Since the pandemic-shortened 2020-21 NHL season, a goaltender has posted a .900 save percentage or better (at least 30 games played) 160 times.Three of those belong to Sam Montembeault in 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25, when he had a .902 percentage. Another belongs to Jakub Dobeš this season, when he finished with a .901 in 43 games.Among those 160 goaltending performances, you can find a few examples of a goaltender like Dobeš emerging with a season like the one he just had as a 24-year-old rookie and launching their career. But you can also find examples of goaltenders who took a step back the next season.Ville Husso, for example, was 26 and in his first full NHL season for the St. Louis Blues in 2021-22, when he got 38 starts and went 25-7-6 with a .919 save percentage just as he hit unrestricted free agency. The Detroit Red Wings signed Husso to a three-year contract worth $4.75 million a year, and Husso has not been the same goaltender since.What Dobeš accomplished this season for the Montreal Canadiens as a rookie was nothing short of remarkable, particularly his performance in the playoffs, where he is essentially assured of finishing first among goaltenders with 13.3 goals saved above expected, nearly five more than any other goaltender, according to Moneypuck.com. He was the biggest reason the Canadiens advanced to the Eastern Conference final.It bodes extremely well for his future.“The sky’s the limit in my head,” Dobeš said at the end of the season. “I want to do whatever I possibly can to have the best career. I feel like this is just the beginning, and hopefully I will continue to play like that next year too.”It left an impression on his coaches, his teammates and management as well.“The one thing that always stands out to us about him is even if he gives up a soft goal, he just has such a competitive spirit that if the game is still on the line, he’s going to continue to fight,” general manager Kent Hughes said. “And that’s to his credit.”Husso’s story has to be in the back of Hughes’ mind, however. Dobeš has a year left on his contract, so that is not necessarily an immediate concern. But the volatility of the goaltending position makes it the most difficult position to manage.The Canadiens know that firsthand, because the main reason Dobeš was given the opportunity to emerge and blossom this season is precisely that their goaltending plan fell prey to that volatility.Montembeault was supposed to be the Canadiens’ No. 1 goaltender, but he never lived up to the billing. After finishing fifth in the NHL in goals saved above expected and being Canada’s third goaltender at the 4 Nations Face-Off last season, Montembeault’s game fell off a cliff, forcing the Canadiens to change their plan at the trade deadline.They did not trade for a goaltender, though they did make some inquiries. Instead, they called up 21-year-old Jacob Fowler and shifted Montembeault down to No. 3 on the depth chart.“I had a discussion with Sam when we called up Fowls just after the trade deadline. We were coming back from California,” Hughes said. “I told Sam, ‘We know you’re a good goalie. You’re not playing up to your capabilities right now. You’re not the first goalie (this has happened to). Several of the best goalies in the world have had difficult seasons.“I asked Sam to keep fighting: ‘We have no idea how it will go, but keep yourself in the best shape and be ready to be a good teammate.’ I couldn’t say a bad word about Sam Montembeault. I think he’s in the best shape of his life, first of all, so you see all the work he put in.“As a teammate, he was exceptional.”That discussion with Montembeault is revealing.“We had a good talk when Jacob was called up,” Montembeault said. “I really appreciated it too that he called me in before the announcement that he would be called up and told me everything that was going on. He gave me the example that Jeremy Swayman last year didn’t have that good of a year, but came back, and this year he’s a Vezina finalist.“Things didn’t go my way this year, but he said I wouldn’t have a contract like this if I never played real good hockey. He said you’ve been really good all three years he was there, so I’ve just got to turn the page this summer, put the work in and make sure this is just a one-off.”Hughes mentioning Swayman is interesting because of the similarities to Montembeault’s down year. Swayman did not have a contract entering training camp in 2024, and that standoff with the Boston Bruins was only resolved Oct. 6, severely hampering his preparation and putting him under a lot of pressure to live up to that eight-year, $8.25 million per year deal. Montembeault also felt a lot of pressure entering camp this season. It just wasn’t contractual.“I think when I got here, I put too much pressure on myself right away, and when it started going badly, there was a lot going on in my head. As a goalie, that’s the worst thing you can do,” Montembeault said. “So, I would go into games, and my skill wouldn’t show because there was too much going on in my head. My mindset wasn’t good. I wasn’t going into games thinking I could make the difference. I was going into games thinking I can’t get scored on.“When you’re going into games like that, you can’t expect it to go well.”Montembeault was adamant about his desire to return in the fall, that this was not necessarily the end of his Canadiens tenure, but also that this was not his decision to make, that it was “above my pay grade.”Hughes and hockey operations president Jeff Gorton have that decision to make, and Hughes joked at the end of the season that he’s always said having three goalies is not ideal, and here they are again.But in today’s NHL, where No. 1 goalies don’t play nearly as much as even Montembeault did last season — he finished tied for fourth in the NHL with 60 starts — perhaps having three goalies is not such a bad thing, especially when one of them, Fowler, can be stashed in the AHL without needing waivers and can get the playing time he still needs to continue his development.There are teams in the NHL that need a goalie, and seeing as the Pittsburgh Penguins were able to trade Tristan Jarry and actually get something for him without retaining salary this season, it is not difficult to imagine a market for Montembeault. But goalie trades rarely bring back much of a return, and unless the Canadiens can get something significant back, they need to at least consider the possibility that Montembeault is a good insurance policy.Maybe last season was a sign of Montembeault’s decline, but maybe it was indeed a one-off. That is a determination they will need to make, but if it were a one-off, Montembeault would still be a valuable piece for the Canadiens next season.And if Montembeault winds up back in the No. 3 position for the final year of his contract, he’s already demonstrated he can do that without being a distraction to the team.“Monty’s unbelievable,” Dobeš said. “I mean, the support I got from Monty and Jacob throughout the playoffs, it’s really unbelievable. Those guys were supporting me no matter what. Unbelievable teammates, both of them, really. Three goalies is weird, (but it was the) best time we ever had. Always positive, always smiling, always laughing, jokes.“We had a great time together.”Hanging on to Montembeault would be a risk, but it seems like a risk worth taking. The downside is that Montembeault could find himself in the same position he was in this season, though he handled it like a professional.But the upside is having the ultimate antidote to the volatility of goaltending: having options.