Montreal Canadiens: Positional Grades – Defensemen

With the season over, here at A Winning Habit, we’re continuing to wrap up our coverage of the Montreal Canadiens 2022-23 season before setting our sights on what’s ahead. That includes taking a deeper look at the performances of each position. We’ve already looked at the goaltenders, which you can read about here, and today we’ll be discussing the defenseman.

In the goaltenders article, we discussed each individual goalie, but due to the much larger amount of players we have to discuss, we won’t be doing that for both forward and defensemen. So instead, we’ll focus on the position as a whole, highlight some key contributors, and discuss players who could be better next year.

The Canadiens had about as inexperienced of a blueline as you could imagine, with five rookies playing significant time this season, including four on opening night. So to say that little should have been expected from this unit this year would be an understatement. And yet, this unit was… not terrible. It wasn’t elite by any stretch, nor is it where it needs to be, but all things considered, I would say that it lived up to expectations, and that definitely matters when trying to grade this unit.

Before we look at the rookies in a deeper context, let’s first discuss the veteran defensemen on the Canadiens blueline, which was a real mixed bag. This group comprises Joel Edmundson, David Savard, Chris Wideman, and Mike Matheson.

Mike Matheson proved to be a tremendous addition by Kent Hughes, bringing him over in theJeff Petry trade. Matheson was easily the Canadiens’ best defenseman this season, putting up 34 points in 46 games. His smooth skating and puck-moving abilities allowed him to be a true two-way defenseman, effective in all situations. The Canadiens were better with him on the ice. There is no doubt about that.

But the same can’t really be said for the remaining vets, as all three struggled to prove their worth to the Canadiens this season. Wideman, a depth defenseman, did nothing to suggest he should be in the lineup over any of the rookies, and I’d argue Edmundson and Savard didn’t either. But with their reputations, it would’ve been difficult to scratch either of them.

I’d expect each of these guys to be with the team next season, as they’re under contract, but if I were Kent Hughes, I’d see what I could get for any of those three now. I just don’t see an improvement coming from any of them, and I’d rather see all five of the rookies play over them. I don’t expect Kent Hughes to move all of them, but he may try and move Edmundson (1 Year Left at $3.5 Million), especially if he has legitimate interest.

If we were strictly grading the veteran defenseman, Mike Matheson would be the main and really only bright spot. Joel Edmundson finished last amongst Canadiens defensemen this season in 5v5 GF% at 33.64%. No one else was even close to him. On the other hand, Matheson was first amongst all defensemen that played significant time this year, just above 50%. The bottom line is, if these veterans do return next year, they need to be better. Expectations may not have been high, but aside from Matheson, this group still failed to reach them.

As for the rookies, I would say they more than lived up to what people hoped and expected of them. Even for a rebuilding organization, having a defensive corps consisting of five rookies is far from ideal. The NHL is not a developmental league, yet the Canadiens young D-men showed they can cut it at this level all season long. Even if they’re paired together.

This season, the Canadiens’ best defensive pairing was Jordan Harris and Jonathan Kovacevic, two players with less than 20 games of NHL experience combined prior to this season. And yet, together, they played better than any other combination the Habs tried, for which there was a lot. The duo played over 600 minutes at 5v5 together and had a GF% of 57% and an xGF% of 50.85. It was also the Canadiens most consistent pairing, with no other duo even reaching even 400 minutes together at 5v5.

And other rookies played well, too, with Kaiden Guhle showing what he’s capable of and Arber Xhekaj and Justin Barron also performing well under challenging circumstances. Ideally, you don’t have so much inexperience on the backend, but you also need to pay the best players, and it’s hard to argue that the rookies didn’t earn their minutes. So now it’s about taking that next step towards reaching their potential, which would have felt unlikely under the previous regime.

I feel really good about where things are from a development standpoint within the Canadiens organization. So I feel comfortable saying I expect the blueline to be even better next year as the rookies take another step. This season they were good but not outstanding by any stretch. In order for the Canadiens to one day become Cup contenders, they still need to develop quite a bit further. But with Adam Nicholas in charge, I think that will happen.