MONTREAL— Lane Hutson had already played nearly 19 minutes before he jumped on the ice with roughly 17 to go in the third period and singlehandedly took over the game.
Huston had the Philadelphia Flyers chasing him all over their zone. For nearly two minutes straight, they couldn’t stop him. And with just a smidgen of luck on his side, they’d have not and Hutson would have been successful in shortening the chase his Montreal Canadiens were in — down two goals in what eventually turned out to be a 4-1 loss cemented by Travis Konecny’s empty-net goal with 18:25 to play.
The Canadiens were unlucky, and so was Hutson. The score wasn’t particularly reflective of their performance, and the minus-2 on Hutson’s balance sheet couldn’t have been less representative of his.
Because in this game, Hutson affirmed what had already become clear about him long before the puck dropped — that he’s a leader.
The thing is, this game forced him to lead, with Mike Matheson injured and missing from action for the first time all season and Hutson tagged into the No. 1 spot on the Canadiens’ blue line.
It’s a heck of a position to be in for a 21-year-old kid with just 121 games of NHL experience (regular season and post-season combined) under his belt, but Hutson didn’t look the least bit out of place in it.
Matheson is signed for five more years after this one, but the time for him to cede that spot to Hutson will come much sooner than he’d like it to, because Hutson is undeniable and Matheson knows it. He knows there’s a determination in Hutson that makes him so; a determination that has already propelled Hutson to a meteoric rise to NHL stardom and a determination that will see him break the mould of what constitutes a No. 1 defenceman in this league.
While Hutson may be only five-foot-nine and 162 pounds, his height and lightness don't negate how tall and heavy he plays in all situations.
“The biggest quality for Lane is he’s just a competitor,” said Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis. “His compete level is off the charts on both sides of the puck. You can tell, tonight in the third, he wanted to be the difference. I thought he was dominant.”
It’s what you’d say about Hutson on any given night, but it’s usually better represented on the scoresheet.
Still, shot attempts at five-on-five were 29-14 Canadiens with Hutson on the ice Tuesday. Scoring chances were 16-7 for the home team when he was out there wheeling and dealing. And his expected goals percentage of 72.3 per cent was representative.
Hutson was also dominant on both the power play and penalty kill, though he had nothing to show for that.
What Hutson showed, however, is just how far he’s come since stepping into the league at the end of the 2023-24 season.
What you have to like is that the NHL’s 2024-25 Calder Trophy winner qualified his progress as a sophomore as just “a small step” before saying he expects to take several big ones towards the player he knows he can be.
“I think I just feel more confident, and I feel like I’ve been more assertive in wanting the puck even more and trying to kill more plays and make it uncomfortable for the other team,” Hutson said. “I have so much to work on still. As good as I can feel in a game, you’ve got to do it every game, not just once.”
The Canadiens have played 33 games so far this season, and Hutson has had reason to feel good after most of them.
There were a few at the beginning where he was off, obviously distracted by some building consternation over his unsettled contract situation.
But since signing an eight-year, $70.8-million contract on Oct. 13, only four defenceman in the league have posted more than Hutson’s 27 points. And his play without the puck has been just as noteworthy.
The Canadiens play with and without it was reasonably strong against Philadelphia, erring only a couple of times in the neutral zone and catching a couple bad breaks —one in the defensive zone when a Flyers dump-in hit a linesman and changed the rush pattern the Canadiens were defending, and one in the offensive zone when the puck bounced hard off the lower dasher and over a pinching Alex Carrier’s stick to leave them a bit more exposed to an odd-man rush off a turnover — that resulted in goals against. And St. Louis accurately called rookie goaltender Jacob Fowler’s turnover behind his own net “a freebie” that put the Flyers up 3-1 in the last minute of the second period.
But the coach had to have seen what we did from Hutson from first through third — a player continuing to prove he can handle whatever gets thrown his way.
Eventually, it’ll be harder minutes at five-on-five and more time on the penalty kill, and “eventually” will come sooner than anyone could’ve predicted when Hutson was drafted 62nd overall in 2022.
Because he is uncontainable.
It showed on that wild shift in the Flyers zone, and it’ll continue to show as Hutson’s career progresses.
