Carey Price has never wasted a word. According to The Athletic, he wrote his Hall of Fame speech in one sitting, in a single morning, and expected to use only about three and a half of his five minutes. That fits the goalie we watched for 15 seasons: quiet, direct, and at his best when the moment was biggest. He was inducted on Monday night in Toronto, and tonight the Canadiens add him to their Ring of Honour. Here is the story behind both ceremonies, told through his own words, from the boy in Anahim Lake to the man who stepped on that stage.
The best speech he ever gave had six words
It was not given on a stage. It happened in a dressing room, at the second intermission of Game 7 of the 2021 first round against Toronto. Montreal had been down 3-1 in the series after scoring only two goals in three straight losses. Price told the media he believed his teammates would find the net. He never said he would take care of the other end. He just did it.
At Scotiabank Arena, a few blocks from where he was inducted, the Canadiens led 2-0 after two periods and the room was silent and tight. Everyone knew they were 20 minutes from knocking out a big rival. Price broke the silence with one line: “This is what it’s all about.” Phillip Danault told The Athletic he still gets chills thinking about it. Joel Edmundson answered with a short, colourful agreement. Montreal won 3-1, with an empty-netter making it 3-0 before Toronto scored late.
Price remembers it simply. Everybody was nervous, and he loved that feeling, because it meant they were playing for something that mattered. He said it is one of the things he misses most. As a coach, I will tell you why that moment worked: the goalie is the one player who cannot hide from pressure, and when he is the calmest person in the room, everyone else breathes.
A plaque that starts with Ulkatcho
Most Hall of Fame plaques open with the team or teams the player represented. According to The Athletic, Price’s begins with the words “A member of the Ulkatcho First Nation in B.C.” He still considers himself an Anahim Laker even though he no longer lives there. His message to young people, repeated every time he is asked, is the same: be proud of yourself and your heritage, set goals, and give everything you have to reach them. In his speech he thanked the Cariboo Chilcotin area and the Ulkatcho First Nations, and for many First Nations kids, seeing a goalie from their part of the world make it to the Hall is proof that the door is open.
The dream: Anahim Lake, a red carpet and Patrick Roy
Price opened his speech by saying that all he ever wanted to be was a hockey player. Anahim Lake has roughly 1,500 people, so he knew the odds were slim without two things: a relentless desire and an opportunity. The opportunity, he said, was time. It meant a mother and a son apart, and a father and a daughter apart, while he travelled more than 200 miles to Williams Lake for minor hockey. Now a parent himself, he understands that this was the biggest sacrifice of all, and he thanked his mom, his dad and his sister Kayla, as NHL.com’s speech highlights recorded.
He thanked the coaches, parents and volunteers of his childhood, then the Tri-City Americans, where he spent four years and still loves to fish. He had a word for Hamilton, too, calling the group that won the 2007 Calder Cup special and joking that giving the reins to a 19-year-old was a gamble. Then came the part I loved most. As a kid, Price pictured himself walking a red carpet and meeting Patrick Roy. He thanked the Canadiens for letting him live a literal childhood dream, and the fans for the love they showed him, saying it is always a joy to come home.
Simple is hard: how Price changed goaltending
Pekka Rinne, who went into the Hall with him, had a career almost parallel to Price’s. Both stayed with one franchise, both own most of that franchise’s records, and they sit 22nd (Rinne) and 24th (Price) on the all-time wins list, according to The Athletic. Asked how the two of them influenced the position, Rinne turned the question around: he said it was easier to explain how he watched Carey change the game. When Rinne started, the position was evolving quickly, and Price was on the front line of the new technique. Everybody was trying to model themselves after him. Rinne described it as very good technique in a quiet way, and said he tried to slow his own athletic game down after studying Price.
Price grew up idolizing Roy, who made the butterfly the standard, and he tried to copy Martin Brodeur’s puck handling. His own explanation of his style is humble: he just tried to play as simply as possible, and it takes a special mindset to slow things down. Coaches, take note. Smooth movement, perfect positioning and saves that look easy are not luck. They are the result of removing every unnecessary move. If you coach a young goalie, this is the lesson: calm hands and a calm head beat flash every day.
“A human like everyone else”
At the Hall of Fame ring presentation on Saturday, TSN’s Glenn Schiller asked Price how he wants to be remembered in Montreal. He did not give the usual answer. He said he wants to be remembered as a down-to-earth person who tried to have positive interactions with fans, and as a human like everyone else.
The Athletic explains that this was a reference to his alcoholism, which Price chose to fight publicly toward the end of his career. When he was asked about it later, he said hockey players are idolized, and that what matters to him is showing that he is not a perfect person: he has faults, he made mistakes, and he learned from them and worked to get better. Price has never wanted to be treated as a hero for overcoming his addiction. What he wanted was to set an example by asking for help. That is a powerful message for any young player, and for anyone who thinks that strength means doing everything alone. It also fits with how he ended his speech, thanking his wife, his children and, in his words, God for his forgiveness.
The pads, Kelowna and the door that stays open
Among the memorabilia he brought to Toronto, Price donated a set of pads and a mask to the Hockey Hall of Fame. He said it was the hardest thing to give up. They are the pads he wore in his last NHL game, on April 29, 2022, and he has not worn any goalie pads since. Today he lives a happy life in Kelowna, B.C., and says his commitment is at home. A future in hockey, maybe even a push to win the one trophy he never got, is still in the back of his mind. But he is not the kind of person who does things halfway, so the answer is maybe when his kids are older. He said the time is not yet.
A small moment in Toronto
There was a light moment during Brian Burke’s speech. Burke wished out loud that he had brought a bottle of water to the stage, and Price stepped over and handed him his own. Burke joked that it bothered him to take help from a goalie, and noted that the class had two of them. There was a Montreal link, too. Patrice Bergeron thanked his former agent, Kent Hughes, now the Canadiens’ general manager, and recalled winning Olympic gold with Price in Vancouver and Sochi.
Coach’s view: what young players should take from Price
First, desire without opportunity goes nowhere, and opportunity is built by the people around you. Second, use your words rarely and make them count. Third, the best players make the game look simple. And fourth, strength includes asking for help. Young goalies in the Habs system, from the prospects we follow every day to Jacob Fowler, would do well to listen to this speech twice. For how Fowler is following in Price’s steps, read As Price Enters the Hall, Fowler Follows in His Steps.
Tonight: the Ring of Honour
The Canadiens will honour Price in an on-ice ceremony before the game against the Minnesota Wild at the Bell Centre tonight, Tuesday, Nov. 10. He becomes the 62nd member of the Ring of Honour, and the first one added since Shea Weber in 2024, according to NHL.com. The numbers explain why. His 361 wins are the most of any goalie in franchise history, 47 more than Jacques Plante. He leads the franchise in games played with 712, and his 49 shutouts rank third behind George Hainsworth and Plante. In 2014-15 he won the Hart, Vezina, Ted Lindsay and Jennings trophies in the same season.
We will be watching, and HABSHQ will have more after the ceremony. If you are in Montreal, be in your seat early. A goalie who gave this city fifteen seasons deserves a loud welcome home. Our Canadiens Lineup Tonight page has everything for the game against the Wild, and our earlier tribute, Carey Price: From Anahim Lake to the Hall of Fame, tells the full career story.
Sources: The Athletic, Hall of Fame profile of Carey Price; NHL.com, “Hockey Hall of Fame Class of 2026 induction speech highlights”; NHL.com, “Price to be honored by Canadiens on Nov. 10 following Hall of Fame induction” (Aug. 19, 2026).
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