The Montreal Canadiens greatest rival in signing Matt Duchene
By Omar L
Montreal vs. Nashville
From various ’31 Thought’ hits via Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, we know there is mutual interest in Duchene joining the Montreal Canadiens. At the same time, Duchene would entertain the idea of playing for the Predators, and not just because of his interest in country music.
Nashville is slowly becoming the San Jose Sharks of the Central Division. They’ve had a top team in the NHL for a number of years but haven’t been able to obtain the ultimate prize.
The Preds made it to the Stanley Cup Final in 2016 and unfortunately lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins seeing them claim their first championship in seven years. The season after saw them lose to their divisional rival Winnipeg Jets in the second round of the playoffs while they fell to the Dallas Stars who channelled their star power while getting stellar goaltending from Ben Bishop.
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Despite having offensive weapons in Filip Forsberg and Victor Arvidsson, Nashville continues to struggle to score. Ryan Johansen, their number one centre, put up 14 goals and 50 assists for 64 points. Kyle Turris only had 23 points while Nick Bonino had 35. The only other player on Nashville to have at least 20 goals was Craig Smith playing on Turris’ right with 21.
That’s not enough. Predators may have one of the better blue lines in the NHL with Roman Josi, Mattias Ekholm, and Ryan Ellis, but they need to find more means of putting the puck in the net.
Here is where Matt Duchene comes in for Nashville.