Carey Price entered the Hockey Hall of Fame on Monday night in Toronto, closing a weekend built around the Canadiens’ No. 31. Tonight the celebration moves home, where Montreal will raise him into the Bell Centre Ring of Honour before the Canadiens host the Minnesota Wild.
Price was inducted with the Class of 2026: players Patrice Bergeron, Pekka Rinne, Keith Tkachuk and Cindy Curley, and builder Brian Burke. He is the 62nd member of the Canadiens to enter the Hall, in his second year of eligibility, and his plaque was presented by Shea Weber, the former Montreal captain inducted in 2024.
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A speech about desire, sacrifice and time
Price’s speech, covered in NHL.com’s induction speech highlights, began where his career began: Anahim Lake, British Columbia, a remote community of roughly 1,500 people. His family drove him more than 200 miles to Williams Lake to play minor hockey.
“All I can ever really remember wanting to be, was a hockey player. Growing up in a remote community, there was a very slim chance of this happening without a relentless desire and an opportunity.”
He recalled a childhood dream of walking a red carpet and meeting Patrick Roy, the goaltender he grew up wanting to become, and closed the loop on it:
“I’d like to thank the Montreal Canadiens organization for believing in me and giving me the opportunity to live out a literal childhood dream.”
He also thanked Habs fans directly, and said he was proud to have represented the Cariboo Chilcotin area and the Ulkatcho First Nation.
One team, fifteen seasons, every record
Montreal drafted Price fifth overall in 2005, and he never wore another NHL sweater. Across 15 seasons he played 712 regular season games and won 361 of them, both franchise records for a Canadiens goaltender, plus 92 playoff games. His 2014-15 season remains the standard for the position: he won the Hart Trophy and the Vezina Trophy in the same year, a double no goaltender matched for a decade.
That one team loyalty is what made the weekend resonate beyond the numbers. Price told reporters on Saturday that it always felt like Montreal was where he was supposed to be. The fans who travelled to Toronto for induction weekend clearly agreed.
Carey Price Ring of Honour night at the Bell Centre
The weekend has one more stop. Before tonight’s game against Minnesota, the Canadiens will add Price to the Bell Centre Ring of Honour, the franchise’s permanent tribute that circles the arena. It is a fitting order of ceremonies: the Hall of Fame plaque lives in Toronto, but the Ring of Honour hangs over the ice where he actually played.
Montreal then travels to Boston on Thursday to face Bergeron’s Bruins, a neat scheduling echo of a Hall of Fame class that will be linked for decades. For one more night, though, the building belongs to No. 31.
