Before the start of the season, pundits were hesitant about the Montreal Canadiens; they didn’t dare put them too high in their power rankings, partly because nobody could tell if their qualification in the playoffs last season showed real, sustainable growth or was a product of different factors, including luck.

One week after the start of the campaign, Daily Faceoff released its power rankings, and the Canadiens have made a bit of a jump. In their first edition, they had Martin St-Louis’ team as a team on the bubble, not among their playoff contenders or even playoff hopefuls.

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In their latest edition, the Canadiens land in eighth place, and Scott Maxwell writes that while their two wins came against teams they should have beaten in any case, it was their outing against the Toronto Maple Leafs that impressed him the most. In fact, he’s been so impressed that he would have put them in sixth place in those rankings, but since his collaborator Hunter Crowther would have put them in 15th place, they land at eight, which is still a massive improvement from the season’s start.

It will be interesting to see if other outlets follow suit in their own power rankings. Still, so far in a tiny sample, the Canadiens have done everything right to convince people that they are indeed on the way up and that last year’s result was anything but an anomaly. Of course, it’s not perfect; they still have plenty of things to work on, starting with sorting out their power play units, but they’ve come a long way since last season, when it seemed like no one understood how to play defense the way the coach wanted it played.

Who knows, with Lane Hutson now signed to a maximum term contract at a very reasonable AAV, a weight has probably been lifted from the sophomore defenseman’s shoulders, and he’ll be free to focus on what he’s best at, playing hockey.

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