{"id":527265,"date":"2026-03-28T09:02:51","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T09:02:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/527265\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T09:02:51","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T09:02:51","slug":"montreal-canadiens-sign-gritty-d-man-to-entry-level-deal-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/527265\/","title":{"rendered":"Montreal Canadiens Sign Gritty D-Man To Entry-Level Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Montreal Canadiens <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/CanadiensMTL\/status\/2037605649249419573?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:have announced;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;have announced&quot;}\" class=\"link \">have announced<\/a> that they have signed defenseman Owen Protz to a three-year entry-level contract, which kicks in during the 2026-27 season.<\/p>\n<p>Protz was selected by the Canadiens with the 102nd overall pick of the 2024 NHL Entry Draft. The 6-foot-2 defenseman appeared in 64 games during this regular season with the Brantford Bulldogs of the OHL, where he had five goals, 18 assists, 23 points, 84 penalty minutes, and a plus-45 rating.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Protz is a defenseman with size who plays a very heavy game. With this, he is undoubtedly an intriguing prospect in the Canadiens&#8217; system, and they will be hoping that he can become a nice part of their blueline in the future.<\/p>\n<p>Protz has continued to show promise at the junior level, too. During the 2024-25 season with the Bulldogs, he had five goals, 27 assists, 32 points, and a plus-11 rating. He also had one goal and six points in 11 playoff games for Brantford last year.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, there is a lot to like about Protz&#8217;s game, and it will be fascinating to see how he continues to develop his game from here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Montreal Canadiens have announced that they have signed defenseman Owen Protz to a three-year entry-level contract, which&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":527266,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5103],"tags":[11843,620,265,5,264,21,5147,4,5972],"class_list":{"0":"post-527265","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-montreal-canadiens","8":"tag-2024-nhl-entry-draft","9":"tag-brantford-bulldogs","10":"tag-canadiens","11":"tag-hockey","12":"tag-montreal","13":"tag-montreal-canadiens","14":"tag-montrealcanadiens","15":"tag-nhl","16":"tag-owen-protz"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116306002650415358","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527265","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=527265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527265\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/527266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=527265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=527265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=527265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}