Habs Prospects
The Montreal Canadiens Select Aatos Koivu 70th Overall
The Montreal Canadiens have made their third pick of the 2024 NHL Entry Draft, selecting none other than Aatos Koivu from TPS Turku.
Koivu is obviously the son of former Canadiens captain, Saku Koivu. To learn more about the newest member of the Montreal Canadiens you can click here.
Montreal Canadiens Draft Pick Information And Pre-Draft Trades
The Montreal Canadiens owned 10 draft picks heading into the 2024 NHL Draft: 5th Overall, 21st overall (via Los Angeles), 70th overall, 78th overall (via Minnesota), 102nd overall, 130th overall (via San Jose), 134th overall, 166th overall, 210th overall (via Washington) and 224th overall (via Edmonton).
Prior to the draft the team owned 12 picks, but they swung a pre-draft trade with the Los Angeles Kings to improve their draft position. Montreal exchanged the 26th overall pick (via Winnipeg), the 57th overall pick (via Colorado) and the 198th overall pick for the 21st overall pick. Seeing as the Habs already own an impressive prospect pool, as well as plenty of draft capital, it’s the type of trade that fans were hoping to see prior to the draft taking place. Simply put, it’s a matter of quality over quantity for the Canadiens, both for picks and prospects.
The team used the fifth overall pick to select a very talented forward, Ivan Demidov., considered the second-best talent available in 2024. He immediately becomes the most talented and most important player in their prospect pool, which is important seeing as the Canadiens already own one of the best prospect pools in the NHL.
They followed it up by selecting USHL standout Michael Hage, a well-rounded forward that should bring depth, intelligence, and speed to their transition game.
Any way you cut it, the Habs enjoyed a rather successful first round at the 2024 NHL Entry Draft.
If you would like to learn more about the state of the Montreal Canadiens rebuild we invite you to take a look at our ‘State Of The Rebuild‘ series which was published following the conclusion of the 2023-24 season.
Canadiens Contracts: Finding Comparables For Guhle’s Extension
Habs Daily: Free Agents, 2024-25 Schedule, Coaching, Hage
Montreal Canadiens 2024-25 Schedule And Notable Games
Canadiens Free Agency: Searching For The Next Sean Monahan
Habs Daily: Slafkovsky Extension, Free Agency, Laval Rocket
Instant Analysis: Canadiens Hit Home Run With Ivan Demidov Pick
Flyers Made Aggressive Draft Trade Offer To Leapfrog Canadiens
Instant Analysis: Canadiens Add Crucial Forwards In First Round
Canadiens Draft Intentions, RFA Signings, Trade Talk, and UFAs
Tyrone
June 29, 2024 at 12:48 pm
Kooooooiiivuuuuuuu!!!
Dana
June 29, 2024 at 2:34 pm
Great job Marc at creating all these draft articles! Busy boy!
Greg
June 29, 2024 at 4:58 pm
I like that we were able to draft him. There’s talk his numbers aren’t as good as Saku’s 30 years or so ago, but that’s ignoring how much the game has changed.
When you watch videos of these kids growing up, they’re all doing exercises that very few were doing 30 years back. The strength and conditioning is off the charts compared to when I was a kid (in my early 50s), and far better than even the start of the salary cap era. The competition is better, and countries that were doormats are producing star players.
Koivu Jr has lots of time to develop. If he’s anywhere near as good as his dad, he will have a long career.