Ivan Demidov

And I guess in terms of growth for the Montreal Canadiens or whether they can improve over last year, the buzzword has been organic, talking about organic growth, growing from within, growing because their players got good experience last year in both the regular season and the playoffs.

And so is it going to be, you know, Lane Hudson getting better and Ivan Demidov getting better and Oliver Kapanen and all other young players and the goaltending? You know, where do you see the growth coming from in terms of the Montreal Canadiens so they can stay in that mix?

Definitely internally.

Definitely internally.

that means you would get DuPont, Joseph or Pribilov.

So, and, and that's like, you know, getting Ivan Demidov third, if you take him a lot, right? Like you're not going to be upset by that at all.

Like, yeah.

Is he going to be a center? No, but I mean, I'm not going to tell elite talent to play somewhere else.

Less than a week from right now, as a matter of fact, we are going back to the well on Opici, Platinum.

We are going to keep looking for Schaefer, Demidov, Seneca, the big rookies.

So we'll talk about that.

We'll talk about one-of-ones, grading one-of-ones.

Opici Platinum 2526.

We're looking for Schaefer.

We're looking for Demidov.

We're looking for all the big 2526 rookies.

I know they've been linked to Marchenko.

They're kind of keeping their powder dry, waiting for either Michael Hage to arrive at the end of the season or for an acquisition that's gonna play with Demidov full-time.

And if that happens, I, I imagine both of us would be significantly higher on it.

But yeah, 90 and a half probably seems right, even if it's a bit of a step back for a team that made it to the East Final last year.

A moment, a game, a goal.

Okay, let's, let's not go Demidov two seasons ago.

Yes.

Okay?

Sure.

'Cause people are gonna say, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, Ivan Demidov's first goal."

Yeah, some will, some will say that, but I think a lot of people will say, "You know, there must've been a game that Carey Price had in, like, his first year," where everyone was like, "Yep, this is the guy."

Name it.

Uh, I mean, you know, the Canadiens, you know, we just finished talking about Marchenko.

The reason they wanted Marchenko is 'cause they have a hole in their top six, um, opposite Ivan Demidov on that wing.

Um, a bunch of candidates to fill that hole internally, but none of whom are really ideal candidates, you know, with maybe with the exception of Newhook.

But, um, so yeah, there's, there's a need there.

They were talking about the Habs a little bit yesterday, and Montreal has seven guys, like their seven core guys signed up for 52 mil.

Seven guys, Suzuki, Demidov, Slafkovsky, Hudson, Dobesh.

Who else was it? Dobson, maybe.

And was there another one? Did I say Suzuki? Did I say Suzuki? He's in that mix, too.

What the Maple Leafs said is that they didn't want him to go because they want him to be fully rested and ready for the main training camp, which begins next week.

Well, we'll use the Demidov example, right? When he played a handful of games in the NHL and then he was present at rookie camp the year after, ahead of the season for the Canadians.

played one game and then they they're like okay well i don't know if we want to risk this you're clearly better than everybody here and i think that's what the outcome would be with gavin mckenna present because like him or not i mean the guy's the number one overall pick and i think he's going to be a heck of a player in the national hockey league so if you've identified that he's going to be a big part of your team you want him on that first power play unit yada yada yada whatever you may think I think you better prioritize getting him ready with the group that he's going to go into the season with as opposed to guys that he's not going to be playing with because there's a lot of catching up to do.

Yeah, and the four teams, by the way, taking part in the NHL Prospect Challenge in Gatineau are the Maple Leafs, the Winnipeg Jets, the Ottawa Senators, and the Montreal Canadiens.