Kent Hughes has been a busy man since being hired as general manager of the Canadiens on Jan. 18, 2022.
Since then, Hughes has made 52 trades, according to Puckpedia, acquiring 38 players while trading 42 players away. Hughes has also acquired 34 draft picks and traded away 25 picks.
Hughes has done an impressive job, taking over what was the worst team in the NHL and helping the Canadiens improve every season during his tenure while making the playoffs the last two seasons and advancing to the Eastern Conference final this year.
Seven players on the current Canadiens roster were acquired by Hughes in trades: defencemen Noah Dobson, Mike Matheson and Alexandre Carrier, along with forwards Kirby Dach, Alex Newhook, Zachary Bolduc and Phillip Danault. Forwards Juraj Slafkovsky and Ivan Demidov were drafted by Hughes, along with defenceman Lane Hutson and goalie Jacob Fowler.
But no general manager — including Hughes — is perfect when it comes to trades and/or draft picks.
Defenceman David Reinbacher has been unable to stay healthy since being selected fifth overall at the 2023 NHL Draft and has played only two games with the Canadiens. Forward Filip Mesar, selected 26th overall at the 2022 NHL Draft after Hughes took Slafkovsky with the No. 1 pick, had 9-18-27 totals in 71 games last season with the AHL’s Laval Rocket and was a healthy scratch in the playoffs for the second straight year. Hughes made up for the Mesar pick by selecting Hutson in the second round that year with the 62nd overall pick. Hughes acquired that pick as part of a trade that sent defenceman Brett Kulak to the Edmonton Oilers.
With the Canadiens getting closer to their ultimate rebuilding goal of not just making the playoffs but being legitimate Stanley Cup contenders for several years, the next trades Hughes makes will be huge as he looks to add a top-six forward (preferably a centre) and an experienced right-shot defenceman who could play beside Hutson.
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The worst trade Hughes has made so far was acquiring Dach from the Chicago Blackhawks.
First Hughes traded defenceman Alexander Romanov to the New York Islanders, along with a fourth-round pick at the 2022 NHL Draft (used to select defenceman Isaiah George), in exchange for the 13th overall pick that year. Hughes then traded the 13th pick to the Blackhawks (used to select forward Frank Nazar), along with a third-round pick (forward Gavin Hayes) in exchange for Dach. Nazar, a 5-foot-10, 190-pound centre, had 15-26-41 totals in 66 games last season with the Blackhawks, while Dach had 8-7-15 totals in 37 games while continuing to deal with injury problems.
But Hughes hasn’t given up on the 6-foot-4, 221-pound Dach, signing him last month to a one-year, US$3.6-million contract, hoping the 25-year-old can finally stay healthy and maybe show it wasn’t a mistake trading for him.
Here’s a look at three players Hughes traded away in the rebuilding process who went on to have success elsewhere.
Tyler Toffoli: In the first big trade Hughes made less than a month after being hired to start the rebuild he sent Toffoli to the Calgary Flames in exchange for Emil Heineman, Tyler Pitlick, a first-round pick at the 2022 NHL Draft and a fifth-round pick in 2023. Hughes used the first-round pick to select Mesar and the fifth-round pick to take goalie Yevgeni Volokhin.
On the bright side, Heineman was part of the package that allowed Hughes to acquire Dobson from the Islanders last summer.
As for the 34-year-old Toffoli, he has 136 goals over the last six seasons, including 19 last season with the San Jose Sharks. Cole Caufield (165) and Nick Suzuki (139) are the only two Canadiens to score more goals during that span.
Artturi Lehkonen: A month after trading Toffoli, Hughes sent Lehkonen to the Colorado Avalanche in exchange for defenceman Justin Barron and a second-round pick at the 2024 NHL Draft. That pick was later traded to the Los Angeles Kings as part of a package that allowed the Canadiens to move up and select Michael Hage with the 21st overall pick.
Lehkonen scored the Stanley Cup-winning goal in his first season with the Avalanche and has scored 85 goals over the last four seasons while earning a spot on the No. 1 line with Nathan MacKinnon and Martin Necas.
Hughes traded Barron to the Nashville Predators two seasons ago in exchange for Carrier.
Jake Allen: In hindsight — which is always 20/20 — the Canadiens made a big mistake sticking with three goalies for the majority of the 2023-24 season before finally sending Allen to the New Jersey Devils in exchange for a third-round pick at the 2025 NHL Draft that was used to select goalie Arseny Radkov.
The three-goalie situation wasn’t good for Allen, Samuel Montembeault or Cayden Primeau, who the Canadiens eventually gave up on and traded to the Carolina Hurricanes in exchange for a seventh-round pick at the 2026 NHL Draft. That pick was used to select forward Tyler Deakos 224th overall — the final pick of the draft.
In 68 games over the last two seasons with the Devils, Allen has a 2.71 goals-against average and a .906 save percentage.
