Okay. Thought you might mean the Habs and I was thinking WTF, that isnt reality. Yeah, this isnt some "new thing", has been around forever that you let your top prospects dominate at lower levels before taking the next step.
No, I forgot one word in there lol. I'll say though that from when Savard took over the team to his departure as assistant-GM, this was how the team developped its players with a lot of success.
We saw a number of changes including being coaffiliated to the Bulldogs with the Oilers and a stronger emphasis on coaching there. Just look at Jarvis and how much time he used to spend with Kostitsyn to make sure his game would make it to the NHL.
And, during the Savard tenure (+around 1-2 more years) we had a number of guys who were left a long time to develop join the team and make some sort of impact: Komisarek, Higgins, Kostitsyn, Ryder, Ribeiro, Plekanec, Grabovski... the rushing really started when he left with guys like Price, Latendresse, Sergei Kostitsym and later on with Pacioretty (and everyone we know since 2008).
They made some great points about Winnipeg as well, from letting guys master one level, not being fans of 18 year olds in the NHL (Laine of course, being an "exception" type player having had some historic runs against men during his draft year) and even talking to prospects after each of their games and asking them to write files about each of them. They also put emphasis on the importance of a strong AHL system.
Basically a lot of things some people here don't believe in, despite the amount of case reports from successful teams at drafting/developing that don't rush like we do, nor do they put token coaches in the AHL.