Habs steal a defenseman from the Jets on Saturday.

There is going to be a ton of waiver activity in the coming days as we rapidly approach what will be the start of the regular season for most of the teams in the National Hockey League. Not only is this a busy time of year for waiver activity under normal circumstances, but several years of a relatively flat cap in the NHL have pressed teams right up against the cap and will force many of them to make tough waiver decisions over the coming week.

On Saturday the Winnipeg Jets were unfortunately treated to a prime example of this when one of their veteran defenseman was stolen away by the Montreal Canadiens. The Canadiens put in a claim for defenseman Johnathan Kovacevic who was waived by the Jets on Friday and with no other team above them in the waiver priority submitting a claim, Kovacevic is now officially a member of the Montreal Canadiens.

Kovacevic is a former third round draft pick (74th overall) of the Jets at the 2017 NHL Entry Draft and has been primarily used at the American Hockey League level since joining the organization. Last season Kovacevic had 3 appearances at the NHL level, scoring no points, picking up a pair of penalty minutes, and finishing with a plus minus rating of +1. At the AHL level with the Manitoba Moose he had 11 goals and 19 assists for a total of 30 points over 62 regular season games.. He finished his season in the AHL with 45 penalty minutes and a plus minus rating of +23.