Montreal Canadiens Should Not Give Up On Jonathan Drouin

The Montreal Canadiens had a much better season than anticipated. Ultimately, they fell just short of the playoffs, and many fingers were pointed at Jonathan Drouin for the team missing out.

The Montreal Canadiens started the 2018-19 season with low expectations. After an abysmal 2017-18 campaign, it was expected there was more pain in store. The Habs surprised many by staying in the playoff race until the last minute.

Ultimately, Montreal fell just short of making the postseason. They spent a good portion of the season inside the playoff picture. However, tough losses in the waning weeks to the Carolina Hurricanes and Columbus Blue Jackets led to those two teams earning wild-card berths and the Habs sitting in the dreaded ninth spot in the eastern conference.

Although the team exceeded their low preseason expectations, being on the outside looking into the playoffs was a tough pill to swallow. The Canadiens were buyers at the trade deadline, and at that point of the season, the playoffs seemed to be a near certainty.

The wheels basically fell off for a while for the Habs after the trade deadline. A 4-6-0 run from late February to mid-March was enough of a setback to have them miss the postseason by two points.

One player who bore the brunt of the blame at season’s end was left winger Jonathan Drouin. And rightfully so. With the Canadiens in the midst of a playoff push, Drouin was non-existent. He was held scoreless in 16 of the team’s last 18 games.

After starting February on fire with nine points in three games, Drouin finished the remainder of the season with one goal, six assists and seven points in 26 contests. His lack of production when the team needed him most, has many Habs fans calling for him to be dealt.

Not that it is an all-inclusive poll, but searching Jonathan Drouin on twitter will lead to a lengthy list of people claiming Drouin can’t handle high stakes hockey. Click on the armchair-GM tab on capfriendly, and most Habs teams have Drouin dealt away for help on defence.

Although his performance late in the season was abysmal, it’s too early to give up on Jonathan Drouin. He just finished his second season with his hometown team, and he was not put in a position to succeed in year one.

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Drouin was traded to Montreal for defenceman Mikhail Sergachev. There was more focus around the city of Montreal on how great Sergachev could be one day than there was on Drouin. Also, he was asked to move to center, a position he had not played at the NHL level.

He scored 13 goals and 46 points in 77 games that season. Once again, a lot of the focus has been on the negative for Drouin this season. Yes, he struggled mightily in the last 26 games as previously mentioned. However, his seven points in the last third of the season means he scored 46 points in his first 55 games.

That is just short of a 70 point pace. There is too much focus on the last third of Drouin’s season and not enough on his impressive 55 games to start the year.

A few players selected a year before Drouin in the 2012 NHL Draft just had breakout seasons. Teuvo Teravainen jumped from 64 points a year ago to 76 this season. Tomas Hertl went from a career high of 46 to 74. Morgan Rielly jumped to 72 points, 20 more than he ever had in a season before.

The same type of jump could be coming for Drouin next season. All of those players are a year older, and all of them showed signs and flashes of offensive potential but hadn’t put it all together. It took them until their 24-year-old season to reach their potential.

It would be wise to bring Drouin back next season, and hope for a similar jump in production like Hertl and Teravainen saw this year.

A wise man named Sam Pollock put together some of the best hockey teams ever assembled. He would say about young players that you don’t move on from them until you are 100% sure they won’t come back to bite you.

There is no way current general manager Marc Bergevin can be 100% sure that Jonathan Drouin won’t become a 70-80 point player. He should heed his predecessor’s sage advice and hang onto his talented 24-year-old winger.