With Kaiden Guhle nearing a return, there was a potential logjam on the horizon on Montreal’s back end. That’s no longer the case as the Habs announced Friday that they’ve traded Jayden Struble to Nashville for a 2027 second-round pick (from Vegas).
Struble was a second-round pick by the Canadiens back in 2019 and after finishing his college career in 2023, he made his way to Montreal in short order. He spent most of the next season with the Habs and has been a full-timer on their roster since then.
Heading into this season, Struble had seven goals and 28 assists in 172 games along with 139 blocks and 358 hits. However, his playing time had dipped in each of the last two years, going from 16:07 per game in his rookie year to just 14:01 last season. Meanwhile, he was often a healthy scratch when Montreal’s blueline was fully healthy.
The 25-year-old played in the first three games of this season alongside Arber Xhekaj but was sat on Thursday against his new team in favour of Adam Engstrom. With Martin St. Louis talking about how he feels that Engstrom is NHL-ready, it’s not surprising that they’ve made a move to give the youngster a shot at a full-time roster spot.
Interestingly enough, a former Hab likely had a hand in this deal being made. William Trudeau, who played in Laval the last four years but is now with the Predators, was injured against his former organization last night. Trudeau is set to miss several weeks and was placed on injured reserve today. Instead of them calling someone up from AHL Milwaukee, they instead opted to make this move for Struble.
Struble is in the final season of his bridge deal, a contract that carries a $1.4125 million cap hit. He’s slated to be a restricted free agent with salary arbitration rights next summer and with how contracts are starting to jump, it’s possible that he’ll be pricier than the Habs would want to pay a depth defender. Now, they get themselves a bit of short-term cap space and an extra second-round pick at their disposal.
With the swap, the Habs now have eight picks in the 2027 draft, including extra picks in the second and seventh rounds while not holding one in the third as part of the trade-up move to select Gleb Pugachyov.