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Hughes' Midseason Media Availability |
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The theme of the general manager’s media availability was without a doubt balance. As always, Kent Hughes was very honest with the media and made it clear that both his and Martin St-Louis’ jobs right now are balancing act.
The GM knows that his team won’t make the playoffs and that he doesn’t have a team that can win every game, what he wants though, is to strike the right balance. The best quote from the 40 odd minutes presser was probably when he reported a conversation with his head coach: “I said to Marty, we’ve gotten to a point where the wins are good only to a certain point and the losses are bad only to a certain point”. This perfectly sums up what the two men are trying to achieve, build a winning culture, but while developing their young players to the best of their ability and knowing full well that a good draft pick this season will go a long way towards helping the rebuild.
Unsurprisingly, he was questioned about Juraj Slafkovsky development and his answer wasn’t all that surprising either, in a nutshell, he feels the youngster’s development will be done in stages. Clearly, he would have liked him to go through more stages this year, but his season ending injury has put a stop to the process.
Unlike the fans, the Habs’ brass is not concerned about Slafkovsky’s production right now (10 points in 39 games) for he’s not up to the point where it’s what matters. This season, the coaching staff has worked hard with Slafkovsky and has given him things to work on in his game that he needs to incorporate while playing in the fastest league in the world. Sure, he could have been sent to Laval to rack up some points, but that’s not what would have made him a better player in the long run, it was decided that the best option was to keep him close and monitor his progress.
When asked what he had to say to those who believe that the youngsters are not being used enough, Hughes was once more very frank, if the team was to only use the young players and put all of their focus on the development of those players, they would lose the room. They can’t say we don’t have the team to win and just focus on developing because if they did and there was no accountability in games, players would become more individualistic and that’s not how you develop a winning team.
While Hughes hasn’t been able to make much roster tweaking this season (aside from picking up Kovacevic on waivers), he does expect that business will pick-up in the run-up to the trade deadline. The Canadiens are open for business, but deals will only be made if they work for both teams. Contenders will more than likely be interested by Habs’ veteran players, but they’re not going anywhere if Hughes doesn’t get what he wants to get.
At the start of the season, he made it clear to Sean Monahan that he didn’t know what was going to happen in the long run, whether he’d be traded or extended, but he told him that he was not going anywhere at the start of the season and that’s the approach he has with his players, he keeps them in the loop about his intentions.
Samuel Montembeault will probably be pleased to hear that the GM thinks he’s part of the plan, he won’t be entertaining offers for the young netminders. As for the blue line, Hughes admitted that the way his young defensemen have played is giving him option, if the offer is good, he could be tempted to move some of his veteran defenders, even though they have important roles helping the rookies to learn the game. In other words, if someone comes knocking with a can’t miss offer for Joel Edmundson or David Savard, they could be on their way out.
As his team is once again hit hard by injuries, Hughes was asked if there's anything they could do to stop this worrying trend and the GM stated that some players need to be protected from themselves. There are always players that are told they'll be ready to come back in say 3 weeks but want to be back out on the ice after only half that time's gone, he added that Brendan Gallagher was one of those.
Finally, as transparent as he wants to be, Kent Hughes said that he can’t really comment on the ongoing negotiations with Cole Caufield for obvious reasons. He did say however that the Habs want to count on their sniper long term and that he feels Caufield also wants to stay long term and that something will be worked out. Caufield could become a restricted free agent this summer, but before the GM focuses on that file, he’ll probably have to concentrate on the upcoming trade deadline and the draft. Fear not though, Caufield will be inked sooner rather than later, it’s written in the sky.
Tonight, the Canadiens will be taking on the Florida Panthers at the Bell Centre, hoping to get a 3rd win in a row and to avenge the 7-2 beating the Cats ended them at the end of December. Even with all the new injuries, Martin St-Louis thinks his team is in a much better place than it was at the end of December and he believes that they can step up to the challenge. For the superstitious amongst you, it might seem like too tall a task since the Canadiens will be wearing their retro reverse jersey in which they’ve been outscored 18-5 and have lost 4 games so far.
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