Montreal Canadiens: Laval Rocket Giving Us Exciting Lineup To Watch This Weekend

The Montreal Canadiens face the Vegas Golden Knights tonight in a rematch of the Stanley Cup semifinals.

These two teams battled for a trip to the Cup Final against the Tampa Bay Lightning with the Habs earning that right on an Artturi Lehkonen overtime goal in Game 6 at the Bell Centre.

However, no one would blame a Canadiens fan if they had their eyes elsewhere when the Habs and Golden Knights are facing off. That’s because the Laval Rocket are sending out one of its most exiting lineups in recent memory.

With Cole Caufield recently sent down, the Rocket have a goal scoring phenom added to its top line. They also shipped Mattias Norlinder down to the Rocket for a conditioning stint. It was expected the Swedish defenceman would either play with the Canadiens (unlikely) or head back to Sweden to play in the SHL this season (very likely).

The possibility of Norlinder playing at all with the Rocket seemed impossible as he had an out clause to go back to the SHL if he didn’t make the Canadiens. However, he was injured in training camp and is now on a “conditioning assignment” and hasn’t been officially sent down. So, the clause in his contract is meaningless for the next week and he will play for Laval.

With Alex Belzile called up to the Canadiens, Caufield will likely take his spot on the top line with Ryan Poehling and Rafael Harvey-Pinard. Poehling has five points in four games this season, though it is really just three games as he left one very early with an injury.

Harvey-Pinard has just three points in eight games but he has earned himself many favourable comparisons to Brendan Gallagher.

Watching that trio will be a lot of fun. The Rocket also have Laurent Dauphin who has scored six goals in eight games this season, one off the league high. He is playing on a second line with Jean-Sebastien Dea who has put up seven points in eight contests and Jesse Ylonen, a recent second round pick who is playing his first full season in Laval. Ylonen has five points in six games played this season.

That is a young, and exciting top six to watch. A lot of times AHL teams will have a handful of 30 year old veterans leading the charge offensively, but the Rocket are going to use 22 year old Poehling, 20 year old Caufield, 22 year old Harvey-Pinard, and 22 year old Ylonen as keys to their offence.

Adding Norlinder, a speedy, offensive minded, 21 year old defenceman to the back end gives the Rocket yet another near NHL ready prospect to lean on this weekend.

The Rocket face the Syracuse Crunch tonight at 7:00 PM EST and will take on the Utica Comets tomorrow at 5:00 PM EST.

Caufield played just two games in the AHL last season before making the leap to the NHL. He scored three goals and four points in those two games. I’m not promising the same production this weekend, but watching the young players take over the Rocket’s prominent lineup spots this season is a good sign for the Canadiens future.

And the Canadiens need all the good signs they can get after their own 3-9-0 start to the season.