Montreal Canadiens Roster Reconstruction Under Kent Hughes Making Good Progress

It’s hard to believe that it’s been less than 18 months since Kent Hughes was named general manager of the Montreal Canadiens. On that day, January 18, 2022, the vibes in the locker room were certainly very different, but how much has the roster actually changed since then?

The final game the Habs played prior to the arrival of Hughes was a 5-2 loss to the Arizona Coyotes that left them with a 7-25-5 record through 37 games and dead last in the NHL standings. A far cry from the team that just months earlier had competed in the Stanley Cup Final.

With more recent departures of players from the Marc Bergevin era via trades and free agency this offseason, the Canadiens overhaul continues to move full steam ahead. To further illustrate, I have shown the active roster for that last game of the previous regime while also adding in the players that were on the injured list at the time. See who is still with the team and who is no longer there by checking out the lists below:

STILL WITH TEAM                                                     NO LONGER THERE

Jake Allen                                                                    Paul Byron

Josh Anderson                                                           Ben Chiarot

Joel Armia                                                                   Laurent Dauphin

Cole Caufield                                                              Jonathan Drouin

Christian Dvorak                                                        Joel Edmundson

Jake Evans                                                                   Brett Kulak

Brendan Gallagher                                                    Arturri Lehkonen

Mike Hoffman                                                            Sami Niku

Sam Montembeault                                                 Cedric Paquette

Michael Pezzetta                                                      Mathieu Perreault

Rem Pitlick                                                                  Jeff Petry

Cayden Primeau                                                        Ryan Poehling

David Savard                                                               Alexander Romanov

Nick Suzuki                                                                  Tyler Toffoli

Chris Wideman

It should be mentioned that Carey Price and Shea Weber were also on the roster at the time but both were on LTIR and therefore not included in the list.

From the column on the left of the remaining players, outside of Rem Pitlick and Cayden Primeau who are at best on the bubble, I would suggest almost all are projected to make the opening night roster next season.

It should also be noted that Bergevin/Trevor Timmins draft picks Rafael Harvey-Pinard and Jesse Ylonen were late season call-ups in 2021-22 and both figure to be in the mix this season as was Alex Belzile who recently departed as a free agent to the New York Rangers.

So as you can see about half the roster is gone but many holdovers remain which means there is definitely a lot more work to be done. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither will Kent Hughes vision for a cup contender but unlike most construction projects in Montreal this edition of Extreme Makeover: Habs Edition is moving along right on schedule.

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