{"id":488231,"date":"2026-03-06T03:29:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T03:29:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/488231\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T03:29:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T03:29:15","slug":"canadiens-linked-to-zach-whitecloud-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/488231\/","title":{"rendered":"Canadiens Linked To Zach Whitecloud \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Canadiens have held discussions with the Flames around acquiring defenseman\u00a0Zach Whitecloud<\/a> from Calgary, Pierre LeBrun of TSN said on Thursday\u2019s \u201cInsider Trading.\u201d<\/a> He\u2019s one name in a larger push from the Habs to add a right-shot rearguard for their playoff push, LeBrun said.<\/p>\n

It would be Whitecloud\u2019s second trade in a matter of weeks. A career-long Golden Knight, Vegas sent him to the Flames in January\u2019s Rasmus Andersson<\/a> deal, largely as a cap casualty to permit them to make more additions closer to the deadline. Vegas achieved that goal and was able to pick up\u00a0Cole Smith<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Nic Dowd<\/a>\u00a0this week to augment their forward depth without moving out a contract or having retained salary involved.<\/p>\n

He wouldn\u2019t be a rental for the Habs, either. He\u2019s got two more years left on his deal at a $2.75MM cap hit. That\u2019s strong value for the high-end bottom-pairing role he played in Vegas, but he\u2019s been exceptional in a short sample for the Flames while essentially operating as their top defender now without Andersson or\u00a0MacKenzie Weegar<\/a>. He\u2019s averaged over 23 minutes per game, a sharp rise from the 17-to-19 he routinely saw in Nevada, and has posted four assists with an even rating while controlling 54.9% of shot attempts at 5-on-5.<\/p>\n

Whitecloud wouldn\u2019t be slotting into a top-four role in Montreal \u2013\u00a0Kaiden Guhle<\/a> (on his off side) and\u00a0Noah Dobson<\/a>\u00a0have that covered \u2013 but he could be an upgrade over current #3 righty\u00a0Alexandre Carrier<\/a>, who\u2019s having an underwhelming season. There\u2019s also the opportunity, by augmenting their right-shot depth, to ice lefties Guhle, Lane Hutson<\/a>, and Mike Matheson<\/a>\u00a0on three different pairings and sending\u00a0Jayden Struble<\/a>\u00a0to the press box.<\/p>\n

As for what the return might look like, the Habs have just $1.49MM in cap space and can\u2019t take Whitecloud on outright without Calgary retaining salary, something they\u2019re not keen on doing to keep their retention slots open for higher-priced targets. Herb Zurkowsky of the Montreal Gazette<\/a> earlier this week said that the Flames have an eye on the Habs\u2019 Arber Xhekaj<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s decisively Montreal\u2019s #7 defender and has just two points in 51 games this season while averaging under 12 minutes per night, but his 6\u20194\u2033, 240-lb frame and physical style have always generated intrigue. He carries a $1.3MM cap hit, and the Habs may not be too keen on qualifying him at that price, given how little he\u2019s been used, so moving him out would give them just enough cap flexibility to take on Whitecloud but wouldn\u2019t allow them to make any other moves without shipping out more salary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Canadiens have held discussions with the Flames around acquiring defenseman\u00a0Zach Whitecloud from Calgary, Pierre LeBrun of TSN…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":488232,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5103],"tags":[407,26,265,5,264,21,5147,4,3708],"class_list":{"0":"post-488231","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-montreal-canadiens","8":"tag-arber-xhekaj","9":"tag-calgary-flames","10":"tag-canadiens","11":"tag-hockey","12":"tag-montreal","13":"tag-montreal-canadiens","14":"tag-montrealcanadiens","15":"tag-nhl","16":"tag-zach-whitecloud"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116180114978130058","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=488231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/488232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}