The results of the 2025-26 season have undoubtedly been a success thus far for the Montreal Canadians. A team that is attempting to leave its rebuilding phase in the past and progress into a true contending hockey club. The switch from basement-dweller to Stanley Cup threat doesn’t happen overnight; in fact, it often takes several years of inconsistency and early playoff exits before an up-and-coming team is ready to push for Lord Stanley. That’s where the Canadians find themselves now, out from the league’s basement, but not quite seen as legitimate threats to challenge for the cup. As is the case with most rebuilding seasons, this year is still incredibly important to the future of this Canadians core, and as we reach the campaigns halfway point I think it’s only right to discuss the biggest stories that have headlined an exciting forty-one games of Habs hockey.

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The Record

Expectations for this Canadian season could have justifiably been all over the place. The team looked nowhere close to contending through the first half of the season a year ago, but caught fire in the new year and ended up with a surprise playoff berth. The offseason continued to make things interesting with the additions of Noah Dobson and Zach Bolduc, but a major need for another top-six center still remained. I’m sure the expected progression of the young core was enough to make fans think this season would be another improvement on the last. How much of an improvement would certainly be a reasonable debate, but I think fans would have been justified to expect a continued upward trajectory.

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Whatever your pre-season expectations were, they’ve probably been met through the season’s first half. After forty-one games, the Habs are rocking a 22-13-6 record, which puts them third in the Atlantic division and just a single point behind the first-place Tampa Bay Lightning. There are legitimate questions about whether the team can sustain its impressive pace through the season’s back half (which I’ll touch on later), but for now, it’s fair to say the results have been as good as one could have hoped for. With the Eastern Conference looking like a juggernaut, the Habs won’t be able to afford a major slip-up down the stretch, but if they can maintain similar production, another playoff appearance is well within reach.

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The New Core

Maybe the most important aspect of this season, even more than the team’s results, is the development of its future star players. Lane Hutson, Ivan Demidov, and Juraj Slafkovsky are the three active Canadians that have the most influence on the Habs future success, and they’re starting to emerge as the true “core” of this hockey club.

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Calling those three the core of the team isn’t an effort to discredit some of the more established pieces, who are already contributing to winning hockey. Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield have been running the Canadiens’ top line for several years now and are going to continue to be major contributors as the team progresses into a contender. Noah Dobson and Kaiden Guhle are going to help solidify the back end for the coming years and will be integral parts of taking the team’s defensive play to the next level. But Hutson, Demidov, and Slafkovsky provide something different. They provide the potential to take this team to an entirely different level, the potential to give fans sustained success for the next ten years, and the potential to win Stanley Cups.

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The beauty of this core is that they all provide something different. Hutson, a defenceman who is already a point per game player in just his second season, has greatly improved his defensive play in this sophomore campaign and is actively becoming one of the most impactful two-way blueliners in the league. Demidov is the offensive gamebreaker, with the skill and smarts to easily produce point per game seasons throughout his career, and possibly be the first Canadian to crack the 100 point mark since 1986. Slafkovsky is the unicorn, a six-foot-three two hundred and twenty pound winger who demands to carry the puck and set up teammates like a shifty playmaker. All three bring something unique to the table, and all season they’ve been showing glimpses of what they’ll bring at their peaks.

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We’re in an era of Habs hockey that is littered with talent, but I fully believe the true core of this roster is just starting to emerge.

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Suzuki, Caufield … and Who?

Prior to the season’s puck drop, it would have been foolish to question who would suit up alongside the Habs most prominent duo of Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield. Juraj Slafkovsky seemed to be the man destined for that role from the moment he was drafted, and he’s done an excellent job serving those two over the past two seasons. But some line shakeups earlier this year saw Slafkovsky moved away from his usual partners and paired with fellow winger Ivan Demidov to help create a more balanced top six group. The success that Slafkovsky and Demidov have seen together should have the organization excited about the idea of those two paired at the hip for the foreseeable future, but it also leaves a hole in the top trio that was so effectively filled by the big Slovak.

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Zach Bolduc and Alex Texier have both been seeing time on the top line, but haven’t quite fit with Suzuki and Caufield as well as Slafkovsky. When Suzuki and Caufield are on their games they don’t need a ton of playdriving and creation from their other linemate. Just someone who can be a solid defensive presence, win pucks, and make the right little plays to help sustain offense, all things that Slafkovsky did well.

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Suzuki and Caufield have still produced pretty strong on-ice metrics this season when separated from Slafkovsky. According to Natural Stat Trick, they’re running a 52.4% expected goals for percentage (xGF%) and outscoring their opponents fourteen to eleven at five-on-five.

We know they can play together; they’ve done it for most of their careers, but there’s still a need to find a long-term solution on the other wing, and I’m not too confident Bolduc or Texier is the answer. Luckily, the Habs have plenty of resources at their disposal to attempt to solve any problems at the top of the lineup. Internally, top prospects like Michael Hage and Alexander Zahrovsky are lighting up their respective leagues, and externally, the team has plenty of future assets and cap space to facilitate a trade or free agent signing if needed. Things should start to fall into place as this team progresses in the coming years, with plenty of options on the table to fill any important holes.

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Can They Sustain?

I mentioned earlier about some potential questions as to whether this team can sustain its first-half pace into the new year, questions that I think are incredibly valid when looking at some of the data behind the first forty-one games. It’s been an impressive showing for the Habs thus far, but I think it’s important to look under the hood of the surface-level results to have a better understanding of where this team truly stands among its peers.

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Let’s start with this: the Habs haven’t created a ton of offensive chances this season. Although they rank fourth in the league, averaging 3.39 goals per game, that number is probably inflated due to their 22% powerplay and 13% shooting percentage (which ranks second in the league). According to Natural Stat Trick, the Canadiens have generated the eighth fewest scoring chances and third fewest great danger scoring chances this season at five-on-five. You wouldn’t be able to tell from the goal totals, but the Habs have struggled to generate quality chances at five-on-five. Again, according to Natural Stat Trick, among the top five teams in five-on-five shooting percentage (Stars, Maple Leafs, Lightning, Sharks, Canadiens), the Habs have by far the fewest great danger chances created (323) and high danger goals scored (31). All of this indicated that the Habs might be benefitting from some shooting luck on their low and medium-danger scoring chances, a trend that usually tends to even out as the season progresses. Even with some possible goal-scoring regression on the horizon, there’s one trend from the season’s first half that I believe could help mitigate a dip in offensive results.

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Goaltending has been an issue. There’s no hiding that fact from anyone who’s watched even a little bit of Habs hockey this season, but with the recent promotion of top prospect Jacob Fowler, there’s some hope that the troubles between the pipes will start to resolve themselves during the second half. According to Evolving Hockey, the Habs have the fifth-worst five-on-five save percentage in the entire league. Sam Montembeault’s struggles this season have been well documented, with the opening night starter posting just an .869 save percentage, -3.58 goals saved above expected, and -12.49 goals saved above average in 18 appearances. Jakub Dobes fared a bit better than Montembeault, posting an .889, 6.77, and -4.09 in the same statistics. But the emergence of Fowler should bring some confidence to the Canadiens’ crease that they’ve desperately been missing this season. It might seem like it’s asking a lot of a 21-year-old netminder to be the answer to a major in-season problem, but the Habs don’t have much of a choice. The goaltending has to be better if this team wants to make any noise in a loaded Eastern Conference, and a hot run from one of the league’s top prospects could very well be the solution.

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Internal Reinforcements

The injury bug has hit this team hard. Not in an incredibly drastic way that would’ve seen stars like Suzuki, Caufield, or Hutson miss significant time, but in a way that’s really tested the depth of this roster. Patrik Laine and Kaiden Guhle still haven’t seen any game action since their injuries in mid-October (although it’s believed Guhle is close to a return), and the team has been without Kirby Dach and Alex Newhook since mid-November. To pile on even more, the end of the new year saw Jake Evans and Josh Anderson go down with injuries of their own, continuing to test the strength of the team’s bottom six forward group.

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Every team deals with injuries throughout a season. As long as you can avoid your stars missing significant time, there’s always a way to get through it. The Habs continue to be evidence of that, with a 22-13-6 record, you probably wouldn’t think the team has been without a handful of important depth pieces for the majority of those games. It speaks to the importance of having star players to rely on and how a competent front office can find ways to fill in for production that’s missing from injured skaters. The NHL season is long, which means players are going to miss time, but it also means (for the most part) they’re eventually going to return, which might be the most exciting realization for the Habs second half. The thought of adding multiple middle-six pieces and a top-four defenseman, without having to part from any assets, is an advantage most other teams aren’t going to have as we head into the second half of the season, and it should help smooth out some roster wrinkles that could help push the team to another level.

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Deadline Aggression

This last section kind of goes hand-in-hand with the previous one, but one of the biggest question marks surrounding the Canadiens’ second half will be their status during trade season. The return to play of pieces like Kaiden Guhle, Kirby Dach, and Alex Newhook will almost certainly play into the decisions of Kent Hughes and the Habs front office come March, but if the team is committed to putting its best foot forward this season, then there’s still more they can do.

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The addition of another center to the current roster is something that’s been talked about since the offseason. The trade to reunite with Phillip Danault was one that seemed to satisfy many fans, and one I think makes a lot of sense given the current trade market. I don’t foresee an addition to the back end via trade. With the return of Guhle imminent, the Habs have a pretty solid defensive group set for the remainder of the year, with internal additions like David Reinbacher waiting to be called upon if needed. But there’s still room to upgrade the forward group, even with the return of several injured players on the horizon.

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The Canadiens are no longer deadline sellers, but that doesn’t mean they have to be buyers either. This team is still in its early stages of contention, and I’m of the belief this front office isn’t going to make any moves just for the sake of doing so. It wouldn’t shock me to see a depth piece added to the team to help for the lack of production from guys like Brendan Gallagher, Josh Anderson, and Joe Veleno. Nonetheless, the trade deadline presents a difficult decision for most NHL front offices, with this season proving to be a particularly interesting one in Montreal.  

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This season has been an introduction to what the Montreal Canadiens should hope is to come over the next decade. Contending in an Eastern Conference filled with Stanley Cup hopefuls, in large part due to the play of star pieces acquired from their years of losing. It’s exciting that there’s still plenty of room to grow, but there’s also reason to expect results now. It’s not entirely reasonable to expect this roster, in its current form, to go out and bring home Lord Stanley, but a desire from fans and management for continued improvement is only natural as this team progresses through its rebuild.

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The Habs have started winning, and winning is great, but winning also brings expectations – expectations that haven’t existed with this team in a number of years. Expectations that many of the current players aren’t familiar with. Expectations that will only continue to grow.