draft.  Expectations are that he will try to do something big again this summer to get the Canadiens ready for their next step.

Kent Hughes will continue to look and build off of some of the discussions he had leading up to Friday’s deadline and carry that back into the summer and around the draft. I fully expect the Habs to do some more type of deals around draft time in LA, not like last year, because last year (Patrik) Laine was much later on in the summer. But the previous two drafts, they got (Alex) Newhook. They got (Kirby) Dach, I would be 0% surprised if they try to pull off something again, maybe a little bit bigger, a little more impactful around draft time and in LA in June

So, what is the end goal for the Canadiens in the summer? The feeling is that the Montreal Canadiens will look for a center, seeing as Kirby Dach can’t stay healthy. Recall that a couple of seasons ago, at the draft in Montreal, the Canadiens traded for Dach to be that second-line center. He has not been that.

In fact, there has been talk about them potentially trading him. Again, whether that happens is another story. But Dach was not the player Montreal expected when they traded for him from the Chicago Blackhawks. When he is healthy, he is good, but he hasn’t been healthy. 

So the center position is an area that will be addressed according to Marco D’Amico of RG Media. 

“I’d be shocked if the Canadiens didn’t trade for an age-appropriate center this summer, especially with a young phenom like Ivan Demidov landing in Montreal next season,” said a pro scout to RG Media. “From what I’m hearing, the Canadiens feel like that’s the missing piece to get them to the playoffs. Much easier to acquire a top-6 center with term in the offseason than in February or March, especially when you’re mostly offering futures.”

The next question is who they go after. The team tried for Dylan Cozens, but nothing was really close before Cozens got traded to Ottawa. But that is the type of player they will try to get.

Now that the Montreal Canadiens young core has tasted meaningful hockey, the next step is to compete for a playoff spot, if not to make the playoffs.