The Montreal Canadiens are heading into the opening stretch of the 2026-27 season with no shortage of pressure on the roster. A Tuesday night date with the Toronto Maple Leafs gets things started, followed by a road trip to face the Pittsburgh Penguins. Then comes a four-game homestand that includes playoff rematches with the Carolina Hurricanes and Buffalo Sabres.
That kind of schedule can turn early-season momentum into something real fast. It can also expose the players who need to come out firing.
For a few Canadiens, these first games could say plenty about where their season is headed. Some are trying to build on uneven preseasons. Others are trying to hold off players who have already made a strong case for more ice time.
Oliver Kapanen is one of the names at the center of that conversation. The Canadiens didn’t bring in a center over the summer, and Kapanen is expected to open the season as the second-line center. The coaching staff has set him up with Juraj Slafkovsky and Ivan Demidov, a trio that already showed promise together last season.
That line will matter. Montreal needs it to chip in and ease the load on the top unit, and if the offense stalls early, a lineup tweak would not be a surprise.
Kapanen did put up 22 goals and 15 assists last season, but he faded down the stretch and wasn’t much of a factor in the playoffs. A strong start would go a long way toward quieting the noise around him.
Kirby Dach is in a different kind of spot. His preseason didn’t go well, and this is already shaping up as a prove-it season for the former third overall pick. At the start of camp, he looked like a bottom-six candidate, but that spot is no longer guaranteed.
Florian Xhekaj made that picture more complicated. He had a strong camp, earned a place on the initial 23-man roster, and played well enough to get into the lineup against the Maple Leafs.
Even with Xhekaj pushing hard, the coaching staff may still want to give Dach one more chance once the games count for real. If that chance comes, Dach has to make it count quickly, because Xhekaj is right there.
Then there’s Jakub Dobes, whose preseason opened the door to a possible change in how Montreal planned to divide the goalie starts. Samuel Montembeault emerged as the Canadiens’ best goalie in camp, and Dobes isn’t in danger of losing the starter job, but the way the starts were going to be split may no longer be set in stone.
Dobes appeared in three games and posted a .857 save percentage. In his final preseason outing, he allowed four goals, though all four came on the power play against the Senators. Montembeault, meanwhile, gave up just one goal across three games and finished with a .971 save percentage.
The Canadiens may not even need Montembeault until the middle of October, when back-to-back games arrive. But if Dobes looks uncertain early, Montreal could decide to turn to Montembeault sooner and see whether his preseason form carries over.
In Other News...
Canadiens Sent David Reinbacher Down For A Bigger Reason
David Reinbachers latest assignment to Laval says more about the Canadiens roster picture than it does about his play. Montreals decision was not a reflection of how he performed, but a sign of how the club wants to manage a young defenseman who is still best served by getting major minutes rather than sitting in a limited role on the NHL bench.
The timing matters, too, because the Canadiens are getting healthier on the blue line. With Kaiden Guhle edging closer to a return, the immediate need for an extra defenseman has eased, leaving Montreal with a choice that favors development over depth. For now, Reinbacher stays where the games can give him more responsibility, even if the path back up becomes clearer again soon. [Read more 🡒]
Canadiens Make A Tough Early Call On David Reinbacher
The Canadiens final roster cuts brought a notable early-season decision on David Reinbacher, who will start the year with the Laval Rocket in the AHL. The former fifth-overall pick had a strong preseason, but Montreal is clearly taking the long view with a young defenseman whose development has already been shaped by injury history and a crowded battle for minutes on the blue line.
For now, Reinbacher should get the kind of heavy workload in Laval that can be harder to guarantee in Montreal, where the club had to balance roster spots, waiver concerns and its depth chart on defense. The door to the NHL is hardly closed, though, and if he keeps building through the season, the Canadiens are leaving themselves plenty of room to bring him back up when the timing makes sense. [Read more 🡒]
Canadiens Trade Interest Just Raised The Stakes For Kent Hughes
The Canadiens spent part of the summer exploring a bigger swing, with Frank Seravalli reporting that management had considered packaging Kirby Dach in a larger deal if it meant bringing immediate help back the other way. It was the kind of roster-thinking that makes sense for a team trying to accelerate its timeline, and it also showed how aggressively Kent Hughes has been willing to survey the market when there is a chance to reshape the lineup.
Montreal had Kirill Marchenko in mind as a possible target before he was moved to Toronto, which forced the Canadiens to keep searching for another path. The Edmonton Oilers also showed interest in Dach, but Hughes appears to be holding out for a more significant trade opening, leaving the next move tied to whether a better fit comes available. [Read more 🡒]