Montreal Canadiens: Ranking The Canadian Division’s Goaltenders

Montreal Canadiens have great goaltending heading into short season.

Montreal Canadiens general manager Marc Bergevin was busy throughout the offseason. One of the more surprising moves he made was to acquire Jake Allen.

Allen is a goaltender who is heading into the final year of his contract with a fairly heavy cap hit of $4.35 million. Not ready to be done surprising everyone, Bergevin then extended Allen’s contract by two years with a future cap hit of $2.875 million.

This means the Habs will be paying $14.85 million to its two goaltenders next season and $13.375 million for the following two years.

That’s the most in the league, but it’s okay as long as two of the team’s top centres are on entry-level contracts, which Nick Suzuki and Jesperi Kotkaniemi currently are. It also works out fine if the starting goaltender is Carey Price. A rested Price showed he could still be the best goaltender in the world during the postseason in the Toronto bubble.

Price was exceptional in the 2020 postseason, posting a 1.78 goals against average and a .936 save percentage in ten games. He was at his best in the 2014-15 season when he won the Hart Trophy, Vezina Trophy and Ted Lindsay Award. He was constantly overworked since then and is now 33 years old.

Bringing in Allen to relieve some of the workload from Price was a wise move by Bergevin. Guaranteeing a more rested Price will play this season, and. having a veteran like Allen to take on the number two role gives the Habs a great tandem.

But where does that tandem rank in the Canadian Division?