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David Reinbacher

Canadiens Activate, Reassign David Reinbacher

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The Canadiens have assigned top defense prospect David Reinbacher to AHL Laval, per a team announcement. Reinbacher had spent the first four and a half months of the season on the non-roster list after undergoing left knee surgery on Oct. 1 but will now get his campaign underway in the minors.

Reinbacher, 20, was selected fifth overall in the 2023 draft. He signed his entry-level contract a week later but was loaned back to Switzerland’s EHC Kloten for most of the 2023-24 regular season. This year was set to be his first full-time in North America, but a knee injury sustained in a preseason contest against the Maple Leafs trashed most of his campaign.

The 6’2″, 194-lb righty looked good to close out last season in Laval. He suited up 11 times down the stretch in the AHL after his Swiss National League season ended, scoring two goals and three assists with a plus-six rating. On a high note, he also began the 2024-25 campaign with two assists in three games for Austria at the final Olympic qualification tournament, although they didn’t make the cut.

Reinbacher exploded in his draft year, scoring 3-19–22 in 46 games with Kloten and earning a plus-seven rating, but a disastrous campaign for the club in 2023-24 saw his totals step back to 1-10–11 in 35 games and a -15 rating. The Canadiens and most others were willing to write that off as an outlier, especially considering his finish to the season after coming across the Atlantic.

There’s no roster math involved for the Habs with this move, as Reinbacher didn’t count toward their 23-player limit or the salary cap. He’ll now get a look at top-four usage in Laval before a potential late-season call-up to Montreal.

David Reinbacher Out Five To Six Months After Knee Surgery

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Canadiens top defense prospect David Reinbacher will miss most of the 2024-25 season after undergoing surgery on his left knee Tuesday morning, the team announced. He’s expected to return to play in five to six months.

It’s likely worse news than Habs fans expected after Reinbacher sustained the injury during the first period of Saturday’s preseason loss to the Maple Leafs. After he was on the receiving end of a hit from Toronto defenseman Marshall Rifai, he fell awkwardly into the boards between the benches, landing awkwardly on his left leg. He was able to get off the ice under his own power but was in visible pain.

Montreal didn’t disclose the specifics of Reinbacher’s knee injury. They’re also waiting on official news regarding a return-to-play timeline for top-six winger Patrik Laine, who also sustained an injury later in the first against the Leafs after a knee-on-knee hit from Toronto depth forward Cédric Paré. He’s also likely looking at a long-term absence.

Reinbacher, 20 later this month, was the fifth overall pick in the 2023 draft. He spent his 2023-24 season on loan to Switzerland’s EHC Kloten, where his all-around numbers took a step back from his draft year. He managed a goal and 10 assists with a -15 rating in 35 games after posting 22 points and a +7 rating in 46 games for Kloten in 2022-23. He ended the season with a strong stretch of play with AHL Laval, though, logging five points and a +6 rating in 11 appearances.

He would have been looking to make his NHL debut in 2024-25, potentially on opening night, if he could have finished training camp on a high note. His season debut will now have to wait until at least early March, however, and it’s likely that he’ll spend his brief playing time this year back in Laval while getting back up to speed in his development. The Habs will be out one of their most intriguing prospects for most of the campaign, but it does mean less competition for playing time for other young defenders like Lane Hutson, Logan Mailloux, and Jayden Struble.

Since Reinbacher didn’t log any days on the NHL roster last season, he’ll carry a $0 cap hit while on season-opening injured reserve. However, he’ll still collect his prorated $855K base salary as scheduled.

Snapshots: Lindholm, Maple Leafs, Austria

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One of the free agents that the Canucks lost in free agency this summer is center Elias Lindholm.  Acquired early in the season from Calgary, the veteran ultimately inked a seven-year, $54.25MM contract with Boston.  In an interview with Hockeysverige’s Ronnie Ronnkvist, GM Patrik Allvin indicated that Vancouver tried to keep the 29-year-old but ultimately couldn’t afford to bring him back.  Lindholm is coming off a down season that saw him notch just 44 points in 75 games (after putting up 64 and 82 points in the prior two years) but given the high demand and low supply of centers, he was able to land another long-term agreement at a considerable raise.  Ultimately, Vancouver elected to fill Lindholm’s salary slot with a pair of former Boston wingers in Jake DeBrusk and Danton Heinen.

More from around the hockey world:

  • While the Maple Leafs shook up parts of their roster this summer – particularly on the back end – there was no big change among their core group. GM Brad Treliving defended that decision in an appearance on TSN 1050 (audio link), stating that “I know sometimes people fall in love with ’let’s make a big change just to make a big change. But at the end of the day, you can go out and make big changes, if they’re not making your team better, to me it doesn’t make any sense.”  While no major trade was made, Toronto did add Chris Tanev and Oliver Ekman-Larsson on the back end and with Mitch Marner and John Tavares now on expiring contracts, they’ll have the cap flexibility to make a big change if they want to next summer.
  • Austria’s roster for the upcoming Olympic Qualifying Tournament was announced There are no active NHL players on it with Marco Rossi taking a pass to focus on preparing for training camp next month.  However, a pair of top NHL prospects are on the roster, Canadiens blueliner David Reinbacher (fifth overall in 2023) and Red Wings forward Marco Kasper (eighth overall in 2022).

Canadiens Reassign David Reinbacher To AHL

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The Canadiens reassigned 2023 fifth-overall pick David Reinbacher to the AHL’s Laval Rocket on Monday, per the minor league’s transactions log. The organization’s highest-drafted defense prospect will get his first taste of North American pro hockey to close out the 2023-24 season.

Reinbacher spent this season on loan to EHC Kloten of the Swiss National League, where he’s played since making his professional debut in 2021-22. The 19-year-old logged major minutes on one of the worst teams in the league, finishing second among Kloten defensemen with a goal and 11 points in 35 games with a -15 rating. It was a downturn in production compared to last season from the Austrian defender, although it’s excusable given the state of Kloten, which cycled through multiple head coaches and posted a -69 goal differential in 56 games. Once one of the best teams in the country before the turn of the century, Kloten was relegated to the second-tier Swiss League in 2018 before gaining promotion back to the NL in 2022.

The right-shot blueliner inked a lucrative three-year entry-level contract which could pay him up to $6.35MM shortly after last summer’s draft, but his European Assignment Clause meant he needed to return to his Swiss club after not making the Montreal roster out of training camp. However, by all accounts, that was the plan as early as draft day. If Reinbacher doesn’t get a recall to the Canadiens and remains under 10 NHL games played on the season, his ELC will not go into effect this year and will slide to 2024-25. If that occurs, he will be an RFA in 2027.

Laval is in a fight for a playoff berth in the North Division, trailing the Toronto Marlies by three points with two more games played for the final berth. The Canadiens hope Reinbacher can slot into a defense that’s allowed a division-worst 209 goals this year and play major minutes during their 12 remaining regular-season games in preparation for a battle for a roster spot during next season’s training camp.

East Notes: Östlund, Reinbacher, Gomez, Bochner

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The Buffalo Sabres confirmed today they’ll be loaning 2022 first-round pick Noah Östlund to the Växjö Lakers of the Swedish Hockey League. It’s unclear what the delay was in Buffalo announcing the move – Växjö confirmed it in early June. Regardless, it presents a step up for Östlund, as the 19-year-old center spent last season in the second-tier Allsvenskan with Djurgårdens IF, where he recorded a respectable 26 points in 37 games. He’ll aim to carve out a top-nine (potentially even top-six) role in Växjö, who is coming off two SHL championships in the span of three years. This is expected to be his last season in Sweden before coming to North America to play for either the Sabres or AHL’s Rochester Americans in 2024-25.

Elsewhere in the Eastern Conference:

  • In some other loan news, CapFriendly reports the Montreal Canadiens have recalled 2023 fifth-overall pick David Reinbacher from EHC Kloten of the Swiss National League ahead of rookie camp next month. Reinbacher will not suit up for them this season, however – they’re expected to return him to Switzerland when training camp is over, and he’ll lace up the skates in a top-four role for Kloten. The 6-foot-2, 194-pound right-shot Austrian defender could see full-time NHL action as soon as the 2024-25 season.
  • Former New Jersey Devils forward Scott Gomez has found a new post-hockey home with the BCHL’s Surrey Eagles, the junior A club with which he posted 124 points in just 56 games with during the 1996-97 season. Gomez, a Calder Trophy winner and two-time Stanley Cup champion with New Jersey, will be an assistant coach next season. Gomez has not worked behind a bench in nearly five years, last serving as an assistant coach with the New York Islanders from 2017 to 2019.
  • The Carolina Hurricanes have hired Daniel Bochner as a development coach, according to a team release. The 38-year-old has spent the last five seasons on staff with the KHL’s SKA St. Petersburg in a player development role, graduating to an assistant coach job in 2020-21. Born in Toronto, the former pro defenseman carries Israeli nationality and represented them at multiple low-level World Championship tournaments throughout the 2000s.

Prospect Notes: Korchinski, Dvorsky, Reinbacher

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The Chicago Blackhawks are quickly assembling one of the more tantalizing prospect pools in the league, at least in terms of upside. While much of the discussion is around their expected generational talent in Connor Bedard, don’t gloss over last year’s seventh-overall pick – defenseman Kevin Korchinski, who NBC Sports Chicago’s Charlie Roumeliotis says the organization faces a short-term decision on in regards to his playing future.

The 19-year-old defenseman had an incredible campaign with the WHL’s Seattle Thunderbirds, tallying 73 points in 54 games during the 2022-23 season en route to a WHL championship and Memorial Cup berth. But due to the NHL-CHL transfer agreement, he’s not yet eligible for assignment to the AHL’s Rockford IceHogs next year, leaving him with two options: the NHL or a return to juniors, where he has very little left to prove. Blackhawks head coach Luke Richardson doesn’t have a crystal ball into what the organization may decide, telling Roumeliotis, “we’re confident he’s going to be here. When? We don’t want to put a label on that right now.”

It seems the most likely scenario is, at the very least, a nine-game trial for Korchinski out of training camp before determining whether or not to burn the first year of his entry-level contract, which could slide to 2024-25 if he plays less than 10 NHL games this season.

Some more notes on a pair of top-ten picks:

  • Bally Sports Midwest’s Andy Strickland confirms that 2023 tenth overall selection Dalibor Dvorsky will return to Sweden for 2023-24, honoring the first season of a two-year commitment he signed with SHL club IK Oskarshamn earlier this summer. Dvorsky is technically eligible for AHL play this season under the NHL’s transfer agreement with Swedish leagues, given he was a first-round pick, but he (and the Blues) believe a year of experience against the top level of Swedish competition is the right choice for his development. Dvorsky did play pro hockey in Sweden last year, but it was with second-division club AIK – part of the HockeyAllsvenskan league, not the SHL.
  • Montreal Canadiens co-director of amateur scouting Nick Bobrov sat down with The Athletic’s Arpon Basu, commenting on the organizational philosophy that led them to select defenseman David Reinbacher at fifth overall – a pick contested by some who believe the team should’ve taken a swing on Matvei Michkov, who fell to seventh overall. Emphasizing Reinbacher’s solid pro play and well-rounded analytical profile, Bobrov did have an interesting comment regarding concerns about the team’s lack of scoring: “So I would push back against the notion that we have no scoring. We have very young players who always scored, and they’re getting better every month. And then, you know, how many 40-goal scorers did Vegas have this year? You start looking at the playoffs, right? The playoffs.” Scoring by committee isn’t a new philosophy for the Habs, who haven’t had a player hit the 80-point plateau since Alex Kovalev in 2008.

Montreal Canadiens Sign David Reinbacher

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The Montreal Canadiens have signed recent fifth-overall selection David Reinbacher to a three-year entry-level contract, according to a team announcement.

CapFriendly has word on the financial details: the contract carries a $950k cap hit and a $2.117 AAV factoring in possible performance bonuses. Reinbacher has $1MM available in “type A” performance bonuses for the three years of the deal, and gets $500k in “type B” performance bonuses available to him in the final year of the contract. The deal also contains a European Assignment Clause in its first two seasons.

The Canadiens have not finalized their plan on where they’ll have Reinbacher play next season, though by signing this entry-level deal Reinbacher will now get the chance to compete for an NHL job at training camp next fall or be assigned to their AHL affiliate, the Laval Rocket.

Reinbacher could also always be loaned back to the club he was drafted from, EHC Kloten, and have his entry-level deal “slide” another season just as many players have in the past, such as Moritz Seider with the Detroit Red Wings.

Laval is shaping up to be extremely well-stocked with Canadiens prospects next season, with top names such as Joshua Roy, Riley Kidney, Logan Mailloux, and more expected to see regular minutes for the team’s AHL affiliate.

There is merit to the idea that having Reinbacher log heavy minutes with that group is the best route to take for his development, as it would not only acclimate him to smaller North American ice surfaces but also allow him to build lasting relationships with his potential future teammates.

There is also merit to loaning him back to Kloten. Reinbacher had quite the season for the recently-promoted Swiss side, rapidly climbing their depth charts and moving from a bottom-pairing, number-six role near the start of the season to a top-pairing, minutes-eating role by the end of the year.

Worth noting is the fact that if Montreal does assign Reinbacher to Laval out of training camp, the European Assignment Clause in the deal likely means that the Canadiens will eventually have to loan Reinbacher back to Kloten at a certain point in the season.

It’s Reinbacher’s immense success in one of the more talented men’s leagues in Europe that got him drafted so high (along with his upside as an all-around defenseman, to be clear) so it wouldn’t be surprising to see Montreal double down on Kloten being the right environment for Reinbacher to develop in even without any time in Laval.

Regardless of what path the Canadiens ultimately choose, signing this entry-level deal was largely a formality for Montreal with Reinbacher. While the team faced heavy backlash from a small-but-vocal subset of its fanbase for passing on Russian superstar winger Matvei Michkov to draft Reinbacher, just a quick look at the latter’s game film from Kloten shows exactly why he was made such a high pick.

Reinbacher spent quite a bit of time at Canadiens development camp partnered with and playing with the team’s other top defensive prospect, Lane Hutson, and it’s easy to imagine the two complimenting each other and Reinbacher in the future serving as the long-term partner for the player he recently called “the next Cale Makar.”

But before that can happen, Reinbacher will need to continue to develop his game, and by signing this entry-level deal he’s opened up every possible option in order to do so.

Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Atlantic Notes: Matthews, DeBrincat, Reaves, Reinbacher

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Although numerous insiders have spoken about their confidence that the Toronto Maple Leafs will end up re-signing Hart Trophy winner Auston Matthews, it doesn’t appear a deal is imminent according to The Fourth Period’s David Pagnotta. Pagnotta says “a deal is not yet close,” and adds “his next deal will be 3, 4, or 5-year” term.

Matthews would be a league-altering free agent if he were to hit the open market, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to get there. It’s something of a surprise that the Matthews won’t be locked down to a longer term, but going on a shorter deal allows him to take another bite of the apple down the road to secure another massive deal in his late 20s.

Some other notes from the Atlantic Division:

  • Ottawa Senators general manager Pierre Dorion told The Athletic’s Ian Mendes that they “are not close” to an Alex DeBrincat trade. Many had assumed that the Senators would push to make a trade before the 2023 NHL draft in order to potentially add a first-round pick for Ottawa to be used in tonight’s first round. But Ottawa’s reluctance to give other teams permission to negotiate a contract extension with DeBrincat has likely slowed the trade negotiations, meaning we’re unlikely to see a DeBrincat deal in the near future.
  • Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reports today that the Toronto Maple Leafs are “looking to beef up their bottom six,” and specifically connects two names to the team: Ryan Reaves and Austin Watson. Neither Reaves or Watson offer much on the ice outside of their physical play, but given the perception among many that Toronto didn’t put up enough of a fight in recent playoff series that might be exactly what the team needs.
  • The Montreal Canadiens have been eager to give recent top selections every chance to make their NHL roster in the fall after their selection, but that may not be possible with David Reinbacher. The Austrian defenseman told the media after the draft, including Sportsnet’s Eric Engels, that he has one more year of business to take care of before joining the Canadiens organization in North America. Reinbacher played in the Swiss National League in his draft season and could return to EHC Kloten for another year, or he could move to another team in Europe.

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