MONTREAL — Noah Juulsen and Jacob De La Rose are two players enjoying an opportunity they probably would have never sniffed had the Montreal Canadiens not gotten off to their worst start to a season in 76 years, and they might not even be here if the Canadiens had recovered at any point.

But the 20-year-old defenceman Juulsen and the 22-year-old centre De La Rose are filling important roles in what’s been an extensive garbage-time period for a team that was virtually eliminated from post-season contention by January. Their development has unquestionably been accelerated due to those circumstances, and that’s a firm conclusion you can now draw — especially if you keyed in on both players during Sunday’s 2-1 loss to the New Jersey Devils.

You had to have watched Juulsen really closely on Sunday to know how good of a game he played, which is ideally what you’d say about him after any good game he plays. Simple, smart, efficient, physical; all the things that make up a steady, minute-munching, reliable defenceman. A guy who doesn’t stand out all that much, unless it’s for the right reason. To fit that description in Game 20 of his NHL career is a good sign.

Conversely, if you weren’t watching all that closely, the big Swede wearing No. 25 for the Canadiens would’ve still caught your eye on most of his shifts. That’s a description that speaks volumes about where De La Rose’s game has come since taking on much more responsibility in the void left by Tomas Plekanec’s trade to the Toronto Maple Leafs and Phillip Danault’s long-term absence with concussion symptoms.

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“I think in De La Rose’s case, he’s kind of done what we’ve asked him to do,” said Canadiens coach Claude Julien before the weekend. “I’ve said it before: the first part of the season, or even the first half or even a little bit more — he was playing, but the impact that he had on the game was very, very minimal at best. Now he’s having an impact, where you see him either having a great forecheck, where he’s finishing his check, turning the puck over, creating a scoring chance. That’s what we want to see and that’s what he’s capable of doing.

“That’s what young players have to go through sometimes, they go through growing pains. And that’s why you’re a coach, you’ve got to push them to try and get the most out of them. I always thought there was more to his game and in the first half that was the frustrating part; you were waiting to see that. Good for him for showing the things that we think are in him.”

Good for the Canadiens, too.

On Sunday, De La Rose played 16:06 of impactful hockey. He won 67 per cent of his draws, he had two shots on net, set linemates Alex Galchenyuk and Artturi Lehkonen up with good chances and threw his 215-pound frame into four Devils players.

“I like playing with him,” said Lehkonen. “He works hard, he’s a big body, he wins a lot of one-on-ones, [and] he’s a really fast skater, which makes our line’s game pretty fast, which I personally like.”

For too many of De La Rose’s 64 games prior to this season, those assets just didn’t stand out. And for a fair portion of the ones he played earlier this year, as Julien noted, that was also the case.

If Sunday’s game was a departure from all of that — and a continuance of what we’ve seen from De La Rose of late — part of it had to do with his work in helping the NHL’s worst penalty kill successfully do its job on all five Devils power plays in the game.

Juulsen played his role there, too, hopping over the boards as part of the first unit on each penalty kill.

The kid also played over 20 minutes, had a shot on net, registered six hits, blocked three shots, and was very efficient transitioning the puck from defence to offence. And, in case you didn’t notice, Juulsen really held his own against Devils leading scorer Taylor Hall, doing his part to try to help Carey Price get a win in what was the goaltender’s 556th start — a mark that tied Price with Jacques Plante for most in a Canadiens uniform.

Unfortunately for both Juulsen and Price, Hall slipped in on a short-handed breakaway and scored the winning goal with 4:07 left to play.

It was a tough way to lose a hard-fought game, but the result — as it has been for much of this second half of the season — took a backseat to what was going on for Juulsen, De La Rose and some other young players in the Canadiens lineup.

“That’s why we’re putting those guys in those positions,” said Julien. “At this time of the year, I think we’re looking to develop. We’re not really looking necessarily to win the game. We want to make sure our guys benefit from that, and we’re giving them a chance to do that, and [Juulsen’s] doing a heck of a job at that.

“We’ve got a lot of young guys that are gaining valuable experience from this tough stretch that we’re going through, and, as always, you always hope that you know that it’s going to pay off down the road.”