Montreal Canadiens VP of hockey communications Chantal Machabee issued an update to reporters today, saying that goalie Carey Price suffered a setback and is “essentially starting from scratch in his rehab for his knee,” remaining out indefinitely.
Price underwent knee surgery in late July after the conclusion of the team’s ill-fated Stanley Cup Final run. He was originally supposed to be ready for the 2021-22 season, but also took a personal leave of absence from the team prior to the start of the season. He had begun to skate with the team intermittently after returning in November, but they never issued any timeline for a return.
It’s not a promising sign for Price’s future after previous injury troubles in his career. The 34-year-old netminder is signed through 2025-26 with a cap hit of $10.5MM.
The lack of Price in the picture gave the starting role to Jake Allen, who’s been just okay. It’s hard to fault him and his .901 save percentage with the state of the team in front of him, however, as they’ve scored just 76 goals through 36 games.
A bigger issue than Allen’s play has been the lack of a reliable backup, however. With Price unavailable, the team claimed Sam Montembeault off waivers from the Florida Panthers prior to the season. He’s struggled to be a reliable NHL goalie, posting just a 1-6-3 record and .895 save percentage.
Injuries are one thing but this is a right fine mess. Get a GM in place and start from scratch. Bergevin and Timmons have left a
foul stench at the Bell centre.
Time to just shut him down for the season not worth further injury at this point
Even more to the point, take Price off of LTIR, and the Habs are over the cap by a whopping $6 million. What they really have to be wishing right now is for Price NEVER to come back.
Ehhh, come on. Allen’s “just okay” while Montembeault is “struggling?” When you’ve got a save percentage of .901 vs .897 (where it stood after last night’s game), the difference between the two is that if Montembeault saved ONE more goal over his fourteen games, that’d be tied up. Allen’s stinking out the joint just as badly. Best you can say about him is he isn’t tanking as a starter as badly as Grubauer is.