Hutson On Course To Make Canadiens’ History

While the spotlights haven’t been all on Lane Hutson with the arrival of Ivan Demidov and Juraj Slafkovsky’s awakening, the sophomore defenseman is having quite the season. Despite a slow start, more than likely due to his contractual situation, the youngster now has 11 goals and 53 assists for 64 points. That’s an 85-point pace over 82 games, which, on top of making him more than a point-per-game player, would also see him tie a record that was set nearly 50 years ago by Larry Robinson.

No Montreal Canadiens’ blueliner has ever recorded more than 85 since Robinson did it in 1976-77 with 19 goals and 66 assists in 77 games. In that Stanley Cup-winning season, Big Bird was just 25 years old. Hutson is just 22 years old, and last year, in his rookie campaign, he set a new record for most points and assists by a rookie defenseman, surpassing Chris Chelios’ mark of 64 points and 55 assists set in the 1984-85 season. He even tied the NHL record set by Larry Murphy back in 1980-81 for most assists by a rookie defenseman with his 60 helpers.

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After having such a great rookie season, it’s remarkable that he’s on pace for such a jump in point-production and an improvement in goal scoring as well. Last season, the shifty blueliner managed to find the back of the net only six times, but he already has 11 goals this season. It’s worth saying that the improvement didn’t happen overnight. Hutson is always the first to hit the ice ahead of the Canadiens’ practice, and along with Ivan Demidov, he quite often works on his shot, whether director of hockey development Adam Nicholas is on the ice or not.

Some believed that the sophomore jinx would hit Hutson quite hard, that the rest of the league, having seen him play for a year and having had plenty of opportunity to study his play on video, would have come up with a more efficient way to defend him, but that hasn’t been the case. The undersized defenseman is always ahead of the game and manages to elude hits more often than not. After all, you cannot hit what you cannot catch.