Montreal Canadiens: Even if Jonathan Drouin is Injured, Don’t Expect Cole Caufield’s Debut Tonight
Montreal Canadiens left winger Jonathan Drouin was a late scratch from last night’s contest with the Calgary Flames.
This left the Canadiens with just 11 forwards ready and available for the game, and the team had to dress Erik Gustafsson as their 7th defender for the game.
There were a few questioning whether it would have made more sense for Cole Caufield to be on the ice instead of Gustafsson, but he simply wasn’t eligible.
In order for Caufield to have played last night, he would need to have been recalled by 5:00 PM EST and added to the roster for the day. Caufield is currently on the team’s taxi squad, which means he can travel with the team and join for them practice, but he is technically not on their active roster.
The questioning then turned to, what about tonight’s game? Will we see the Habs go with 12 forwards and six defenders, allowing Caufield to make his debut?
Well, that’s unlikely. First of all, the Canadiens are only allowed to make one more call up from the minor leagues before the playoffs. They are hesitant to use it on Caufield with ten more games to play, but they might not need to tonight.
If Drouin is deemed injured, the Habs could recall Caufield on an emergency basis. This way, he wouldn’t count as one of their four regular call ups between the trade deadline and beginning of the postseason.
However, Caufield’s contract includes a few performance bonuses that push his actual cap hit up to just over $1.3 million. The Habs don’t quite have enough room to add that money right now. The only way they could Caufield fit under the cap would be to send Cayden Primeau back to the taxi squad and recall Charlie Lindgren.
If Drouin is injured then that would take them below 12 forwards and they could recall another forward under emergency, allowing them to still save that last regular recall.
— CapFriendly (@CapFriendly) April 24, 2021
However, to make the cap space work for it to be Caufield they would need to switch Primeau for Lindgren.
The team has already promised Primeau a start tonight, so I can’t see them taking that away so that Caufield can play his first NHL game. Jake Allen has not been a problem for the Canadiens but he has been asked to play a lot lately and could use a break.
What is more likely than Caufield being emergency recalled to replace Drouin would be Jake Evans or Michael Frolik being pulled back up from the taxi squad on an emergency basis for tonight’s game.
Their cap hits are just $750,000 so either one of them could play tonight while Primeau starts in goal as he was promised.
Next. Calling up Caufield not as easy as it seems. dark
We are all excited to see Caufield’s debut at some point, but I just can’t see the Canadiens making it happen tonight.