Montreal Canadiens: Jakub Dobes Semi-Finalist For Top NCAA Goaltender Award

The Montreal Canadiens have not had a great pipeline of goaltending prospects over the past decade or so.

They had Carey Price firmly locked into the starter’s role for many years and really didn’t need to invest in goalies at the NHL Draft. So, they didn’t.

Recently, with Price aging and the succession plan needing to be sorted out in the coming years, the Canadiens have focused a but more on adding goaltenders through the draft.

One of the recent goalies selected by the Canadiens was Jakub Dobes. The 6’4″ and 201 pound netminder was picked in the 5th round of the 2020 NHL Draft after splitting the 2019-20 season between the USHL and NAHL in USA’s Junior leagues.

Dobes played in the USHL last season where he put up a 2.48 goals against average and a .908 save percentage in 47 games.

The native of Czech Republic enrolled at Ohio State University where he was expected to play a backup role this season as a freshman goaltender on what was supposed to be a struggling team.

But Dobes has not taken on a number two role and the Buckeyes squad is not struggling this season at all. And really, they aren’t struggling because Dobes has taken on the starter’s job.

The 20 year old has been excellent in his first college campaign. He has played 32 games for Ohio State while putting up a 2.22 GAA and a .933 SV% on the season. His save percentage is the fourth best in the country and his goals against average is top ten among goalies who have played 20 or more games on the year.

His play this season has earned him some recognition from his league as well. Yesterday, NCAA released the eleven names of the goaltenders that are semi-finalists for the Mike Richter Award as the top goaltender in college hockey this season.

Among the names was Canadiens prospect Jakub Dobes.

From this list of 11, three finalists will be announced sometime in mid-March and the winner will be picked in April during the Frozen Four national championship.

Previous winner of the award include Connor Hellebuyck and Canadiens prospect Cayden Primeau who won it in 2019.