Montreal Canadiens Comfortable Cap Situation Will Turn To Cap Hell Soon

The Montreal Canadiens have spent well under the salary cap for a few seasons. That could happen again next year, but they will be in cap hell following the 2020-21 season.

The Montreal Canadiens have been in a very comfortable cap situation for the past three seasons. Comfortable for those that make the financial decisions within the organization at least. Maybe not so comfortable for fans of the team that have watched them miss the playoffs the past two seasons and are now seeing the same movie for the third straight winter.

The Canadiens decided not to use their cap space in the summer of 2017 after Andrei Markov and Alex Radulov left the team. They went elsewhere as free agents and the Habs had over $7 million in unused cap space in 2017-18. The following year they had more than $8 million that they elected not to spend.

This season the Habs have a little less cap space to use than the previous two years, but they are still far from the top of the heap when it comes to money spent on players in the NHL. Next season could be more of the same, we don’t know for sure, but the 2021-22 season is going to be a tight fit for the Habs salary cap.

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The Canadiens could go into next season with another comfortable cap situation. The only players they need to re-sign this summer are Max Domi and Victor Mete. With a few overpriced players like Dale Weise, Matthew Peca and Keith Kinkaid coming off the books, as well as Marco Scandella, Nate Thompson and Ilya Kovalchuk being unrestricted free agents, the Habs will have plenty of space to fit in Mete and Domi on new deals.

Heading into next season, the Canadiens will have several key players playing on the final year of their current contracts.

Their entire top line of Phillip Danault, Tomas Tatar and Brendan Gallagher will be unrestricted free agents if they are not re-signed by July 1, 2021. They combine for a cap hit of $11.6 million this season and next, but could nearly double that if they are all brought back for the 2021-22 campaign.

Also needing a new deal at the same time is Joel Armia who showed the ability to score 25 goals this season before being injured. He is certainly going to be looking for a raise on his current cap hit of $2.6 million. Artturi Lehkonen is on pace for a career high in points and is an invaluable defensive winger. He will be a restricted free agent in 2021 so he can’t walk away but he will be looking for a bigger payday than his $2.4 million this season.

Jeff Petry will be a free agent at the same time if he wishes. If the Habs want to keep him, it is unlikely he would agree to a contract that pays him less than the $5.5 million he makes now.

Youngsters Ryan Poehling, Cale Fleury and Jesperi Kotkaniemi will be coming off their entry-level deals at the same time and will be looking for raises. How much they will want will depend mostly on how well they play next season, but they all look to have bright futures in the organization and will need a raise for sure.

The only forwards that are already signed for the 2021-22 season are Jonathan Drouin, Paul Byron and Nick Suzuki. Piecing together the rest of the lineup is going to require greatly increasing the payroll just to keep the same players around.

With another round of expansion coming in June 2021 and the league’s tv deal in the United States needing to be renewed at the same time, we could see a large increase in the salary cap.

The Canadiens are one team that is going to need an increase. Though they have had plenty of cap space they chose not to use for three straight seasons, they will find themselves scrounging for every dollar soon.

Will they be able to sign all of their pending unrestricted free agents? It is not likely that they can afford to keep all of Danault, Tatar, Gallagher, Armia and Petry while giving raises to Mete, Fleury, Kotkaniemi, Poehling, Lehkonen and Domi in the mean time.

It will be interesting to see who stays and who goes in the next year, but the Habs could be forced to move a veteran player or two in the near future because they can see the cap trouble coming down the road.