The Montreal Canadiens made one wave of cuts on Saturday to send a number of AHL-contracted players to the Laval Rocket, but needed to make up two lineups for split-squad games that night versus the Ottawa Senators. With the pre-season complete and final rosters due by Monday at 5:00 PM EDT, the Habs have made their final decisions to get the roster down to 23.
One decision was made for them with Kaiden Guhle injured and placed on IR. The team will also keep Bryce Pickford on the NHL roster as he recovers from shoulder surgery, as well as Lucas Condotta who is dealing with an injury, and assign them to the Laval Rocket when they have recovered.
Final cuts
The final cuts of healthy players were the following:
Forwards (11)
Owen Beck
Alex Belzile (placed on waivers)
Dillan Bentley (AHL contract)
Brett Berard (placed on waivers)
Laurent Dauphin (AHL contract)
Jared Davidson
Hunter McKown (placed on waivers)
Filip Mešár
Sasha Pastujov (placed on waivers)
Samuel Poulin (placed on waivers)
Tyler Thorpe
Defencemen (6)
Luke Mittelstadt
Owen Protz
David Reinbacher
Ethan Samson (placed on waivers)
Maksymilian Szuber (placed on waivers)
Reilly Walsh (placed on waivers)
Goaltenders (2)
Jacob Fowler
Kaapo Kähkönen (placed on waivers)
The biggest surprises on the list are David Reinbacher, who seemed set to take a spot in the NHL at least with his earliest games of the pre-season, and Jacob Fowler who served as the Canadiens’ backup and started 17 games last season.
The two prospects who have made the team are Adam Engström, whose place is likely temporary as Kaiden Guhle recovers from surgery, and Florian Xhekaj, who used an impactful pre-season to claim the 14th forward position.
23-man Roster
The players set to be submitted on the official opening-night roster are:
Forwards (14)
#17 Josh Anderson
#76 Zachary Bolduc
#13 Cole Caufield
#77 Kirby Dach
#24 Phillip Danault
#93 Ivan Demidov
#71 Jake Evans
#91 Oliver Kapanen
#22 Chris Kreider
#15 Alex Newhook
#20 Juraj Slafkovský
#14 Nick Suzuki
#85 Alexandre Texier
#63 Florian Xhekaj
#82 Lucas Condotta (placed on IR)
Defencemen (7)
#45 Alexandre Carrier
#53 Noah Dobson
#42 Adam Engström
#48 Lane Hutson
#8 Mike Matheson
#47 Jayden Struble
#72 Arber Xhekaj
#21 Kaiden Guhle (placed on IR)
#94 Bryce Pickford (placed on IR)
Goaltenders (2)
#75 Jakub Dobeš
#35 Samuel Montembeault
