The Athletic recently released its report cards for all 32 teams at the quarter mark of the 2025-26 season, and it's hard to argue with Arpon Basu's assessment of the Montreal Canadiens.
With 24 games played, the Montreal Canadiens have now passed the quarter mark of the season and media outlet The Athletic has released its report card for every team so far. Unsurprisingly, the Habs get a good grade with a B-minus, thanks mainly to their red-hot start, which was followed by an icy stretch.
Assessing the team for The Athletic, Arpon Basu states that both the goaltending and the power play are issues, but that the young Canadiens have fewer issues than they did a year ago. It’s hard to argue with that statement when Montreal looks like it has progressed so much.
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Granted, the Canadiens suffered a humiliating loss to the Colorado Avalanche, but that’s to be expected against a powerhouse team that sits atop the standings. Thankfully, that display was an exception and not the rule, as the Habs were overwhelmed by the Avalanche’s pace and talent.
What we’ve seen on the latest road trip gives some hope when it comes to the goaltending. Even though Jakub Dobes allowed seven goals in Denver, none were terrible goals, and he had been solid in his previous two games against the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Utah Mammoth. As for Samuel Montembeault, he came very close to pitching a shutout against the Vegas Golden Knights, allowing a single goal with less than five minutes to go in the game.
As for the power play, after running on empty for much of the Canadiens’ cold stretch, it’s now looking much better. Of course, double-shifting Nick Suzuki is not an ideal solution, but since so many of the Habs’ forwards are dealing with injuries right now, Martin St-Louis has no choice, really.
The main issue with the man advantage was the fact that it had become predictable. Ivan Demidov’s cross-zone pass to set up a one-timer worked for a while, but that was before other teams studied the Habs.
Now, however, Lane Hutson is learning to shoot more, which means he’s become a credible threat on the power play rather than a player who will automatically pass the puck. As for Cole Caufield, he’s learning to work from in close by the goal, which gives him another option than just unleashing a one-timer from the faceoff dot.
As long as the young Habs learn to mix it up a bit and to stop looking for the prettiest play, they should be able to ice a more than respectable power play. In other words, while I agree with Basu's grade, I believe the Canadiens are capable of improving it before the end of the season, or even before the halfway point.
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