The Montreal Canadiens made some noise last summer at the draft. This summer, not so much. At least not yet.
After reaching the Eastern Conference Finals in 2026 with Noah Dobson anchoring the blue line, the Habs have mostly kept quiet. They traded Brendan Gallagher to Vancouver. They locked up Ivan Demidov and Jakub Dobes on new contracts. And that’s basically been it.
But Montreal still has roughly $14 million in cap space, a young core, and a solid prospect pool. General manager Kent Hughes has the tools to make something happen. The question is whether he’ll swing for the fences or play it safe.
Here’s the thing about the Canadiens: they’ve been hunting for a second-line center for years. They traded for Kirby Dach at the 2022 draft. They grabbed Alex Newhook from Colorado in 2023. Neither guy has locked down the job. Dach has battled injuries and is headed to arbitration. Newhook has played more on the wing. Jake Evans has been the de facto second-line pivot lately, and while he’s a solid player, he’s not the kind of guy who transforms a top six.
So if Hughes wants to actually fix this, he needs to think bigger. The kind of bigger that makes other GMs sweat.
Adam Fantilli is worth the gamble
Columbus Blue Jackets forward Adam Fantilli is exactly the type of player Montreal should target. He’s 21 years old, 6-foot-2, skates like the wind, and already has a 30-goal season on his resume. Back-to-back 50-point seasons. The third overall pick in 2023 out of the University of Michigan. He looks like a legitimate top-six center right now, with room to grow into something more.
Fantilli is a restricted free agent, which means the Canadiens could go the offer sheet route. It would cost them. A lot. We’re talking top dollar, the kind of contract that forces Columbus to make a real decision.
And honestly, that decision might not be as automatic as you’d think.
The Blue Jackets have to sign Jet Greaves and Cole Sillinger this summer. Next summer, they need to figure out new deals for Dmitri Voronkov, Kirill Marchenko, Kent Johnson, and Denton Mateychuk. That’s a lot of money walking out the door. If Columbus matches a monster offer sheet for Fantilli, they could lose one of those other guys down the line.
Would they rather keep Fantilli and risk breaking up the rest of their young core? Or let him walk and use the compensation picks to reload?
Montreal has the draft capital to make this hurt. They’ve got their own picks and enough flexibility to structure the offer in a way that gives Columbus real pause. Even if the Blue Jackets match, the Canadiens would have disrupted their cap planning the way Philadelphia did with the Leo Carlsson offer sheet last year.
But if Columbus doesn’t match? The Habs suddenly have a 21-year-old franchise center to build around for the next decade. That changes everything in the Atlantic Division.
The Canadiens have tried the patient route. They’ve tried developing from within. Maybe it’s time to see what happens when you force another team’s hand.
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