Montreal’s fans know that their organization is the darling of the league. Fresh off a 106-point season and a trip to the Eastern Conference Finals, every little move can transform the Habs from good to great. The hiring of former Tampa Bay Lightning assistant and Detroit Red Wings head coach Derek Lalonde could help in achieving this goal. Particularly for Montreal’s goaltenders, Derek Lalonde’s history shows that he can have a positive impact on defensive structure and goaltending. Those are two areas the Canadiens need to take up a notch.
What Derek Lalonde Brings to Montreal
A former goaltender for SUNY-Cortland in what was then NCAA Division III, Lalonde started coaching at North Adams State College. He worked his way through Division III for seven seasons. Ultimately, he moved up to Ferris State in 2002-03 as an assistant coach at the Division I level. He later worked at the University of Denver. His first head-coaching job in 2011-12 took him to the USHL’s Green Bay Gamblers. He held that role for three years, winning the USHL’s Clark Cup and earning a Coach of the Year honor. Lalonde also held head coaching jobs for Toledo in the ECHL and Iowa in the AHL.
Lalonde joins Montreal, officially announced Monday, for what will be his ninth consecutive season on an NHL bench. He began his NHL journey with Tampa in 2018-19. Lalonde was an assistant coach on both Tampa’s Stanley Cup-winning teams. His final season behind the bench was Tampa’s third consecutive trip to the finals. They ultimately lost to Colorado in six games.
He spent parts of three seasons as a head coach for the Detroit Red Wings with mixed results. Lalonde finished 89-86-23. Lalonde’s best season as a head coach was in 2023-24, when a seven-game losing streak in March cost Detroit a trip to the playoffs in a 91-point season. Detroit fired Lalonde after a 13-17-4 start in 2024-25. He worked in TV for some of that season before returning to the NHL in 2025-26 with Toronto.
Derek Lalonde’s History as a Goalie Could be Important
As a former goaltender, Lalonde has some expertise. He revealed in 2023 that he had been part of a study done by Tampa Bay on their own goaltender, Andrei Vasilevskiy. In his own words on Canadian broadcaster TSN back in 2023, the coach acknowledged that Tampa had conducted a study to determine how to best implement defensive structure to combat Vasilevskiy’s perceived weaknesses from the point. This ultimately maximized his ability.
Lalonde joined Tampa behind the bench in time for the 2018-19 season, leading to arguably the best four-year stretch in Vasilevskiy’s career. He hit a career-high .925 save percentage in two separate seasons. In those four years, Vasilevskiy went 144-52-13 with a .921 save percentage and a 2.43 goals-against average. He finished second or better three times in goals saved above expected during that stretch, per Money Puck.
Montreal’s Goalies Still Have More to Give
This type of influence on Montreal’s goaltenders could be critical. Jakub Dobes had a strong breakthrough season. Top goalie prospect Jacob Fowler also played well. Dobes finished his first full season as an NHL number one, going 29-10-4, with a .901 save percentage and a 2.78 GAA. On an offense-first Habs team, he was eighth in the NHL in goals saved above expected, per MoneyPuck. He was even better in the postseason, leading all goaltenders with 13.3 goals saved above expected.
Fowler had a solid first season in the NHL. He started 17 games, going 9-6-2 with a .908 save percentage, 2.43 GAA and managed to still finish 22nd in the NHL in goals saved above expected among 98 goalies despite only playing 17 games.
A boost from either player, let alone both players, could result in Montreal taking another step. In the regular season, that could mean winning the Atlantic Division. If their structure and goaltending both improve, it could mean much more in the playoffs. If Derek Lalonde’s history in Tampa is indicative of his time in Montreal, that next step could be significant.
How Close is Montreal to Cup Contention?
For a team that finished in the Eastern Conference Finals, that’s a surprisingly tough answer. The young core, as ever, looks phenomenal. The recognition of Lane Hutson as one of the best defensemen on the planet could lead to him representing Team U.S.A. sometime in the future.
Montreal is still in need of another top-six center. Whether that’s through a trade or the arrival of much hyped prospect Michael Hage, a former first-round pick, is anyone’s guess at this point. Still, Montreal has a budding NHL core that just proved it can win playoff games, a deep pipeline system with multiple top-end talents that can either add to the team or be used as trade chips and one of the best long-term goalie situations in the NHL thanks to the combination of Dobes and rising prospect Fowler.
Notably, Lalonde becomes the only other coach on staff with NHL head coaching experience. That experience should be useful for Martin St. Louis. If the latter falters, it also gives Montreal an NHL head coach to fall back on this season.
It’s not quite now or never yet in Montreal. At the moment, it might simply be ‘now.’
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