This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Samuel Montembeault
Montreal Canadiens Goaltender
A .9028 that was worth more than most .920s, behind the fourth-most dangerous shot diet in hockey.
| Season | Team | GP | W | L | OTL | GA | GAA | SO | SA | SV% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018-19 | FLA | 11 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 30 | 3.04 | 0 | 282 | .894 |
| 2019-20 | FLA | 14 | 5 | 5 | 1 | 39 | 3.34 | 0 | 356 | .890 |
| 2021-22 | MTL | 38 | 8 | 18 | 6 | 122 | 3.77 | 1 | 1124 | .891 |
| 2022-23 | MTL | 40 | 16 | 19 | 3 | 133 | 3.42 | 0 | 1345 | .901 |
| 2023-24 | MTL | 41 | 16 | 15 | 9 | 127 | 3.14 | 0 | 1307 | .903 |
| 2024-25 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 144 | 49 | 60 | 21 | 451 | 3.38 | 1 | 4414 | .898 |
This Season So Far
The 2024-25 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
41 games, 16-15-9, a .9028 save percentage and a 3.14 goals-against average on 1,307 shots faced.
That is the best save percentage of his career at 27, against a career .8978 across 144 games. It looks ordinary and it was not: Montreal’s skaters conceded 186.2 expected goals at five-on-five — the fourth-most in hockey — and the club allowed 164. The crease came in 22.2 goals better than the chances it faced, fourth in the league.
The Physical Game
He is 6-3 and 218 and plays a big, square, deep game, letting the puck find him rather than going out to find it.
One career shutout in 144 games, which tells you about the clubs rather than the goaltender. He is not quick across the crease and the depth is how he compensates. He handles the puck adequately and does not go looking for it.
The Mental Game
Rebound control is better than the save percentage suggests; the reason he survives this shot diet is that the second chance arrives less often than it should.
He tracks through traffic well, which behind a blue line that concedes as much as this one is most of the job. Forty-one games behind the twenty-ninth-worst chance suppression in the league is a hard season and he had the best one of his career inside it.
The Intangibles
A third-round pick in 2015 by Florida, out of Becancour, Quebec, five seasons across two organisations, and 49 wins in 144 games at a career .8978.
He is 27 and has become the most valuable player on a twenty-eighth-place club without anybody outside Quebec noticing. If the .9028 is the floor now, this rebuild has its goaltender.