Montreal Canadiens: Predicting Habs 2025-26 Defense Pairings
Kaiden Guhle – Justin Barron
Kaiden Guhle was drafted in the first round by the Canadiens with the 16th overall pick in the 2020 NHL Draft. He was a large defender coming off an impressive season with the Prince Albert Raiders but his development was stunted a bit the following year.
In 2020-21, Guhle played just five regular season games as he suited up for three games with the Laval Rocket and just two with the Raiders before being injured for the rest of the season. He also played seven games with Canada at the World Juniors that season where he won a silver medal.
Upon getting healthy, Guhle has quickly developed into a stud defenseman. It all started when he was traded to the Edmonton Oilers and dominated the WHL Playoffs as he helped them win a championship. He looked like a young Chris Pronger on the blue line, towering over his opponents, shutting everything down in the defensive zone, and adding eight goals and 16 points in 19 games. He was named WHL Playoff MVP that spring.
His current partner, and likely future partner for a long time, and also partner at the World Juniors, is Justin Barron. He started the season as the team’s seventh defenseman but was moved into the lineup when injuries occurred and it seems impossible he will even sit out again.
Barron’s combination of smarts and speed make him a difficult defender to play against and he has grown in leaps and bounds since arriving from the Colorado Avalanche in the Artturi Lehkonen trade.
Guhle is just 21 and Barron recently turned 22. They are going to become a dominant pairing within a couple of years and should take over as the Canadiens top defense pairing by 2025-26.
Lane Hutson – David Reinbacher
Lane Hutson is one of the most exciting prospects to be drafted by the Canadiens in recent memory. He is perhaps the most agile skater to ever play college hockey as he just darts from one direction to the next like a young deer trying to scamper across a highway.
Except Hutson is in full control and just breaks the ankles of his opponents as they are sure he is heading one way before he uses another set of head fakes and dekes and then just suddenly shoots across the ice in another direction.
He has been pretty much impossible to stop and has already scored eight goals as well as eight assists in 13 games with Boston University this season. He continues to grow, both literally and figuratively, and is inching closer to six feet while scoring at a 1.23 points per game pace.
While Hutson’s offensive game is exceptional, his defensive game is still a work in progress. He isn’t awful in his own end, but he will need a smart, defensively responsible partner which will allo Hutson the freedom to carry the puck and join the rush when he chooses.
Enter David Reinbacher who was drafted in the first round with the fifth overall selection last spring. He is also labelled as a very smart defender who gets things done without error in his own zone and shuts things down defensively. He adds some offensive punch as well but his focus will be defense at the NHL level and he should turn in to the perfect partner for Hutson when they two make the leap to the NHL.
Jordan Harris – Logan Mailloux
Extra: Jayden Struble
There are plenty of options for the Canadiens to fill out their blue line in this setup. An incredibly young top four with unlimited potential is followed up by…. three more young defenders with a lot of upside as well.
The Canadiens have not been shy to gamble on their youth since Martin St. Louis arrived behind the bench and Kent Hughes took over as general manager, and they will need to continue to do that if they want to see this team dig itself out of the muck it has been stuck in for three seasons now.
Jordan Harris is 23 years old but has shown signs of being a versatile, reliable, defensive player. He does not put up a lot of points, but he plays a mistake free brand of hockey that allows him to play minutes and keep the opponent from scoring. He would be best fit in a role where he is either on a shutdown pair or with an offensive minded partner.
Well, Logan Mailloux certainly fits the description of an offensive minded defenseman. He started his first pro season slowly, with just two points in his first eight games, but he now has eight points in his past ten games with the Laval Rocket.
After not playing a lot of hockey for two years due to Covid, injuries and suspensions, Mailloux scored 25 goals and 53 points in 59 regular season games in the OHL last season and was even better in the playoffs where he scored eight goals and 24 points in 21 contests.
He has an incredible shot and great offensive abilities. He will work this season and next in the AHL to develop his instincts so he knows when to attack and when to sit back as well as bringing along his defensive game. By 2025-26, he should be ready to bring his elite shot and power play acumen to the NHL level.
The team’s seventh defenseman at that point should be Jayden Struble who is another promising young defender. It is not ideal to have a young player playing a support role, but injuries are inevitable and Struble can cycle in to give Harris and Mailloux the odd rest to keep fresh and step into lineups when more muscle and physicality is needed.
Who Is Out?
There are a couple of notable omissions from this list of defenders. First of all, Mike Matheson is still under contract for the 2025-26 season before becoming a free agent. He is the experienced veteran on the team now, and other players would have to take on that role quickly if Matheson were to be moved.
However, with the plethora of options on left defense, it makes the most sense to use Matheson to try and trade for a scoring forward, or to trade him for a handful of picks and prospects that could be flipped for a scoring forward.
He has put up a lot of points since joining the Canadiens, but will be 32 when his contract expires in 2026 and a pricey extension would not be a wise investment. Instead, trading him as soon as the summer of 2024 would give the Canadiens a big return they could parlay into filling a bigger need up front.
With Guhle, Hutson, Harris and Struble still there on the left side, the loss of Matheson could be absorbed by these young defenders growing into better players.
Arber Xhekaj is also not mentioned here as I just think it makes more sense to capitalize on his popularity around the league and get a big return for him when Struble is ready for a full time role. There is no rush to make such a trade, as Struble could spend more time in the minors to develop his two-way game.
With so many great young options to choose from, it will be interesting to see which defenders end up being traded from the Canadiens in the next year.
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