Tag Archives: Andrei Markov


 Powered by Max Banner Ads 

Fill Up At The Trough!

Posted on by

Regular season game #5

Both the Habs and Jets came in to Tuesday’s game riding three-game winning streaks. Something was going to give, and it was the type of game where you cringed whenever anybody took a shot on goal; neither goalie was particularly special. My pool is not going to like this one little bit.

The Habs jumped out to a 2-0 lead thanks to goals by Bourque and Gallagher, who displayed the impressive skill and know-how of a seasoned vet. The kid’s a keeper. Speaking of keepers, that Galchenyuk is doing a good job of making folks like me eat their words. I thought Sarnia was a better place for him – not because his skills were not up to NHL standards – but because playing boys is totally different from playing against men. Not to mention the Montreal fishbowl that will soon come to expect miracles from him. Not enough good things can be said about the play of Montreal’s two greenhorns.

While the Habs have jumped out to a 4-1 start and enchanted the city with their sudden ability to score goals, there are still some serious areas of concern that have been a problem for a long time: faceoffs and giveaways. Montreal was almost 50% tonight, winning 34 of 69 draws overall, but the silver lining is that they won 15 of 24 draws in the third period, for a success rate of 63%. With no help on the way, only practice will fix this issue permanently. As for the giveaway minus takeaway differential, the Habs were a woeful minus, coughing the puck up 12 times, and only taking the puck from Winnipeg three times. Once the powerplay comes down from it’s frantic pace (or once the opportunities evaporate), that stat will come home to roost. Subban should help here, but not enough to tilt the ledger in Montreal’s favour.

Habs certainly look good, but their schedule can be safely described as soft, and their extended stay at home has helped them to put badly needed points in the bank. Their schedule will soon tilt to a road-heavy configuration, and considering the struggles of David Desharnais, the pressure to produce will trickle down to Plekanec (again) and Galchenyuk.

We can’t close off tonight’s recap by applauding the work of Michel Therrien. He recognized Desharnais and Eller’s struggles and gave limited ice time in the third period. He didn’t bench Galchenyuk after taking an ill-advised penalty while the team was on the powerplay. He once again kept Tomas Kaberle’s participation to a minimum and overall, managed to coach his team to a win when they very easily could have been staring down the barrel of a deflating loss. Finally, what more can be said of the buffet that Andrei Markov and Raphael Diaz are feasting on? Both are tied for the team lead in points with seven apiece in just give games. Surely this won’t last, but props to them for gorging while the gettin’ is good.

See you again tomorrow.

Follow me on twitter: @kyleroussel

 

Sunday Drive

Posted on by

Regular Season Game #4

I keep some canned text handy for whenever the Devils and Canadiens play. Game reviews featuring these two teams normally read “The Canadiens and Devils played each other tonight. It was slow, boring, tedious and enjoyed by nobody”.

That’s it.

We know the script. The Devils slip in a quick goal or two, then apply the sleeper hold. This night, the Habs looked to turn the script on its ear by jumping out to a quick 2-0 lead, and forcing the Devils to play catch up, which incidentally, they do quite well. For a while it looked like the Canadiens had broken free when Brandon Prust put the team up by two goals early in the third period. But the Devils, dogged lot that they are came back to tie the game and squeeze a point of the affair.

While the Canadiens skate away with another precious two points, there are still some glaring areas of concern. Faceoffs remain a problem, with the team only winning 21 of 59 draws all night. When Desharnais is your leader in faceoff efficiency, Houston, you’ve got a problem. They also continue to flirt with having twice as many turnovers as takeaways, and that’s not a good thing, either. Despite the win, there were a bunch of players who are expected to lead who did not deliver. Plekanec, Gionta, and Desharnais were all virtually invisible all night. It goes to show the Habs paper-thin depth and delicate balance in the top-six when Max Pacioretty is out of the lineup. Virtually everyone was lost. It’s to Alex Galchenyuk’s credit that he carried the offensive mail for the forwards tonight, along with Brendan Gallagher, who scored his first NHL goal on a sweet feed from the Habs third overall pick. Hard work through four games also earns Rene Bourque an honourable mention. With any luck, will soon be rewarded for his work. The biggest accolades, however, belong to Andrei Markov, who has not missed a step since having his knee rebuilt for what feels like the umpteenth time. His importance to the Habs early success cannot be overstated. Anyone who thought he should have never been signed, or that he should be bought out is fit for a dunce cap today.

A win is a win, and it would be awkward to linger for too long on the aspects that ail the team. Hopefully the coaches and players will work out the kinks while they continue to put points in the bank.

Through four games, Montreal look like a tenacious, energetic bunch who are definitely harder to play against. We’ve seen Therrien on the bench communicating with players, we’ve seen him emotional and we’ve seen him supportive of his players. All of this is the opposite of what we had to suffer through under the Jacques Martin regime.

Things start to get tougher from here for the good guys with games against the Jets, Senators, Sabres, Senators, Sabres and Bruins coming up.

Follow me on twitter: @kyleroussel

Striking Back

Posted on by

Regular season game #3

After splitting their first two home games, the Habs ducked the intense cold of Montreal for the warmer climes of Washington to play the Capitals, who thoroughly dominated Montreal last season. The Habs went 0-4 against Washington and were outscored 13-3 in the four games. Given that the Habs were a dismal team, how would they fare against a Capitals team desperate for their first win?

Well, to put it mildly: the Caps stink this season. What a mess they’ve become. Not to dwell on the opposition, but their coaching carousel has not panned out the way they had hoped. Exploding for four goals in the second period (which is one more goal than they scored all year against the Caps last season), the Habs played a perfect road game, right up until, and including Prust’s bout with the game well in-hand. Another message sent.

Montreal weathered the early storm, avoided getting burned ny penalties, and Markov’s brilliance staked the Habs to a lead that the inept Caps could not hope to overcome. A late goal by Gorges effectively sealed the deal as the home town fans darted for the exits.

And what of young messers Galchenyuk and Gallagher? Credit Coach Therrien for having his finger on the pulse of the game and giving more ice time to the rookies as the lead grew larger and safer, including over a minute of power play time to close out the game.

All told, it was as solid a road win as you can ask for at any point during the season. If there’s anything to nitpick, it would be another poor night at the faceoff circle. The Habs went 25 for 55 for a 45% success rate. They also had twice as many giveaways than takeaways (8 vs 4 respectively). Being on the wrong side of those stats while winning can’t go on forever, especially when the competition gets tougher than it has been through three games.

Two players that need to up their game are Ryan White and David Desharnais. While White was mostly applauded for jumping Tomas Fleischmann on Tuesday, he seemed to cross the fine line that Michel Therrien later alluded to. Lars Eller may have found himself an opening to the roster on Sunday evening. As for Desharnais, it seems teams are no longer surprised by him. He has made some good things happen, but a top line center needs to bring more to the table than he has.

These were two points that I don’t think many were counting on. For all the Caps’ struggles, the Habs had become the tonic for what ailed slumping teams. With Therrien’s new system and culture, playing tougher seems to be giving the team the backbone that it has so badly lacked since 2009. Three games don’t make a season, but it sure looks like the Canadiens aren’t going to be the flaccid team that skulked around the ice under Jacques Martin. That in itself is a giant step forward.

Follow me on twitter: @kyleroussel

Lars Who?

Posted on by

Regular season game #2

I kid, I kid. No matter the result, or how you slice it, the decision to make Lars Eller a healthy scratch is a baffling one. Coaches get let off the hook if their choices lead to a win, so we won’t dwell on this but let’s pray that young Eller finds his way back in to the lineup right away. After all, Therrien himself said that young players have to play.

Following Saturday’s loss to the Leafs, the top two lines were deemed to be AWOL for the most part, from top-to-bottom. Not so tonight. Plekanec opened the scoring on a sweet feed from Brian Gionta and David Desharnais reported for duty with a great bit of pocket-picking along the boards to start the play that led to Markov’s power play goal…his first goal with the Habs in a long, long time. We could choose to mention the lazy penalty that Desharnais took to start the second period which led to Florida’s first goal, but we’re trying to enjoy the season’s first win, right?

Suffice it to say that that was the start that Habsland was expecting for the season opener. Better late than never, especially in a season where falling behind the pack early is more or less a death knell. The second period started the way you thought it would given the Habs inconsistencies. They took an early penalty, gave up a goal and surrendered some momentum…that is until Markov put the Habs back up by two, followed by a beauty of a tip by newcomer Alex Galchenyuk for his first NHL goal (also of note was Brendan Gallagher’s NHL point on the goal).

The third period unfolded the way you thought it would. The Habs sat back on a 4-1 lead and in doing so took some penalties, but none as severe as the five-minute major taken by Ryan White when he jumped Tomas Fleischmann for running Gorges in to the boards. If one of Michel Therrien’s intentions is to make the Bell Center an inhospitable place to play for the opposition, then sometimes what White did is a necessary evil. Price (who was again spectacular) and friends made the rest look easy en route to their first win.

If This is the game template that Michel Therrien wants to move forward with then we may see some nice things this season. Though with one dodgy game and one strong game in books, we still have no idea who the real Habs are. In the quest for 8th place, the Habs took the first step forward, and it was a mandatory one. With 6 of their next 9 games at the friendly confines of the Bell Center, they absolutely must rack up wins before going out on the road where recent history shows they suffer badly. They were able to impose their will on the Panthers and their season rides on their being able to do the same on the road.

Time for a Long Nap

Posted on by

It’s nearly time to separate the wheat from the chaff. The NHL playoffs are around the corner and in what is normally a hopeful time for Habs fans, this season, there’s nothing. Nada. Zippo. Nothing to do but root against the Bruins, laugh at the Leafs as they cruise past 3000 days since their last playoff game, and take a long summertime nap. But around here, hockey never sleeps and we’re already asking if it’s October yet; the assumption being that there is confidence in this team’s ability to regroup, reload and reorient itself in hopes of a playoff appearance…or better next year.

Is it foolish to think that this team can rebound so quickly? The Flyers did it a couple years ago, and the Senators did it this year, after being terrible last season. The pieces are already in place for the Canadiens to be a competitive team on the ice, so why can’t the bleu-blanc-rouge rebound next year? Well, look up….look waaaaay up! It’s behind the bench and in the front office where the deep, dark questions lie. What becomes of Randy Cunneyworth? How long will it take for Geoff Molson to punt Pierre Gauthier to the curb once game 82 ends? In my view, before any changes on the roster take place, the coaching and management group needs to be rectified, and they need to be rectified without the restraints of politics and sociology attached to them. If the focus is on anything other than hiring the best people for the job, then the Canadiens are in for more mediocrity. And fans, who have become adept at telling themselves whatever they have to in order to maintain sanity (to no avail!) will be left hoping for things that never come true.

It will be up to Geoff Molson, his next General Manager, and his next coach to ensure that this team breaks free from the shackles of mediocrity that have rendered the Canadiens an afterthought in the NHL. The Habs used to be a model franchise, and used to have clout among the ranks of players and league executives. Those days are long gone, and if they are to be restored, it has to come from years of excellence on the ice, not from winning the “league’s most profitable team” award (though the Habs aren’t tops in this regard, either).

If you’re like me, you’re hoping that Geoff Molson has already begun targeting potential candidates for the soon-to-be vacant General Manager position. You’re also hoping that names like Patrick Roy and Bob Hartley are kept far away from the team. While many would be doing cartwheels to have an ex-legend behind the bench, we should be cautious. Certainly a boost of emotion after the sleep-inducing ways of Jacques Martin would be welcome behind the bench, and Patrick Roy could deliver that. But his greatest asset is also his weakest link. His volatile nature would consume the team and he would be the leading story every day. That’s not what “team” is about. In a city like Montreal, it’s a match set to a pool of kerosene.

Before we cast our collective gaze to the prospect pool, and to the list of free agents, we need to acknowledge that it is all for naught if the right suit-wearing men are not in place to steer the ship. Period.

The Habs will finally (hopefully?) be selecting in the top 3 at the amateur draft in June, so fans can hope that Trevor Timmins will wave his magic wand and pick the large, skilled centerman that the team has so desperately needed for so many years. Many have already zeroed in on Quebec Remparts standout Mikhail Grigorenko as the best bet, but even a teen fresh out of junior should not be parachuted in to the Canadiens’ franchise-saviour role so quickly. That’s a recipe for failure and the Canadiens cannot afford to see this draft pick go to waste.

We can hope that Markov remains healthy throughout the summer, and that he returns to form next fall. Together with P.K. Subban, the Canadiens will have 2 healthy, legitimate top-flight defensemen capable of playing 22 or more minutes per night. Buffered with the likes of future captain Josh Gorges, Alexei Yemelin, and hopefully a free agent addition such as Brad Stuart, the back end should be solid, if not spectacular.

It will be interesting to see what any given sportsbook review will think of the cellar-dwelling Canadiens when the preseason bets start rolling in. Will they give the Canadiens’ talented roster a pass for this abysmal season, or will they come down hard on them for this disaster and cast them as long underdogs yet again? It shouldn’t matter, as in past years the Canadiens have thrived as underdogs while choking like dogs when expected to succeed. That’s a cultural thing that must change, and usually takes time to accomplish. But with the right “win at all costs” attitude, at least you’ve given yourself a shot.

Limbo Champs

Posted on by

As the Habs continue to fight against the current, one thing is becoming more and more clear: this team is not living up to anyone’s expectations. Not the fans’, not the media’s, who, although they didn’t peg the Habs as elite, didn’t have them as being this bad, either. Most importantly, they aren’t living up to their own expectations. We hear it repeated over and over in post game scrums and press conferences about how they we not prepared, not focused, not playing as a team. Now they’re griping about seeing the standings every day in their own locker room and not being pleased with what they see. As the writing on the wall starts to take shape, the mood in the room sounds decidedly flat and negative. A once jovial and tight locker room seems to be fraying at the edges. It’s hard to believe that they’ve turned on one another, given that their good character guys, but it’s not hard to believe that they no longer believe in the game plan that is being forced upon them.

It’s clear that the Canadiens are currently not living up to their own expectations. After all, they were the ones who came up with the “Rise Together” marketing campaign. What, exactly were they implying by that? Rise to where, exactly? To 8th place? 6th place? After a 2010-2011 year in which the Canadiens showed great promise, fueled by Price, Subban and Pacioretty, the team’s Marketing department may have made their first misstep in actually trying to RAISE the bar for once. They finished 6th last year, and, as the refrain goes, if they had Markov, Gorges and Pacioretty all year, they could have done better. So I assume they had higher targets this year.

Oops!

You might tell me that injuries have derailed the best laid plans, but I think that’s nothing but a lazy, old and tired excuse. Markov has been out for so long that he should no longer be factored in to the team’s plans or fortunes until he’s back in the lineup. Same goes for Campoli, a wildcard player left on the free agent scrap heap until late September. Surely, such saviours don’t rot on the scrap heap do they? The only thing we can say is that we don’t know how he would have fit in to this roster. Maybe he would have helped, maybe not. Scott Gomez, another big name and cap hit on the shelf wasn’t producing and was a drag on the team, so don’t tell me about him. You can spin the injury argument all you like, but the Penguins hummed along without Crosby, Malkin and Staal for long stretches so save the injury excuse for the apologist round table discussions. Mismanagement of resources, weak bench management, puzzling choices, lack of coach-to-player communication, motivation, outdated and ill-fitting systems, unprepared (and yes, underachieving) players are the real problems of the team. Many of these can be fixed by putting a Coach in place that puts talent in position to succeed, armed with a game plan that matches their skill sets. That hasn’t happened for much of the last 2+ seasons.

Ask yourself this: What other organization can steeply raise prices across the board and deliver such an average product? Even worse than losing is that they’ve become BORING. From the General Manager, to the Coach and now finally tricked down to the ice, the team is void of flair, personality and FUN. That’s perhaps the biggest knock against the brand of hockey that the Jacques Martin era will be known for. Montreal is a city teeming with flair, fun and personality, and given how tightly woven the Habs are in the fabric of the city, their current state is a loose thread on the tapestry. Yet legions of people are willing to accept it? I understand “accepting it because you’re virtually powerless to change it” (you’re not, by the way), but I cannot comprehend anybody “accepting it because you think it’s good enough”. By the way, the Canadiens have played many poor games this year, and currently have the worst home record in the league. Some reward for those people who scramble to find ways, despite the rapidly escalating prices, to go to the Bell Center and buy up all things Canadiens.

Rise Together? I guess if you’re at the bottom, then there’s nowhere to go but up, right? Maybe this has been the plan all along.

Yet as team owner Geoff Molson stands pat, offering his support for the General Manager, Head Coach, and Gomez alike, it seems all too clear that profits are a higher priority for the powers that be than winning is. This should come as no surprise. All outward appearances seem to indicate that making the playoffs and reaping pure profit from a couple home games is the goal. They tell us that the Cup is the goal, but as we all know, actions speak louder than words. In my last post, I’ve clearly showed that winning the Cup is a matter of home ice advantage. Without it, chances of glory are slim, yet that doesn’t stop pie-eyed optimists from believing that “anything is possible”. I don’t hold that belief against anybody, because anything is possible if you want to get in to semantics, but with just one of the last 34 Cup finalists winning it all (that’s 3%) without entering the playoffs with home ice advantage, I tend to put my stock in the overwhelming stat that has been proven over a long period of time.

And so we’ve become very good at limbo, because we happily bend over backwards to make time for this team, spend money on it and invest our hopes in it. What a pity.

Sadly, the Canadiens, through spin, media mouthpieces, marketing and PR have successfully lowered the bar to the point where making the playoffs is seen as some great accomplishment, and as a result, fans now believe that an upset or two (and even near-upsets) are highwater benchmarks of success.

Many of us know better. Unfortunately, it seems that not enough do.That, my friends, is the magic of good marketing.

He’s Lying to You – Part 2

Posted on by

If you hit up an online sportsbook like http://topbet.com/sportsbook/, you’d have found good odds on whether or not I’d follow up my last post with a sequel. With so much material to write about, you could have taken it to the bank!

During the post-game press conference following the Habs 3-2 shootout loss to the Sabres on Monday night, Head Coach Jacques Martin added to his ever-growing pile of perplexing, curious and false statements carefully designed to deflect pointed questions, avoid damning himself and erect trickster smokescreens. I’m not sure when he’s going to stop insulting the intelligence of the fans and media with his ridiculous answers, but it’s clear from the audacity of some of his replies that he’s running out of tricks.

In a game where the Canadiens dictated the pace and tone through 40 minutes, something changed during the second intermission. In easing back on the accelerator, the Canadiens let the upstart Sabres back in the game. Whether the players were instructed to play it safe or if the players did it themselves out of instinct, lack of confidence or fear of winning, when asked for the reasons behind the Canadiens collapse, Martin offered up the following:

“…a lot of youth on the backend, and they took advantage”.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before. With P.K. Subban, Yannick Weber, Alexei Emelin and Raphael Diaz patrolling the blue line, there certainly were many young kids trying to hold the fort. But is it right to blame them for the loss? A team that has ZERO shots on goal in the third period through 14 minutes sounds like a team that isn’t intent on doing the same things that made them successful through the first 40 minutes – and that includes much more than a handful of young defencemen who played their hearts out. Since taking over as Coach in 2009, Jacques Martin has proven nothing if not that he strongly favours his veterans and only leans on young players if he has no other choice. How else do you explain his overuse of Mathieu Darche on the powerplay? Or Travis Moen on top scoring lines? Or bypassing Lars Eller at nearly every turn despite his rapid improvement? Or benching a slumping Andrei Kostitsyn? Last season, P.K. Subban didn’t rise to prominence until both Markov and Gorges were lost, leaving Martin with no other choice but to play the high-risk/high-reward Subban for 20+ minutes per night.

So are the young defencemen truly to blame, as the Coach would have us believe, or is Martin taking the easy, predictable path of least resistance? After all, if he starts shining the light of blame on his veterans, he can kiss his locker room support – and eventually his job – goodbye. It’s the last bastion of a Coach who can’t adapt, adjust to an evolving game, or make the best use of available resources. Whether it’s strategy or tactics, he simply marinates in old school game plans, then wraps himself in the kevlar vest that is the happiness of veterans while cursing the youth at every turn.

As I listened to Martin drive over his young rearguards and then back over them again, I  thought back to the past two seasons. Oddly, I don’t remember him ever publicly smacking his veterans for their questionable-at-times play. So I took a look at the numbers, and admittedly it’s difficult to try and quantify poor defence. But if we look at turnovers/giveaways under the Jacques Martin reign, we’ll see some eye-popping numbers. No, turnovers aren’t the be-all-end-all metric, but they’re a good starting point. If we can agree that turnovers are a barometer of a player without an idea of what to do with the puck, a player in a panic, a player without poise and without the benefit of experience, then surely veterans must be the opposite, and the numbers will reflect that, right?

Let’s start with this current 2011-12 season. The Canadiens are currently 4th overall in the league in giveaways – that’s 4th most, not 4th least. At first glance you’ll say “AHA! You see, with some many young defencemen, it’s no wonder they’re 4th overall!” Ok, but keep reading. Among the defencemen, it should shock nobody that Subban leads the pack. He’s committed the 6th most turnovers in the entire league, with 17. It’s no surprise that Subban has struggled this year, mightily at times and was guilty of the turnover that led to the Sabres tying goal on Monday night. We’ll concede this to Coach Martin. Right on Subban’s heels is Hal Gill, coming in at 11th place with 16 turnovers, followed by Yannick Weber (31st with14), Josh Gorges (50th with 12) and Raphael Diaz (115th with 9). For their parts, Emelin and Spacek were way down the list, so we’ll let them off the hook. But overall it’s a pretty fair mix of vets and young players, wouldn’t you say? But no, in Martin’s mind it’s easier to only single out the under-25 set. You’ll tell me that Gill didn’t play, and Spacek left Monday’s Buffalo game early. True, but take a look – Gill is still near the top of the leaderboard even if he hasn’t played every game. Hal Gill of 1000+ games played! (Disclaimer: I really like Hal Gill; he can play on my team as long as he wants; his good outweighs the bad).

In Martin’s first season as Habs Coach, the Canadiens committed 910 turnovers, good for 2nd most in the entire league. Leading the group? Roman Hamrlik (3rd in the NHL with 86), Jaroslav Spacek (4th in the NHL with 81), and Hal Gill (8th in the NHL with 76). Well that’s weird. Weren’t those players all in their mid-thirties at the time, with the benefit of experience that thousands of games under their collective belts provides? 2 of the top 5 in the league? 3 of the top 10? Funny, I don’t recall Coach Martin ever blaming his veterans for the team’s defensive woes back then, do you?

Last season in 2010-2011, the Canadiens had a marked improvement. They finished the year with 738 turnovers, still good for a lousy 7th in the NHL. It’s pretty sad when a 7th place finish is seen as a big improvement. Leading the pack? James Wisniewski (23rd with 67, with Isles and Habs), Hal Gill (30th with 62 giveaways),  Subban (49th with 56 and who was a rookie playing the role of a #1 defenceman), Jaroslav Spacek (54th with 55) and Roman Hamrlik (62nd with 53). So while there was a significant improvement, and nobody was even in the top 20, as a team the Canadiens were still guilty of far too many turnovers, and it was largely the veterans who were at fault. Still, we never heard Martin come down on them.

I’ve intentionally left the forwards out of the mix, but rest assured that veterans like Plekanec, Cammalleri and Gomez have all been guilty of many, many turnovers in the past 2+ seasons. Seasoned veterans, all three of them, and they all are among the team leaders in coughing up the puck.

If you’re still with me, I thank you for sticking around. It can be challenging to slog through so many stats and it can be even harder to make sense of them. If you leave this page with any sort of takeaway, it’s this:

  • Experienced defencemen are vitally important, but it’s lazy to always blame young rearguards simply because the Coach says so, or because they make the easiest, most convenient target. The numbers show, at least in part, that in the Jacques Martin era, veterans are just as likely as young defencemen to make egregious turnovers. Regardless of who’s in the lineup (old or young) this team coughs the puck up with regularity.

Instead of pointing the finger of blame at the young blue line, perhaps Martin should be made to explain why his team constantly eases off in third periods? If they maintained an aggressive forecheck, and truly were a puck possession team as he claims they are, then the puck would spend more time in the offensive zone and the “culpable kids” would have less burden on their shoulders, no? We know he said that it’s not the plan to back off, but as I pointed out in part 1, he’s either full of it, or he has incompetent players, and I’m certain it’s not the latter.

With a litany of preposterous answers on the record, Jacques Martin is steadily painting himself in to a corner. The answers all dovetail nicely with his most preposterous claim of all – that the Canadiens are in fact a puck-possession team. How can that possibly be true when his team:

  • Gives away the puck more often than the average team?
  • Is perennially close to the bottom of the league in goals for?
  • Has been in the bottom third of the league in minor penalties for the past 2+ seasons?

Is there something that the Wizard of Oz is keeping secret from us lowly, uneducated fans and bloggers? If it hasn’t become obvious already, this team is often an unfocused, confused group under the watch of Jacques Martin. Getting by with miraculous goaltending is not a sustainable plan for winning.

I’m not saying that the Habs’ young defencemen are perfect or that any of them are going to earn a Norris nomination any time soon. But it’s not asking too much for Martin to show a little even-handedness when doling out accountability through the media. If, as some suggest, falling back to protect a lead is a sign of a team without confidence or experience, then it would behoove the coach to stop throwing the kids to the wolves. The last time I looked, young players not only comprise the majority of his defensive corps right now, but more than anything they need encouragement and mentoring. Not the goat horns.

He’s Lying to You

Posted on by

I really feel like I could spin the title of this post – “He’s Lying to You” in to a series of posts, and I may just do that. But for now, let’s kick this one around.

“The plan was not to sit back at all. The best defense is offense.” — Jacques Martin

Martin has tried to sell us many good yarns this year, but this one is really a shocker coming from the King of Passive hockey. But if we are to believe what the Coach said in the aftermath of a game blown to the Buffalo Sabres last night, then certainly he must have recent memories and statistical evidence track record that speaks to that belief, right?

Let’s take a look and see what the Coach may be talking about.

In 2009-10, his first season in Montreal, the Canadiens scored 217 goals. That was good for 10th overall in the Eastern Conference, 23rd overall in the NHL and the 2nd lowest of any Eastern playoff team. I know, I know. The Canadiens went to the Eastern Conference Finals, so stuff it, right? Blah blah blah. Spare me your circular logic. As I’ve said before, we know how the Canadiens got to the Eastern Conference Finals and it had little to do with a spectacular offense.

In 2010-11, his second season in Montreal, the Canadiens actually slipped to 216 goals, good for 12th in the Eastern Conference, 24th overall in the NHL and the LOWEST of any Eastern Conference playoff team. I can hear the homers already: “But they took the eventual champs to overtime in game 7…and the injuries…..THE INJURIES! ARGH!!!!”. Where’s the snooze button, because I’m going to push it. Hard. There are no moral victories in the playoffs, and there were plenty of other teams that had more injuries than the Habs last season. In fact, the Canadiens were pretty much right in the middle of the pack in terms of man games lost to injury.

This season, the Canadiens have scored 42 goals through 17 games. That’s 2.47 goals per game on average, and projects out to 203 goals for the season. So if the Coach think that a best defense is a good offense, his team is going in the wrong direction, and has been going in the wrong direction for what is now a 3rd consecutive season. The addition of Erik Cole, a full season of Max Pacioretty and a bounce back season for some vets were supposed to set the stage of a more potent offense, was it not? Aside from Markov, who has been a gigantic question mark for many months now, the team has been relatively healthy. Cammalleri and Kostitsyn have missed a few games apiece, but certainly not enough to be the sole reason for the Habs’ continued inability to score goals.

Going back to what the Coach said: “The plan was not to sit back at all. The best defense is offense.”…how exactly does the Coach practice what he preaches? As the moribund powerplay continues to circle the drain, the Coach still affords Mathieu Darche precious minutes while other more talented, more deserving players sit and watch from the bench. Does having Tomas Plekanec on the point help or hurt? Does the Coach get his team to continually push the pace? Does he encourage and motivate them to play the same way that put them in a position to have a 2-goal lead to begin with? Or rather does he stand pat while his passive 1-2-2 system kills any offensive momentum his team may have had? If he in fact does not preach sitting back to protect a lead, then why does he continue to let it happen? It’s his job to change his players’ habits, is it not? If the players come out and talk about how they sat back, yet the Coach says that wasn’t the plan, then where’s the disconnect from the Coach to the players? Are the players stubborn? Incompetent? Is the Coach’s message not getting through? Is it not properly delivered? No matter, getting the best from his team and ensuring that his message is getting through is HIS job.

We’ve taken a look at some of the things we can see with our own eyes, but now let’s delve a little deeper in to some stats to try and help paint a clearer picture.
The Canadiens have 14 third period goals this season, which puts them in a logjam with the likes of Phoenix, Columbus, Nashville, Winnipeg and Detroit for 21st in the NHL. Red Wings aside, those aren’t the teams I think of when I think of “offense” and pushing the pace. Until last night, the Canadiens were actually 5-0 when leading after two periods, so a 5-0-1 record this morning should not be the end of the world, and truly it isn’t. The record and team are not on trial here. But that 5-0-1 record still only places them 18th overall in the league when leading after two periods. Since a near-perfect record ranks them a mediocre 18th, it can only mean that more than half of the teams in the league have had more leads to protect after two periods than the Habs, which speaks to the Habs overall inability to score at any point in the game. But the Habs ranking of 21st in the NHL in 3rd period goals means two thirds of the league still manages to score more goals in the final frame. When you put these seemingly disparate pieces of information together, it tells me that the Canadiens don’t push the pace in the third period, whether they are leading or trailing (Habs remain winless when trailing after two periods with an 0-6-2 record) and do in fact sit on leads going in to the third period when they have a lead to protect.

The final analysis says that if Jacques Martin believes that the best defense is a good offense, he does almost nothing to prove it. Is the Coach simply stating what he believes, but is unable to implement? Or is he trying to make us believe (similar to him telling us that young defensemen are to blame, or that his team plays puck possession hockey) what he wants us to believe? Given his track record, we know he’ll probably throw his friend and boss, General Manager Pierre Gauthier to the wolves for failing to provide enough talent. Hmm, that is curious, isn’t it? Tomas Plekanec, Michael Cammalleri, Brian Gionta, Max Pacioretty, Lars Eller, David Desharnais, Erik Cole, Andrei Kostitsyn, PK Subban, Yannick Weber, Raphael Diaz…does that sound like a talentless roster to you? Is that a list of names that evokes “can’t score goals” to you? It’s not to me.

Stoned

Posted on by

Since the beginning of time, we’ve been told that preseason games don’t matter. We’ve also been told that the first 10 regular season games don’t really matter, as the team is busy finding its identity. If the young 2011-12 season has taught us anything, and if the good pupils of Habs Nation have been paying attention, it’s that nothing can be further from the truth.

In his latest “30 Thoughts” column, CBC’s Elliotte Friedman reveals some research undertaken by an unnamed NHL GM, that I believe has gone woefully under reported, especially in Montreal where most fans would rather ignore facts, reality and history. The result of that research is shocking, and should jolt us all from our misplaced belief that the early season can be treated as nothing more than a long warm-up session.

Picking November 1st as a cutoff date, here are some of the takeaways of the GM’s research:

  • 20 teams during the 6 seasons since the lockout ended who were not in the top 8 (i.e. playoff position) on November 1st recovered to make the playoffs – an average of 3.5 teams per season.
  • Of those 20 teams who made it, only 2 of them were more than four points out of a playoff spot (Sabres in 2011, Flames in 2007), yet recovered to play past 82 games.
  • In the era of 3 point games, if the Habs, or any other team are 4 or more points out of a playoff spot on November 1st, the chances of recovering to make the playoffs is a mere 7%. Do you want to roll the dice with chances like that?

What this all means is that the Habs have the next 5 games to get the lead out and put themselves within striking distance. Still ready to say that the preseason and early season doesn’t matter? Enter the excuses:

Injuries! ARGH!! No Markov, no Spacek, no Campoli, no Cammalleri! Hogwash, all of it. As our good friend Rick at All Habs points out, Markov was not expected back, we don’t know how Campoli would have fit in (and let’s not forget that he was sitting on the scrap heap until late September, meaning nobody else had a use for him either), we couldn’t wait to run Spacek out of town at the end of last year, and Cammalleri’s return is imminent. Besides, while it perhaps was never Plan A to have so many young defensemen in the starting lineup, they have all played quite well; certainly as well as Spacek, and perhaps even better than Campoli would have. No, defense has not been the problem. It’s simply a convenient excuse for those looking to give out free passes. You may also tell me that Ryan White is missing, and I’ll concede that much. He is missed. But with all due respect to White, he is not the difference between contender and also ran. This is not to say that injuries have no impact on a team’s performance. They do, but that excuse only holds so much water. It’s up to the coaches and management to mitigate those losses and get more out of less. It’s also up to highly paid veterans to do what they’re paid to do, namely to produce points, not just “look” threatening. We see it all the time, and we’ve seen it from tonight’s opponent in Pittsburgh. The Habs have learned to live without Andrei Markov, the highest profile of all losses. They’ve had some success without him. They are no longer lost without him, and considering how long he’s been out of the lineup, it would be folly to think that the Canadiens haven’t adapted somewhat.

What’s a team to do when Ryan Miller stands on his head? The Habs were robbed! Yes, they were. Ryan Miller put on quite the show the other night, and we’ve seen our own star goalie steal many points from the opposition, especially last season. But in an Eastern Conference stacked with all star goaltending: Lundqvist, Fleury, Bryzgalov, Miller, Thomas, Vokoun, Ward, Brodeur, you can bet that the Habs will probably be robbed more than once this season. Are you prepared to roll over and accept that? In the end, it’s just another excuse. Price may pull of just as many heists to offset, but good teams find a way to win. Good teams have a killer instinct. Good teams don’t offer up simplistic excuses. They get it done.

Tonight’s matchup vs the Penguins is an interesting one. As we all know by now, the Penguins are missing Crosby, Letang, Orpik, Kennedy and Malkin is a question mark. So far the Penguins have blasted out of the gates with a 4-2-2 record while playing 8 games in 12 nights. Tonight’s game will make it 9 games in 14 nights. What a brutal schedule to start the season. Yet the Penguins don’t make excuses. So far, they just win. Can the Habs take advantage of an undermanned, tired team? Or will there be more convenient excuses tomorrow morning?

Campoli the Canadien

Posted on by

This afternoon, Habs General Manager Pierre Gauthier inked free agent defenseman Chris Campoli to a 1-year, 1.75M contract. This out-of-the-blue signing has Habs Nation scratching its head…what does this signing mean?

Take your pick of the following potential reasons:

  • Markov isn’t going to be back any time soon
  • Subban’s back injury will keep him out of the lineup for a while
  • Yemelin isn’t going to make the team
  • Nothing to see here, just a depth signing
  • Something more – a trade – is in the works
  • Weber has fallen out of favour
  • None of the above

Whatever the reason for the signing, there will be no shortage of discussion and dissection for each reason…

What say you?


 Powered by Max Banner Ads