Canadiens claim Blair Betts off waivers, finalize 23-man roster for opening night

The Montreal Canadiens have claimed center Blair Betts off waivers earlier today from the Philadelphia Flyers, who had put the defensive specialist on waivers yesterday to free up cap space. Betts is entering the second and final year of a two-year contract worth $700,000 annually. The 31 year-old center played 75 games for the Flyers last season, notching five goals and adding seven assists for twelve points.

Betts is a very disciplined player as he only took eight penalty minutes all season. Betts finished with a +/- ratio of -3. Betts led the NHL last season among forwards with 3:37 short-handed minutes on ice per game and playing a little over ten minutes per game overall.

The left-handed center finished the season with a 50.3% face-off rate, winning 411 draws on 817 attempts. The absence of a 4th-line center in the Habs organization after the departure of veteran Jeff Halpern was obvious in training camp as no rookie was able to impress head coach Jaques Martin. The leading candidate was Andreas Engvist, but he had a mediocre training camp and he will need more seasoning in the American Hockey League before he can make an impact in the NHL.

Overall, Betts started just 26.9 percent of his shifts in the offensive zone. That’s the second lowest number in the NHL behind the Canucks’ Manny Malhotra, known as one of the league’s best defensive forwards

In order to reach the 23-player limit mandated by the NHL before tomorrow’s opening game in Toronto against the Maple Leafs, the Canadiens have also announced that they have demoted forwards Andreas Engvist, Ian Schultz and Aaron Palushaj to the Hamilton Bulldogs of the AHL. Yesterday, they had placed forward Michael Blunden on waivers to make room; today they did the same thing with veteran rearguard Jeff Woywitka, placing him on waivers as well.

Andrei Markov and Ryan White have been placed on the injured reserve to open the season and make space on the roster to replace them until they come back.

The Canadiens’ 23-man roster as of today October 5, 2011:
Forwards
Mike Cammalleri-Thomas-Plekanec-Andrei Kostitsyn
Max Pacioretty-Scott Gomez-Brian Gionta
Erik Cole-David Desharnais-Mathieu Darche
Travis Moen-Blair Betts-Yannick Weber
Extra:
Lars Eller (still recovering from shoulder surgery)

Defensemen
Hal Gill-P.K. Subban
Chris Campoli-Josh Gorges
Jaroslav Spacek-Rafael Diaz
Extra: Alexei Yemelin

Goaltenders
Carey Price
Peter Budaj

This means the Canadiens will most likely use Yannick Weber as the team’s 13th forward/7th defenseman at the beginning of the season as rookie Rafael Diaz stole his job on the blue line with a solid training camp. The team’s other rookie defenseman, Alexei Yemelin will most likely start as a defensive spare, as he still needs to adapt to the smaller NHL rinks and improve his overall play, especially in his defensive zone.

Carey Price is expected to be the starting goalie tomorrow in Toronto, obviously.

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Fred is a freelance sports writer and translator, as well as a featured Montreal Canadiens blogger on http://hockeyindependent.com/blog/ and a baseball columnist on http://www.dobberbaseball.com/. Fred joined HabsAddict in time for the 2011-12 season.

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