Montreal Canadiens: Kaiden Guhle Impresses in Preseason Debut

Montreal Canadiens first round picks over the past number of years have not really lived up to the hype.

Some of them were taken later on in the first round so they shouldn’t have had the highest of expectations to begin with, but there was still a long run of first round players that were not able to make a big impact, or any real impact at the NHL level.

After taking Ryan McDonagh and Max Pacioretty in the first round of the 2007 NHL Draft, there was a bit of a dry spell.

Louis Leblanc, Jarred Tinordi, Nathan Beaulieu, Alex Galchenyuk, Michael McCarron, Nikita Scherbak and Noah Juulsen were selected in the first round between 2009 and 2015. Galchenyuk and Beaulieu became NHL regulars but didn’t turn into star players and Tinordi just reached 100 career games played shortly before turning 30.

This trend got a lot of attention this summer when Jesperi Kotkaniemi, taken third overall in the 2018 NHL Draft, walked for first and third round picks after an offer sheet. It’s not a good look when another team offers a contract to a player you took third overall just three years ago and your response is, “yeah you can have him.”

However, though the first round has been mostly a dead zone for the Habs for over a decade, there are some real positive signs coming out of the past couple of drafts.

Well, except the most recent draft when they took Logan Mailloux who asked not to be drafted at all and now he has nowhere to play.

But, like, before that for a couple of years looks good.

Cole Caufield looks like he’s about to explode onto the NHL scene this season. He won the Hobey Baker Award as the best player in college hockey and then stepped into a prominent role in the postseason and helped the Canadiens reach the Stanley Cup Finals.

He was selected in the first round of the 2019 NHL Draft, 15th overall and he looks like a steal in the middle of the first round.

Kaiden Guhle was taken with the 16th pick in the 2020 NHL Draft and he looked great in his first preseason game.

The 6’3″ and 210 pound left defenceman played just a handful of games between the Laval Rocket and Prince Albert Raiders of the WHL last season due to shortened seasons and an injury. It would have been easy to excuse his first preseason performance, but Guhle was great.

He led the team in ice time against the Toronto Maple Leafs with 23:44. While Caufield might be one of the flashiest players the Canadiens have drafted in recent memory, Guhle is the opposite. He is a big, physical defender who doesn’t go for the big open ice hits but just battles and wins pucks while playing a steady defensive position.

That’s exactly what he did all night for the Canadiens against the Leafs on Monday. He was on the ice more than anyone else but he was barely noticed because he isn’t an offensive minded player and he doesn’t get beat defensively.

Guhle projects as a top four defender who doesn’t add a lot of scoring, but can play big minutes, shut things down defensively and bring some physicality as well.

He did all of those things on Monday and though it was just an early preseason game, if he continues to play like that for the next two weeks, he might be playing regular season games in October.