Montreal Canadiens goaltender Jakub Dobes has a big heart, and it showed last Wednesday when he gave a young kid a precious gift.
After spending some time in St-Louis at his summer home, Montreal Canadiens’ goaltender Jakub Dobes is now back in town and already hard at work in Brossard. Last Wednesday, as he worked out with still-interim goaltending coach Marco Marciano, Dobes was unaware that a couple of special guests were in attendance.
Marciano had invited his cousin Nadia Bucci and her son Massimo to come watch him work with Dobes. It was a kind gesture by the goalie coach. Young Massimo is on the autism spectrum, and the Habs’ netminder is his favourite player. When they arrived in Brossard, Bucci gave Marciano Massimo’s Dobes jersey so that he could have it signed and inscribed for him.
After practice, the coach came back not only with the signed jersey, but also with the stick the masked man had been using in practice, autographed as well. Needless to say, the youngster was very pleased, and the mother was touched by the gesture. She later reached out to Dobes on Instagram to thank him, and he replied, saying he was happy to help. That’s hardly a surprising gesture from the goaltender; he has often shown this past season that he’s a very emotional guy, and clearly, he was moved by the youngster’s story.
Dobes is not the first Canadiens’ netminder to show kindness towards a young kid; back in February 2019, Carey Price had made the headlines for meeting 11-year-old Anderson Whitehead, who had lost his mother to cancer and gave him signed items, tickets to see the Habs and a very long hug that looked like it meant the world for the boy as his hero told him things would be okay.
It will be interesting to see what Dobes follows his fantastic playoff performance with this season. Unlike last year, he’ll be starting the campaign squarely installed in the number one spot, and with a new contract extension already signed and kicking in next season, he’ll be able to solely focus on his game.
As for Marciano, we should be hearing sometime soon that he’s no longer the interim goaltending coach in Montreal, but that the job is now his full-time. His arrival last season was a real turning point for the Canadiens’ netminders, and Kent Hughes and co. are not in the business of walking away from something that works well.
Unless things change drastically before training camp and Samuel Montembeault is moved, we can expect a goalie battle between him and Jacob Fowler for the role of backup this upcoming season. While Fowler could still be sent back down to the AHL, that may not be the ideal scenario for his development.
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