Samuel Montembeault is in the middle of the pack of NHL goalies in terms of goals against average and save rate (2.73 average, .910 save rate), an achievement, one might say, for a goalkeeper claimed on waivers three years earlier.
He also eclipses his two partners Jake Allen and Cayden Primeau in terms of statistics even if these three goalkeepers have an identical team in front of them. At 27 years old, his progress has been steady since arriving in Montreal in 2021. His performance for Canada at the World Championship last spring, with a 6-1 record, 1.42 GAA and . 939, constitutes another indicator of its rise to power.
In this context, his signing for the next three years, at an annual salary of 3.1 million, constitutes a tour de force on the part of general manager Kent Hughes.
An overview of salaries on the site capfriendly.com shows that barely three or four starting goalkeepers will receive less money next season.
Among them, Stuart Skinner, of the Oilers, who may no longer even be number one next year if management finally finds the hoped-for number one goalie (Jack Campbell, remember, still receives his full annual salary of 5 million in the American League) and Mackenzie Blackwood, a temporary solution for the poor San Jose Sharks.
We don’t know what will happen to the situation in Buffalo, where Devon Levi has just been sold to the American League and Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, from whom we no longer expected anything, finally seems to be blossoming, but whoever starts doesn’t matter next year, none of the Sabers goalies will earn a salary above two million, unless they make a splash on the trade or free agent market.
We will have to monitor the situation closely between now and next year in Los Angeles, still among the NHL’s elite at the start of the season despite two goalies under contract for a single year at a modest salary, Cam Talbot, 36 years old. , and Pheonix Copley.
Otherwise, Montembeault’s contract resembles in almost every way that of Karel Vejmelka, of the Arizona Coyotes, whose performance is down this year however. Vejmelka has also seen Connor Ingram start six of the Coyotes’ last seven games.
The Canadiens’ three-goalie menage is over. At least almost. If not this weekend, in the near future.
The presence of Cayden Primeau in Montreal was less linked to the fear of losing him on waivers than to contract negotiations between the management of the Canadiens and Samuel Montembeault.
Sending Primeau back to the American League or, worse, losing him to another club, would have given Montembeault and his clan the short end of the stick in the discussions because the CH would have had no other valid options in the short term.
Ironically, or not, this signing comes the day after a poor performance from Primeau. We could send him back to Laval, where the guards are having trouble, and it would be surprising if he had to leave Quebec.
Primeau has had some good games this season, but who will want to claim, and keep in the NHL, a goaltender with a 2-3 record, a 3.72 GAA and an .886 save percentage, unable to impose consistently so far in the National League despite a brilliant career in the NCAA?
And if by chance another organization saw Primeau as a diamond to be polished, the Canadian has identified his number one goalkeeper of the future: Montembeault, 27 years old for barely a month, brilliant at the World Championship with the Canadian team last spring, in constant progress since his arrival in Montreal in 2021.
Some more informed Canadian fans, always on the lookout for the performance of the organization’s best prospects, believe that this three-year contract offered to Montembeault will allow the CH to bridge the gap between him and the arrival of young Jacob Fowler, the Canadian’s third-round pick in 2023, shined in his first steps at Boston College in the NCAA, with an 11-2-1 record, a 1.98 GAA and a .931 save percentage.
Fowler is indeed promising. Let us remember, however, that nothing is really certain with goalkeepers. Cayden Primeau also maintained a 19-8-5 record, a 1.92 GAA and a .931 save percentage in his first season at Northeastern, won the title of MVP of the NCAA in 2019 and led the Americans to the silver medal at the World Junior Championship that same year with a 1.61 GAA and .936 save percentage.
More recently, Jakub Dobes, a fifth-round pick of the Canadiens in 2020, was also untouchable in the NCAA: 2.26 average and .934 save percentage in his first season at Ohio State, 2.31 and . 918 in his second, MVP of the Big Ten Conference in 2022.
This 22-year-old posted a 4.23 GAA and .871 save percentage in his debut with the Laval Rocket. So let’s wait…
