The Montreal Canadiens are not picking high in the first-round this year, but that's not to say they couldn't land a good prospect if they end up using their pick.
While Kent Hughes has accustomed us to trades in the run-up to the draft or at the draft, there’s still a chance that the Montreal Canadiens end up using their first-round pick at 28th overall. If that’s the case, there are a lot of players the Habs’ brass could potentially target, including Russian defenseman Nikita Shcherbakov. With Nick Bobrov co-leading the scouting department, the Canadiens have not shied away from drafting Russians in the last couple of years, picking up Ivan Demidov and Alexander Zharovsky in the last two drafts.
While Shcherbakov is a left-shot defenseman, his size and mobility make him an interesting target. At 6-foot-3 and 187 pounds, he could still afford to bulk up, but that’s not surprising at such a young age.
The blueliner has played for three different teams this season: Tolpar Ufa in the MHL, where he picked up 10 points in 15 games; Toros Neftekamsk in the VHL, where he gathered 10 points in 35 games; and he also made his debut in the KHL. With Salavat Yulaev Ufa, the rearguard featured in seven games, went pointless, and had a minus-three rating. The jump to the KHL is not easy, and needing a bit of time to adjust is perfectly normal, but he still didn’t look out of place. During that short KHL stint, he played with Canadiens’ prospect Zharovsky.
While he skates well, Shcherbakov is a defence-first kind of blueliner and shouldn’t be relied on to fill up the scoresheet at the highest level. Having a mobile shutdown defenseman who can keep up with the opponent’s most threatening forward is a need and not a luxury, and that’s not something the Habs’ prospect cupboard is filled with. As things stand, Montreal’s blueline is pretty offensive-minded, and a bit of diversity certainly wouldn’t hurt. The main caveat, however, is that he needs to improve his physical play to be fully effective at the professional level.
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