Catching The Torch: Xavier Simoneau’s underrated, projectable game

Welcome to Catching The Torch, where we keep an eye on the Montreal Canadiens’ North American prospects and how their development is faring week by week. After filling out a tiered prospect pyramid last week and providing a broad scope of the Habs’ pool of North American prospects, I wanted to use the next couple of weeks as an opportunity to get into the specifics of the Habs’ draft picks and their projectability.

Starting off, I wanted to highlight one of the most severely overlooked prospects in the system, Xavier Simoneau. The 5’7”, 180-pound centre started his Junior career with the Drummondville Voltigeurs in 2018-19, immediately making himself known as one of the hardest forwards to…