Jakub Dobeš stood before the microphones after Saturday’s 3-2 overtime loss to the Carolina Hurricanes in Game 2 at Lenovo Center and spoke about a night that felt, for a moment, like everything catching up to him.
Dobeš, who just recently celebrated his 25th birthday, answered questions calmly but with the bluntness of a player who has been through development after development: junior teams in Czechia, the St. Louis AAA Jr. Blues, the Topeka Pilots, the Omaha Lancers, two seasons at Ohio State and then the long AHL grind with Laval that finally delivered him to Montreal’s crease.
The numbers that pushed him into this spotlight are plain: drafted in the fifth round, 136th overall at the 2020 NHL Draft, he signed a two-year entry-level contract in March 2023 and after a 2023-24 season in Laval where he led the AHL in games played with 51, he opened 2024-25 with a 9-3-1 run that prompted a late-December call-up. In his first NHL start he made 34 saves in a shutout of the Florida Panthers. He signed a two-year extension before the 2025-26 season, and by March he was Montreal’s starter, closing the regular season at 29-10-4 with a.901 save percentage and a 2.78 goals-against average.
That regular-season record matters now because it helped carry the Canadiens into a playoff run that has been called historic: Montreal became the youngest team in NHL history to win back-to-back playoff rounds by taking Game 7s from the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Buffalo Sabres. A local outlet has described Dobeš as Montreal’s — and the NHL’s — emerging goalie sensation and called the club’s spring run magical; that glow, though, didn’t prevent a late Carolina goal from erasing Game 2's result.
The immediate tension is obvious. Dobeš’s rapid ascent is the product of an uneven path, and the Canadiens’ goalie depth chart was itself in motion: Montembeault’s struggles early in 2025-26 opened a door, the club recalled Jacob Fowler from Laval in December to carry three netminders, and then Dobeš took over as the starter. The statistical resume is impressive in decisions and outcomes, but a.901 save percentage is not elite, and an overtime loss at home raises the question of whether this is momentum paused or exposed.
There are mismatches between the clean narrative and the facts. He dominated a full AHL season with heavy usage, then made an immediate splash in his first NHL start; he finished the NHL regular season with 29 wins but a middling save percentage. The Canadiens’ youth and dramatic Game 7 victories suggest a team rising together, yet Game 2 showed how quickly a thin margin can flip a series back toward experience and structure rather than emotion.
What happens next is immediate and consequential: Game 3 at the Bell Centre. Montreal needs a response and Dobeš will be central to it. Fans tracking dobes' rise can read more about that looming test in a related piece, Jakub Dobes: Rookie goalie’s streak meets Bell Centre pressure in Game 3, but the matter on ice is simple — the Canadiens must protect home ice and their young goalie must hold up under a crowd and a narrative that has swung from surprise to scrutiny.
When the session ended, Dobeš returned to the locker room without flourish. He has been through departures, call-ups and contracts — from leaving Czechia at 16 to signing extensions in Montreal — and his next appearance will tell whether this season’s climb was a beginning or a benchmark. For now, the team’s historic run and his personal story collide in a single question: can the rookie who became a starter keep defying the odds when the margin for error is smallest?
