Meet the newbies on the Montreal Canadiens
Habs have 7 new players including 2 rookies on their roster to start 2016-17 season
The puck drops on a new Montreal Canadiens NHL season tonight in Buffalo, and on the heels of a disastrous 2015-16 campaign, Habs general manager Marc Bergevin has worked over the roster.
Here's a look at some of the new faces to watch this year:
The rookies
Mikhail Sergachev has been dubbed "the next Andrei Markov" because at only 18, he looks as if he has what it takes to be the next great Russian blue-liner for the Canadiens.
Sergachev comes to the Habs after the team selected him ninth overall in this year's NHL entry draft. The Russian played in the OHL last season for the Windsor Spitfire and immediately made an impact, winning the defenceman of the year award for the league.
He was the youngest player ever to earn that award.
How long Sergachev stays with the big club is uncertain, because as an 18-year-old, he is still eligible to return to his junior team. The Habs will have nine games to decide if he will stay in the NHL or if he will go back to the juniors.
It is rare for an 18-year-old to crack an NHL roster and even more rare when the player is a defenceman, but Sergachev plays a bigger and more mature game than his age would suggest.
Former Habs captain Saku Koivu had it right when he said before training camp began that his Finnish countryman Artturi Lehkonen should make the NHL this year.
Lehkonen is 21 and spent last season playing in the Swedish Elite league for Frolunda, where he scored 16 goals and 17 assists in 49 games.
The pressure was on Lehkonen to make the NHL because his contract situation in Sweden stipulated that if he didn't play for the Habs he would be forced to go back to Frolunda for the rest of the year. The AHL was not an option for him.
In the pre-season, Lehkonen flashed his offensive upside and persuaded the club to keep him.
The top-shelf talent
Opposing team players might want to think twice before going into the corner of the Habs zone this season because Shea Weber is on patrol, and he's gonna crush you.
This is one of the reasons why Team Canada head coach Mike Babcock called him the "man-mountain," but physicality is only one part of Weber's game.
His teammates, past and present, praise his leadership skills, and he has a knack for scoring on the power play. That is an area where the Habs have struggled mightily in recent years.
The Subban trade still stings for a lot of Habs fans.
While that trade might come back to bite management in the butt a few years down the road, this year, fans are going to like the new look Weber brings to Montreal.
The only drawback with Weber is that he doesn't move the puck up the ice as smoothly as Subban did, so the Habs forwards are going to have to adjust.
- P.K. Subban trade is a knife to the heart of Habs fans
- A closer look at Shea Weber, the newest member of the Habs
Alexander Radulov is the latest faded-Russian-superstar reclamation project for general manager Marc Bergevin.
Last year Bergevin rolled the dice with Alexander Semin but he scored only one goal and was released from the team before Christmas.
Bergevin says this time around with Radulov, he's much more confident it will work out.
Radulov came to Montreal as a free agent after spending the last four years playing in the KHL for CSKA Moscow.
He was once a top NHL prospect but bolted from his contract with the Nashville Predators in 2008 to play in Russia.
In 2012 he was given a second chance with the Predators, but it ended badly.
During the playoffs he was spotted in a bar after curfew, was promptly suspended and returned to Russia.
But that was four years ago. Radulov is 30 now. He has a young child and says he's a changed man.
The grit
Andrew Shaw is a tough customer.
He's not afraid to go into the dirty areas on the ice and sacrifice his body to make a play. He hates to lose and has a championship pedigree from his days in Chicago.
In short, he is exactly the kind of character player that Marc Bergevin loves. So it's no wonder Bergevin signed him to a six-year contract after trading for him this off-season.
Shaw gives the Habs lineup a bit more of a sharpened elbow and will make Montreal harder to play against.
- Andrew Shaw excited about fresh start with Montreal Canadiens
- Canadiens sign Andrew Shaw to 6-year deal
The spare parts
Al Montoya is the new insurance-policy goaltender for Carey Price, and unlike his predecessors – Mike Condon and Dustin Tokarski – Montoya has a satchel full of NHL experience.
Montoya, 31, is a former first-round draft pick for the New York Rangers, played for the Coyotes, the Islanders, the Jets and the Panthers but never developed into a full-time NHL starter.
The backup role of playing 20 to 30 games a season suits him well.
Zach Redmond is a depth defenceman for the Canadiens.
At 28, he beat out Mark Barberio in training camp for a roster spot on the team.
Redmond has had to battle his whole career to make it in the NHL. He was drafted in the seventh round in 2008 and bounced around the minors until 2012-13, when he surfaced with the Winnipeg Jets.
That same year he suffered an injury to his leg from a teammate's skate during a practice that nearly ended his career.
For the last two seasons, he played in Colorado under Patrick Roy and signed on with Montreal as a free agent this off-season.