Lane Hutson a unique asset among Habs young defenders
After enraging a large portion of the fanbase by selecting Juraj Slafkovsky first overall on day one of the 2022 NHL Entry Draft, general manager Kent Hughes soothed them by drafting Lane Hutson nearing the end of the second round the following day.
Slafkovsky and Hutson– both highly talented youngsters– represent two extremely different schools of thought in the new NHL.
Both players are physical anomalies. Slafkovsky was listed at 6-foot-3 and 238 pounds as of the Habs’ 2022 training camp, tying him with then-teammate David Savard and Alexander Ovechkin as the league’s eighth heaviest player– as an 18-year-old. Slafkovsky’s reported weight dropped to 230 pounds prior to the 2023-24 season, still enormous for a player of any age. The Slovak uses his big frame and long reach to maintain possession of the puck along the wall and relies on short outlet passes and quick puckhandling skills to outmaneuver opponents and compensate for his lack of dynamic skating skills.
Hutson, on the other hand, has dynamic skating skills in spades. Then listed at 5-foot-8 ¼ and 158 pounds, Hutson was the shortest player invited to the 2022 draft combine and the third lightest, behind only Josh Filmon (157 pounds, drafted 166th overall by New Jersey) and Jagger Firkus (151 pounds, drafted 35th overall by Seattle).
Though he has grown to 5-foot-10 and 162 pounds according to his college team, the Boston University Terriers, Hutson is still severely undersized at his position– and it takes an impressive and adaptable talent to adjust to the NHL as a vertically-challenged blueliner. During the 2022-23 campaign, only nine defensemen under 5-foot-11 played more than 50 games: Quinn Hughes, Sebastian Aho, Erik Brannstrom, Troy Stecher, Samuel Girard, Matt Grzelcyk, Jacob Bryson, Torey Krug, and Jared Spurgeon.
Luckily for the Canadiens, Lane Hutson is an impressive and adaptive talent, and adds an offensive flair to an otherwise defensive-oriented prospect pool on defense.
A quick look at the Canadiens’ roster tells us that the team currently has eight defensemen 26 years or younger on their main roster– albeit Jayden Struble and Mattias Norlinder were recent call-ups due to injuries to David Savard, Jordan Harris and Chris Wideman.
In the system, the team also holds the signing rights to 2023 fifth overall pick David Reinbacher, 2021 first rounder Logan Mailloux, Adam Engstrom, a versatile two-way player from Sweden, among others.
Here are the organization’s 26-and-under defensemen, sorted by height:
Note that the one defenseman beneath Hutson, Miguel Tourigny, is among the list’s least impressive defensemen. Tourigny is currently relegated to the Lions, the team’s ‘double-A’ affiliate at the age of 21. It’s unlikely he receives an entry-level contract from the Canadiens before his rights expire this summer.
In short (pardon the pun), it isn’t being short that makes Hutson such a strong prospect. Jordan Harris, listed just an inch taller than Hutson and in his sophomore season with the Canadiens, shares very few traits with Hutson.
Both are plus-skaters, but that’s where the commonalities end. Harris is a bit taller and notably thicker than Hutson, and as such has the tools to be a more reliable defender. Harris’s edgework, vision and overall offensive arsenal are not in the same breath as Hutson’s and resultantly, he’s forced to play a more conservative style of hockey.
For comparison’s sake, Harris scored three goals and added 18 assists in 33 games in his draft-plus-two season in the same American collegiate division that Hutson now plays in. That would remain his career high in points through all four seasons of college hockey. Hutson, meanwhile, is coming off a rookie season in which he potted 15 goals and added 33 assists, and has scored eight goals and 16 points through 12 games already this season in his draft-plus-two campaign.
Harris, who won the NCAA’s best defenseman award for the region of New England his senior year, can’t even hold a candle to Hutson’s achievements in the same league in just his rookie year:
(Screenshot via: Eliteprospects.com)
That isn’t meant as a knock against Harris, either– albeit he has his flaws as a primarily even-strength defenseman at the National Hockey League-level. Harris’s 48 points are the most from an 18-year-old defenseman in the NCAA since Craig Redmond in 1982-83, above hall-of-famer Brian Leetch’s 47 points in 1986-87 and Norris winner Adam Fox’s 40 points in 2016-17.
Unlike Hutson, the role Harris will need to settle into to further his NHL career is going to be a complementary one, bouncing between the bottom two pairs of a team’s lineup and making up for a more specialized partner’s woes with his positioning, ability to start the breakout, and comfortability playing as either the left or right defenseman.
Some possible partners for Harris at the bottom of the Canadiens’ future defense corps are: Arber Xhekaj, Justin Barron, Adam Engstrom and Logan Mailloux.
Engstrom is cut from a similar cloth to Harris– he doesn’t jump off the page in many areas, but that can be a plus. Engstrom is taller and longer than Harris, and provides more potential as a penalty-killer and in rush defense, but both project as responsible, versatile defensemen who, while they won’t rack up points, will contribute to the offense by pushing the puck up the ice safely and with possession.
Arber Xhekaj, much more like Slafkovsky than Hutson, is an anomaly. His raw physical tools are among the league’s best, but that doesn’t mean he is anywhere near the league’s best defensemen. In fact, right now he’s much closer to the league’s worst.
One thing that can be said about Xhekaj is that with him on the ice, things happen. Sometimes good things, sometimes bad things, and sometimes neutral things, but Arber Xhekaj is a high-event hockey player first and foremost.
Across this season and last, Xhekaj is first league-wide in penalty minutes per 60 minutes (8.45) among defensemen with 500 or more minutes played (at 5-on-5), second in penalties drawn/60 (1.41), seventh in giveaways/60 (3.07), fifth in hits/60 (12.55) and 26th in shot attempts/60 (12.68). The hope is that Xhekaj can become a bit more responsible with the puck and amount to something more than a face-puncher with a hard shot, but otherwise he’ll remain a low-minutes, high-energy player.
Logan Mailloux and Justin Barron are also raw, physically gifted defensemen, but are a little less out there stylistically than Xhekaj. It’s this archetype that the Marc Bergevin-regime prioritized when drafting defensemen, and it doesn’t seem that Kent Hughes is averse to this type of player either.
Both Barron and Mailloux, or even Xhekaj could find themselves running the second powerplay unit behind Hutson who will almost definitely run the first.
Mailloux and Barron are big, athletic, and offensively-inclined– though not as big or as athletic as Xhekaj. Fortunately, they are also smarter hockey players than Xhekaj, though hockey IQ is a strength for neither.
Both players struggle in the same way– a way that a partner like Harris could complement amicably. They’re prone to mistimed pinches at the blueline and to coughing up pucks taking risks in the neutral zone and at their own blueline. Consequently it’s unlikely both of these players are regulars in the Habs’ lineup by the time they’re competing, though both are promising assets.
And lastly, there are the other three defenders in contention for a spot on the top pair alongside Lane Hutson: Kaiden Guhle, David Reinbacher, and the veteran Mike Matheson, who is currently the team’s number one defenseman.
Matheson turns 30 in February of this season, and it remains to be seen if his quality of play will hold up into his 30s– but if it does, he is formidable competition for the young guys trying to dethrone him from his role.
Matheson has scored 49 points in 67 games since coming to Montreal via Pittsburgh prior to last season, and set a career-high in points last year despite playing just 48 games.
Historically, Matheson has not been a number one defenseman– or even a top-pairing defenseman– so reducing him to his former role as a second pairing guy could provide the Canadiens a nice luxury should he remain a Hab after his contract expires in 2026.
Stylistically, Matheson is in the mold of the Habs’ defense corps: big, strong, fast, and sometimes a bit stupid. Matheson leans a little more offensive, as he too is a risk-taker. What Matheson is currently is essentially the best-case scenario for Logan Mailloux and Justin Barron, but it is unlikely he holds up his current caliber of play until the Canadiens are competitive again.
That leaves David Reinbacher and Kaiden Guhle, who project as two pillars of the defense corps alongside Hutson. Like Matheson, Engstrom, Xhekaj, Barron, and Mailloux, Reinbacher and Guhle are athletes as much as they are hockey players. It’s a common theme.
At risk of sounding like a broken record, both players are big, strong and fast. What elevates these two above the Justin Barrons and Arber Xhekajs is that Guhle and Reinbacher have the polished defensive game of a Jordan Harris as well.
Guhle has proven so already at the pro level, ranking in the 91st percentile for even-strength defense according to TopDownHockey’s WAR model since entering the league, while Reinbacher, though injured most of this year, produced at a rate in the Swiss national league last year matched only by Roman Josi among under-19 defensemen in the league’s history.
While Reinbacher and Guhle project as minute-eating defenseman, able to play a high quality of hockey at a high volume, they’re not able to fill the unique role that Lane Hutson offers– a role that is almost positionless.
Until 1923, hockey was played with a seventh position in some leagues such as the Pacific Coast Hockey Association: the rover.
While the rover will never make a return to the sport, some players internalize the role, especially at junior and collegiate levels where the gap in talent from the top-to-bottom of the roster is larger.
Hutson is one of those players, and it’s actually innate to his playstyle.
While Hutson will probably not be allowed the same freedom at the NHL level as he receives at the college level, I don’t expect his fundamental approach to the sport will change.
Hutson’s tools are unorthodox, period– but especially relative to what the Canadiens have. There are a handful of defensemen in the NHL with a comparable toolset and physical profile: Adam Fox, Quinn Hughes, Samuel Girard, Shayne Gostisbehere, Calen Addison– and that’s about it.
It’s an archetype that is offensively-inclined by nature. With few exceptions (see: Adam Fox), they lack the defensive capabilities to reach the NHL without well-above-the-mean offensive production. There are smaller defensemen who play a defense-first style (Jared Spurgeon, Matt Grzelcyk), but these are the ones that tend to contribute to the offense with their awareness and passing rather than actively pushing the play forward (okay… maybe Spurgeon falls in both categories). But the point being, while small defensemen are rare, it is even more rare to find a small defensive defenseman. A smaller defenseman is simply at a massive disadvantage if they aren’t essentially doubling as a fourth forward in transition and for many, in the offensive zone as well.
This is the case for Hutson.
Unfortunately, Hutson activates off the blueline so aggressively at times that his partner is forced to defend more 2-on-1s than he should, and Hutson’s not quite quick enough to make up the gap. Hutson’s frame also makes him a much less formidable rush defender and lends him to losing puck battles frequently, but that should improve to a more acceptable level as he gains more weight.
On the flipside, he has a very real chance at becoming one of the most productive defensemen in the entire league.
This is especially important for the Canadiens’ powerplay, which hasn’t ranked in the top half of the league since 2017-18 (12th), and hasn’t ranked in the top ten since P.K. Subban’s Norris-winning season in 2012-13 (5th).
Hutson won’t quarterback the powerplay the same way that Subban did, but he could do it just as well.
As is common with small defensemen, Hutson isn’t a big booming shot type of shooter. He’s a quick snapshot high shortside type of shooter. Rather than big blasts from far away, Hutson prefers to slash his way down from the point by skating routes, interchanging with his flanks, and using head-fakes and direction changes to put himself in a scoring area closer to the net. As he winds through defenders, he’s a threat to either pass or shoot– or find himself even deeper in the zone with the puck still in his position. He’s not one to throw a puck away– he just might get pickpocketed here or there– although his aptitude for protecting the puck is impressive at his size.
It’s not uncommon even to see Hutson beneath the offensive goalline at even strength– a habit that will likely be snuffed out as he reaches a higher level.
Hutson takes these risks– not just with the man advantage– because he’s talented enough that even with the odd consequence, he is a massive net positive on the ice because of it. Without that spark, and hound mentality on offense, we’re looking at a smaller Jordan Harris. One must first find themselves in positions to do great things, before they do them.
As happens with all players, he’ll be forced to reduce his risk frequency in the NHL, but chances will arise and Hutson will have the green light to do a lot. Having one of Guhle or Reinbacher on his right side– likely Reinbacher due to handedness– should allow Hutson a good safety net.
Of course, one shouldn’t count their chickens before they hatch, and there are legitimate arguments against the Reinbacher selection last year, but the future of the Canadiens’ defense looks bright, and Lane Hutson shines brightest among them.
While there remain notable question marks in goal and at the top of the lineup upfront, Kent Hughes shouldn’t have to worry much about his defense. And regardless of how the offensive is built on top of Cole Caufield, Nick Suzuki et al., Hutson should complement it nicely.