Ivan Demidov or nothing: clearly, the Canadiens didn’t want to draft a defenseman

Although it wasn’t a popular opinion two months ago, I often said that I wasn’t against the idea of the Habs drafting a defenseman with their fifth pick.

Mind you, it wasn’t at any price. It was if Ivan Demidov and Cayden Lindstrom were gone.

Fortunately for Kent Hughes and his team, the player the club coveted most was available at #5 in the Vegas draft. And the Habs weren’t foolish enough to snap him up.

That said, it was possible to believe that yes, the Habs could have seen Demidov go in the top-4. After all, even if we suspected that the Blackhawks would select Artyom Levshunov, the Ducks and Blue Jackets were possibilities for the Russian.

But in the end, after the Beckett Sennecke surprise in Anaheim, Columbus went for Cayden Lindstrom.

It’s clear that the Habs had a limited number of players they really wanted with this pick, since in the behind-the-scenes video of the draft, we see that the club had a backup plan should the Russian be selected in the top-4.

Here’s the full video, for those who want to see it or watch it again.

What this tells me is that the Habs probably had a small group of players they liked enough to draft in the top-5. And besides potentially Sennecke, those are probably the guys taken out in the top-5.

I wonder if Levshunov was on the list. After all, obviously, all the other defensemen were available to the Habs, who would have potentially preferred to trade the pick rather than choose one of the remaining ones.

How many teams had called the Habs to inquire about pick #5? Which team would the Habs have danced with to trade pick #5? Was Yaroslav Askarov still in play? We can’t know for sure.

But I can’t say I would have been unhappy to see Zeev Buium in Montreal, for example.

Note that the Utah club chose Tij Iginla at #6. Would the former Coyotes have chosen Demidov if he were available? Maybe they would have. But in any case, the Habs didn’t seem to like Iginla enough to pick him in the top 5-6, obviously.

In the end, when you see the way the Habs scouts talk (in a video that’s there to make the Habs look good, but still), it’s clear that Demidov was the guy in the club’s sights. There’s no reason to doubt it.

Overtime

– Cayden Primeau surprised Martin Biron. [TSN 690]

– Well done.

Congratulations to Nick Suzuki and the Asista Foundation, who raised $120,500 to train service dogs and raise mental health awareness!

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– Montreal Canadiens (@CanadiensMTL) August 22, 2024