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The Habs ultimately didn’t move their second first-round pick for win-now help last month as many expected. Instead, they took Michael Hage with the 21st selection. Here are some thoughts on Montreal’s newest centre prospect.
Before even getting into discussing the player, I want to touch on how weird the process was to get to the point of taking Hage. Generally speaking, most trade-up/trade-down moves happen during the draft, not hours in advance. That there were three of those deals league-wide was unheard of.
While GM Kent Hughes said after the draft that Hage was the player they were targeting by moving up, I’m not entirely buying that. I think he wasn’t the player but rather was one of a handful of them that they were comfortable with in that range. There’s just no way that Montreal was able to conclusively map out the first 20 picks to be confident enough that Hage would be there at 21. Saying he was the guy sounds nice after the fact but that doesn’t seem truthful.
As for Hage, his selection follows a trend that the Habs have followed in recent years, even going back to Trevor Timmins’ time in charge. They really seem to like the players who take a big step forward development-wise in the second half of the season. If you go through Montreal’s first-round picks in recent years (even Ivan Demidov had a bigger second half), that seems to be a common theme.
Fit-wise, there’s a lot to like. While the Canadiens have loaded up on the back end in recent years, there aren’t a lot of high-end skilled players in their system, even after adding Demidov. Their only other somewhat recent attempt that isn’t in the NHL already is Filip Mesar, a pick that doesn’t look great two years later although he could still turn it around. Hage has a legitimate top-six ceiling which is something this team definitely needed.
They also needed a legitimate top-six centre prospect. Kirby Dach remains a question mark as the long-term second middleman behind Nick Suzuki and Alex Newhook might fit better on the wing when all is said and done. There’s a chance that Owen Beck and Oliver Kapanen can get to a second-line spot but from an organizational planning standpoint, they’re probably slotted in the bottom six and if they beat that, all the better. It’s far from a guarantee that Hage gets there but it’s nice that they have someone with that upside in the system.
If Hage pans out, he and Demidov could be a good second duo to help anchor a second scoring line. Hage also has enough all-around offensive skills to fit in with a high-end offensive piece in Demidov. Give those two a winger that can take care of some board battles and net-front elements and they might have something to work with long-term.
That said, I sense there’s going to be a development challenge here. Offensively, if things go well at Michigan, Hage might only need a couple of years before there’s not much more he can do at the NCAA level. But defensively, he requires a lot of work; two college years probably won’t be enough to get him pro-ready. Defensive awareness and effort are hard to teach at the NHL level so even if Hage turns pro after his sophomore year, I think he’s someone who they will want to start in Laval to work on honing in on some finer points before giving him an extended look with Montreal.
There has been an uptick in recent years of college players signing quickly and playing right away but with that development challenge, Hage might not follow that same path. He’s not at the level of the usual mid-round dart throw that’s a five-year project but it wouldn’t be shocking to see them go with more of a traditional curve of a couple years and then some time in the minors.
In the end, the pre-draft gamble to move up five spots appears to have worked out with Hage slipping out of the top 20 and likely wouldn’t have still been there at 26 had they not made the trade with Los Angeles. As a result, they have the highest-ceiling centre prospect since Jesperi Kotkaniemi. Kotkaniemi was rushed to the NHL but don’t expect Hage to be following suit.
