Jake Allen signs a new deal.

The Montreal Canadiens will be keeping veteran goaltender Jake Allen within the fold for the foreseeable future, likely signalling that the Canadiens expect that they will be needing Allen's services full time in the coming years.

According to an announcement made via the Canadiens' official website on Saturday morning, Allen has agreed to sign a brand new contract extension with the Habs. The extension will keep Allen under contract with the Canadiens for 2 additional years, that is to say until the conclusion of the 2024 - 2025 season barring a trade or any other unforeseen circumstances. The new contract is valued at $7.7 million, which works out to an average annual value and salary cap hit of $3.85 million for the Canadiens. The contract carries with it no trade protection of any kind and comes with a signing bonus in each year of the deal. Allen will earn $500,000 as a signing bonus in the first year of the deal and a signing bonus of $1 million in the second year of the deal.

Allen was already under contract for this upcoming season at a cap hit of $2.875 million and he will continue to play out this contract, with his new deal kicking in on July 1st of 2023.

This would appear to be the latest indication that things regarding the health and future of Canadiens' star goaltender Carey Price are not particularly positive. The Canadiens placed Price on long term injured reserve earlier in the offseason, and there are growing doubts about his future in the National Hockey League and doubts about whether or not he will ever be able to fully recover from his current injury issues.

In Allen the Canadiens are getting a proven NHL goaltender who is still relatively young at just 32 years of age, one that has now been with their organization for multiple seasons. Allen will likely be tasked with a larger workload that he has been asked to take on for the Canadiens in the past, and it will be interesting to see if he performs better or worse with the added pressure on his shoulders.

In his most recent campaign, Allen made 35 appearances for the Habs during the course of the regular season. he recorded a 3.30 goals against average and a .905 save percentage over that stretch.