With 12 picks in their draft cupboard, the Montreal Canadiens could be very busy prior to the 2025 NHL Entry Draft.

Most fans expect the team to pull off a trade, either to acquire an NHL-ready player as they did when they traded for Alex Newhook in 2023, or to move up in the first round as they did when they dealt a few picks to ensure they could draft Michael Hage 21st overall in 2024.

We’ve already discussed the potential cost to move up at the draft.

Simply put, it’s not as expensive as you’d expect.

MUST READ: Establishing The Cost Of Moving Up At The 2025 NHL Entry Draft

But what if we decided to eschew the established framework for a potential draft-day trade?

Moving Multiple Montreal Canadiens Draft Picks

A proposal by Sportlogiq and RDS analyst Billy Bertrand immediately piqued my curiosity.

He wanted to know what kind of value the Canadiens could come up with if they bundled both their first-round picks with a few mid-round picks.

Trading both firsts in a move up would be the most intriguing option to me. How far would they be able to go up with 16, 17, and maybe a few of their abundance of mid round picks if needed?

— Billy P. Bertrand (@BillypBertrand) May 23, 2025

My initial reaction erred on the side of caution. NHL teams rarely, if ever, package multiple first-round picks, especially if they’re attempting to move up in the draft. That type of deal usually centres on acquiring players who are expected to make an immediate impact in the NHL. For example, the Seattle Kraken traded Oliver Bjorkstrand and Yanni Gourde to the Tampa Bay Lightning in exchange for a pair of first-round picks (2026, 2027). I may be forgetting other examples, but it’s one of the few recent trades involving multiple first-round picks that comes to mind.

In other words, what we’re about to discuss is new territory in the NHL, mainly since we’re including two picks from the very same draft.

Moving more than one first-round pick does happen in other leagues, such as the NBA, but it should be noted that basketball teams tend to focus on five starters, whereas NHL teams need a little more depth to fill in the ranks.

Dreaming Big – Moving Multiple First-Round Picks

The Montreal Canadiens have an overabundance of prospects and draft picks, making this type of trade logical from an asset management standpoint.

If we return to the Perri pick chart to determine the value of Montreal’s picks, we get the following value for their first, second, and third-round picks.

16th overall: 23.51

17th overall: 22.18

41st overall: 7.04

49th overall: 5.19

79th overall: 2.03

81st overall: 1.92

82nd overall: 1.87

Total value: 63.74

According to Perri’s chart, the equivalent value in the first round would land the third-overall pick (62.07).

However, you’d be hard-pressed to convince an NHL team that they should move out of the top three in any draft, even if it projects to be a weak class.

If we trim the fat a little and focus on the 16th, 17th, and 41st overall picks, we get a slightly more realistic trade value of 52.23, which is the equivalent value to the fifth overall pick (50.13).

Again, I’m not sure any team would accept such a trade, particularly since it’s never really been done. In that vein, I assume the team handing over the top-five pick would want to be compensated beyond the values established in the pick chart.

For example, would the Canadiens have accepted the same type of trade ahead of the 2024 NHL Entry Draft? Probably not, chiefly since phenom Ivan Demidov was in play. Even if there was no Demidov to drool over at fifth overall, I’m not sure Kent Hughes would have entertained the proposal for more than a few seconds.

But if a team is looking to add a little more quantity to their prospect cupboard, offering a pair of first-round picks as well as an early second-round pick could build the framework of a very interesting draft-day trade.