On Tuesday, Chris Peters of FloHockey joined Mitch Melnick on TSN 690’s Melnick in the Afternoon and gave his opinion on the development of Montreal Canadiens 2024 fifth-overall draft pick Ivan Demidov.
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Peters said that with a fifth overall draft pick, you need to have “cautious optimism.” His input is that “let’s say Demidov does not make the roster so SKA St Petersburg’s KHL team next year, and he ends up in the MHL for the season, then all of a sudden, we’re all talking that he probably needs at least a full year in the AHL after that.”
Peters elaborated even further, saying “I think even if he plays in the KHL there’s still potential that he’s going to have to spend some time in Laval… Because there’s no doubt that he’s exciting, but he also has to get the reps.”
Related: More on Montreal Canadiens Prospect Ivan Demidov
It’s fair to say that Demidov needs substantial playing time in the KHL to prepare for the NHL and that the MHL is not a league that is comparable enough to junior league competition in North America—which Peters does bring up later in the interview. If that’s the case, the Russian prospect is not being granted what he deserves to smoothly transition to the NHL.
Not to come off as short-sighted and make an assumption on a player who has yet to play in an NHL game, but this is Demidov we’re talking about. There hasn’t been a prospect with this high of an offensive upside in the Canadiens system for many years.
I think the strongest argument for Demidov to play in the NHL and not the AHL is that, quite frankly, Montreal does not have the depth up front to ignore what he brings to the table. The first line of Nick Suzuki, Cole Caufield and Juraj Slafkovsky is solid. Alex Newhook and Kirby Dach are looking to have a strong campaign on the second line. Outside of that, there’s been a lot of plug-and-play from the coaching staff to make up the bottom six.
I will take a moment to just say that Josh Anderson hasn’t panned out as the front office had hoped, Brendan Gallagher has endured countless injuries affecting his game and Joel Armia has performed accurately to his abilities with the minutes he’s been given. Kent Hughes wanted to acquire a veteran scorer to lend his skill to the offence but came up empty in free agency.
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