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All things being equal, Canadiens defenceman Andrei Markov will reach two milestones in the coming season.

His 54th game will be his 900th regular-season NHL match, coming in his 15th season with the only club he’s known. Seventeen games later, he will play his 1,000th, including playoffs.

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Markov considered these big round numbers noon-hour Thursday at a downtown restaurant, nodding silently. And he considered a June 1998 day in Buffalo, the city where he could play No. 1,000 next March 16.

On his first trip to the U.S., tired of waiting to hear his name called that NHL draft day in 1998, the 19-year-old left the Marine Midland Arena and went shopping, returning in time to hear the Canadiens make him their sixth-round choice, 162nd overall.

It’s fair to say that he would prove to be a gem uncovered from deep in the earth of that draft.

“When I started, I didn’t think that far,” Markov said of the milestones on his horizon. “Right now, I’m just trying to have fun. Maybe one day I’m going to reach those numbers. Maybe more. You never know what’s going to happen.”