Montreal Canadiens defenceman Lane Hutson’s name was trending on social media Wednesday for two reasons: One, he played the previous night and scored a goal and an assist in a 5-0 preseason win against the Ottawa Senators. But perhaps more importantly, the New Jersey Devils announced a seven-year contract for restricted free agent defenceman Luke Hughes worth $9 million a year.

Hutson is entering the final year of his entry-level contract and has been eligible for a contract extension since July 1, yet no deal is in place. Coming off a Calder Trophy season where he set an NHL rookie record for assists by a defenceman and finished sixth in overall defenceman scoring with 66 points, finding a comparable contract for Hutson is not easy.

Thus, the Hughes signing seems significant. But how significant?

We asked The Athletic’s Canadiens columnist Arpon Basu and national columnist Pierre LeBrun for their reads on the situation.

Arpon Basu’s viewpoint

While Hughes’ $9 million AAV may appear like a natural comparable for Hutson, and it certainly factors into the equation, what might be more significant is when the contract was signed.

We are entering a new financial landscape in the NHL, and contract extensions are generally proving to be tricky. Everyone knows Connor McDavid is eligible to sign a contract extension, yet he hasn’t. Same goes for Jack Eichel, Kyle Connor, Artemi Panarin and several others. The one exception, of course, was Kirill Kaprizov, but it took an NHL record-shattering $17 million AAV to get it done.

Those are all pending unrestricted free agents, of course, so they don’t serve as direct comparables for Hutson, but those cases are indicative of a general sense of the unknown when it comes to what a fair salary will be in a rising salary cap world.

On the one hand, you have players and agents who want a bigger share of the pie, based on prior comparables and the percentage of the cap those contracts take up. On the other hand, you have teams looking to hold the line and create a new standard in a league where fewer and fewer teams are likely to spend to a rising cap.

Thus, with two sides seemingly at odds butting heads over what this new world will look like, leverage becomes a major factor in the timing for signing a contract.

In Hughes’ case, he did not have much leverage until Devils training camp began. With each passing day, the regular season drew nearer and that leverage continued to shift toward Hughes because of how important he is to the Devils’ playoff hopes. The same could be said of Anaheim Ducks centre Mason McTavish, who was skating with the OHL’s Ottawa 67’s until he signed a six-year contract worth $7 million a year on Saturday.

One potential tipping point here is that Monday would be the deadline for a contract with deferred money included to be filed with the league. The mechanism, which allows teams to artificially lower a cap hit by spreading the money out longer than the contract length, will no longer be permitted as of Tuesday. We don’t know if this will impact Hutson. We do know the Canadiens discussed deferred money in Jake Evans’ contract negotiations last season — and we know that because their own TV show aired that conversation between general manager Kent Hughes and executive VP of hockey ops Jeff Gorton.

But aside from the deferral deadline, Hutson has very little leverage. He has one year left on his contract, and even at the end of this season, he will be a 10.2.c restricted free agent, meaning he will be ineligible to sign an offer sheet. He will also be two seasons away from arbitration eligibility.

His only real leverage will come when training camp starts in 2026, and seeing as that is what it took for Hughes to sign in New Jersey and for McTavish to sign in Anaheim – with Luke Evangelista still unsigned in Nashville — it is not difficult to foresee a world where the Hutson negotiation will eventually be resolved then, once the leverage imbalance evens out a little bit.

Now, it’s fair to ask whether it’s worth it for the Canadiens to fully flex their leverage with a player who is a big part of their future. Canadiens fans will recall how this went with defenceman P.K. Subban. After his entry-level deal and coming out of a lockout, he signed a two-year bridge contract on Jan. 28, 2013 — eight days after the Canadiens’ first game of the regular season. Subban won the Norris Trophy that season, and, once that bridge deal expired, had an arbitration hearing. Before the ruling could come down, he signed an eight-year contract worth $9 million a year.

The relationship between the Canadiens and Subban never really recovered.

Do the Canadiens want to go down a similar road with Hutson? What would it take to bridge what appears to be a rather sizable gap between the two parties?

One other factor comes to mind. In July, Gorton was asked a general question about using percentage of the cap as a basis for contracts as the cap rises. Hutson’s name never came up, but one of Gorton’s concerns was how those contracts would play in the dressing room. Captain Nick Suzuki is making $7.875 million for the next five seasons, and Cole Caufield, Juraj Slafkovský and Kaiden Guhle all agreed to slide in underneath that number.

“The agents, they love that. That’s how they hang their hat. The cap’s going up, and it’s the percentage, the percentage, the percentage,” Gorton said in July. “But at the same time, they don’t have to run a team. They’re not in the room, they don’t understand a guy walks back in the room making much more than this guy, how does that make sense? So on the team side, it’s a little harder, right? You’re trying to manage all these things, and you don’t want a lesser player that is not as good as somebody else walking in making way more money than another guy. Because it’s real, right? So those things, when agents argue for percentage of the cap, percentage of the cap, percentage of the cap, it can be a little too much for me. Generally speaking, that’s an argument for the better players.”

All this to say: There are more factors impacting the Hutson negotiation than money. And while the Hughes contract in New Jersey adds context to the discussion, it’s possible we won’t know just how impactful it is for some time yet.

Lane Hutson’s camp is surely going to point to Luke Hughes’ contract as an apples-to-apples comparison. (Scott Taetsch / Getty Images)

Pierre LeBrun’s viewpoint

Arpon, no doubt the Hughes contract injects a fresh comparable into the discussion that neither the Canadiens nor the Hutson camp can ignore, though using comparables always seems to be in the eye of the beholder.

Even though they’re not defencemen, the Habs could point to Hutson’s runner-up in Calder Trophy voting, Dustin Wolf, the Calgary Flames’ MVP last season, who just signed for seven years at $7.5 million AAV. They could also point to the Ducks’ McTavish, a young core player who just signed for six years at $7 million AAV.

The Hutson camp would prefer to look at Hughes as an apples-to-apples defenceman comp (even though Hughes played two full NHL seasons when signing his new deal, while Hutson has one full NHL season under his belt).

As an aside, the Hughes extension in New Jersey also has the family dynamic of Jack Hughes being on the team. No one has said this, but I would imagine the Hughes family as a whole felt the Devils have quite a bargain now in Jack making $8 million a year for another five years and that Luke needed to get his. Who could blame them for thinking that, if that was the case? So, in that respect, the Luke Hughes extension is a bit unique, perhaps.

But $9 million for a young defenceman coming out of entry level is now the board regardless.

Everyone involved in the Hutson negotiations has been very tight-lipped about how things have played out so far, but I believe the Canadiens have been aggressive in their approach to this point.

Obviously, it hasn’t resulted yet in an extension.

At the crux of the matter is how Montreal is trying to build a cap culture that helps foster a better ability to contend long-term. Easier said than done, of course. But I look at how the two-time defending Stanley Cup champions in Florida have done that. There are other factors at play there, such as no state income tax, but GM Bill Zito is a former player agent just like Habs GM Kent Hughes, and I think there’s a parallel to be drawn in how both men see the building of team and culture.

I go back to what Hughes said to me in our sit-down interview on Sept. 2 at the GMs meetings in Detroit. I asked about the rising cap in the NHL, how cap percentage for players in contract talks was a rising trend and how the Canadiens, in trying to curate their cap culture, were trying to stick-handle around it.

“I would say that we’re more inwardly focused than outwardly focused in terms of what we do,’’ Hughes responded. “I don’t think that’s a novel concept. I think there’s other teams in the National Hockey League that look at it that way. I get it that you can’t turn a blind eye to everything, but I would say that if we’re successful building the type of organization that we’re trying to build in Montreal, then people are going to want to be part of it.”

Hutson was never mentioned by name in that specific exchange, but obviously, that negotiation screamed out at the heart of what it all meant right now as the Canadiens try to continue to carefully lock up their core.

There’s also a philosophical discussion at play here, too.

No one should begrudge Kaprizov for breaking the bank when he had the Minnesota Wild over a barrel. Good for him. But at the same time, don’t try to tell me his No. 1 priority is winning in Minnesota, either. Again, I always support a player maximizing his financial leverage. Hockey players have forever been paid less than their counterparts in the other major sports. Good for Kaprizov. But at the same time, let’s be adults and acknowledge that making $17 million a year makes it more difficult for the Wild to build a deeper team around him. The salary cap was never a healthy dynamic for the NHL Players’ Association, let us not forget.

Which brings us to Connor McDavid, the best player in the world. He can command whatever he wants in his next contract. It’s a blank cheque from the Oilers. It’s McDavid who decides what he makes next if he decides to sign an extension in Edmonton. Just don’t be surprised if it’s not for as much as Kaprizov’s $17 million. One reason is that it’s probably going to be a shorter-term deal (if he signs). But the other, and this is genuine and paramount for McDavid, is that he would want the Oilers to have as much ability as possible to keep adding pieces around him.

And, well, do I need to mention that Sidney Crosby never fully maxed out his financial leverage during Pittsburgh’s contending years? He was a bargain forever at $8.7 million AAV because he wanted to win first and foremost.

This brings us back to what I believe the Habs are trying to build culturally in Montreal. Again, it’s easier said than done. But part of their sales job to Hutson, I would imagine, is their long-term vision for building out their core and how that all works under the cap.

Hutson is a very special player. He’s such an important part of what this Habs ascension looks like. I don’t envy the Habs as they try to thread that needle between the overall team needs long term, building a true Cup contender and also fairly paying a young stud who is on his way to what appears to be a spectacular career.

Can both things be achieved? It’s a delicate dance.

(Top photo of Lane Hutson: Minas Panagiotakis / Getty Images)