Montreal Canadiens: Laval Rocket Training Camp Opens Today

The Montreal Canadiens training camp began nearly two weeks ago and we have already seen four preseason contests, with a pair of games against the Toronto Maple Leafs and Ottawa Senators.

The camp began with 70 players on the list of invitations, but injuries, cuts and players being sent back to their Junior teams has brought that number down to about half of the original list.

Many of the players that have been sent packing will head to the Laval Rocket training camp that begins today.

There hasn’t been much fanfare or media attention to the Laval Rocket camp, but 29 players will be in attendance today as they prepare for the American Hockey League season. Players actually showed up yesterday for physicals, team meetings and equipment fittings, but they will take to the ice for the first time this morning at 10:30 AM local time at Place Bell but it is closed to the public unfortunately.

The Rocket will play two preseason games next weekend as they face the Belleville Senators on Friday night and the Toronto Marlies on Saturday. Those will be the only two tune up games for the Rocket before they begin their regular season on October 16th against the Senators.

The list of 19 players should quickly grow by four as Brandon Baddock, Laurent Dauphin, Jean-Sebastien Dea and Michael McNiven will surely join them once they officially pass through waivers later this afternoon. All four of them were at Canadiens camp but reassigned yesterday, though they need to put on the waiver wire before joining the minor league team.

Eventually, we will also see Joel Teasdale and Josh Brook join this group but both are still out with knee injuries. Technically, they are still on the Canadiens injured list and can’t be sent down until they are medically cleared but both will be sent down when they become healthy.