Many people hoped to hear Kent Hughes' thoughts after his intriguing trade deadline. The belief surrounding the Montreal Canadiens was they'd be sellers at the deadline as opposed to buyers. However, Hughes decided to stay the course and keep all of his pending unrestricted free agents. He didn't use any of his assets to acquire players to help the team either, as he entered the post-deadline portion of the schedule with the same lineup.
In order to reach the conclusion to take that path, Hughes had to ask himself a couple of important questions. How close are the Canadiens to contending for a Stanley Cup? Would a couple of additions put them over the hump to be Stanley Cup contenders, or would it just be a pointless step to winning one or two extra playoff games? In the long run, Hughes decided he'd love to give his players a chance to get some playoff experience, but it wasn't worth giving away prospects or draft capital to think they could win four rounds.
The best-case scenario for the Canadiens will be to get the wild card spot, win a couple games and maybe even upset the Washington Capitals in the first round, who are definitely a beatable team. It'll be tough to argue they could advance any farther than the first round, as they don't have the depth to match up with the Carolina Hurricanes or any of the top-three teams in the Atlantic Division. In the end, Hughes had the same opinion, and he echoed those sentiments in an interview with Eric Engels on Sportsnet.ca.
“Being able to see a group of players that can handle the moment is as significant as anything, and I don’t mean just specifically Saturday’s game,” he says. “I mean this stretch run.” The comments make it clear that Hughes isn't as set on making a Stanley Cup run this season, but instead appreciates the experience his roster players will get from playing meaningful games. Hughes also knows it's time to push the team into the next phase of the rebuild, and will ensure he makes the correct moves this offseason to set the team up as contenders.
“I think there’s a lot of ways to go about continuing to improve our team,” Hughes said. “If we’re successful this summer, the player or players that come are here for now to help open our window and extend it well into the future. And I guess there’s other scenarios where there’s certain players that could come now while we’re waiting for other players to develop.”
Hughes is playing the long game with the Canadiens. If you enjoy the playoff atmosphere and implications surrounding the team the past two weeks, you'll be happy to know he is ready to continue that well into the future. It's exciting times in Montreal, and they aren't stopping anytime soon if Kent Hughes has anything to say about it.