Montreal 5 New York Islanders 1 (Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum)
posted by Rocket
AllHabs.blogspot.com
The Montreal Canadiens seem to be coming together and gaining momentum just in time. They are winning games that they are supposed to win. The team’s playoff prospects now seem good.
All is right again in Montreal. Thank you Bob Gainey.
When he was fired, Guy Carbonneau had the worst winning record in the Eastern conference since the All-Star break. The Canadiens were in disarray. They were fragile team with shaky confidence and were in a free fall down the standings.
Now the Habs have defined roles and are working together. For the first time all season, they are starting to play to their potential.
With their win tonight, the Canadiens moved up the standings, ahead of the New York Rangers into 7th place.
Much can still change. The standings are tight. Six points separate six teams who are currently fourth through tenth. The Habs will need to continue their improved play.
The win in Long Island was a team effort. The Islanders come out strong with an aggressive forecheck and played well in the first. Then the Isles ran into penalty trouble and the Canadiens power-play went to work.
Saku Koivu started the play with a face-off win, and after two nice passes by Andrei Markov and Alex Kovalev, Koivu finished the play in front of the net with a power-play goal.
There were themes that would be repeated throughout the game by the Canadiens: staying disciplined and making their opponents pay when they went to the penalty box; winning important faceoffs; and getting traffic to the net.
Once again Koivu’s line dominated with Saku getting a goal and an assist, Tanguay scoring and Kovalev with three assists. This line now has 12 of the last 21 goals for the Habs.
But this was a team effort. Five different Canadiens scored, with three goals coming from defensemen. The Habs scored three times on the power-play and didn’t allow any short-handed goals.
Glen Metropolit had a rare fight. Even more rare, Tom Kostopoulos had a penalty shot. Mike Komisarek scored for the first time since the third game of the season.
As the game wore on, the Canadiens play did become a little more ragged. Passes were sloppy and players passed up shots trying to make fancy plays. But they didn’t fall back and the Habs pressured the Islanders right til the end of the game.
Jaroslav Halak had a very quiet night. He made a couple of tough stops in the first and again in the third but otherwise most shots were handled easily. Halak did give up a weak goal, a shot beyond the circle by Tambellini that beat him over the shoulder.
There were lots of red jerseys in the Nassau Coliseum crowd tonight. At least 12 busloads of Habs fans left the arena very happy knowing that their team was one step closer to the playoffs.
Pre-game
Starting lineup: Lapierre, Kostopoulos, Latendresse, Komisarek, Markov
Jaroslav Halak and Yann Danis started in goal.
O’Byrne, Brisebois and D’Agostini were scratched from the line-up. Carey Price was ill with the flu. Sergei Kostitsyn was out with an upper body injury after being run into the boards by Chicago’s Aaron Johnson. Bouillon and Lang are on injured reserve.
Marc Denis was recalled from Hamilton to back-up Halak.
Dandenault played defense.
Lines:
Plekanec-Andrei Kostitsyn-Higgins
Koivu–Kovalev–Tanguay
Lapierre–Latendresse–Kostopoulos
Metropolit–Laraque-Stewart
Rocket’s three stars:
1. Saku Koivu
2. Alex Kovalev
3. Andrei Markov
(photo credit: Getty Images)
I and hundreds of other screaming Hab fans were at the game. One difference goaltending. Halak kept his cool and made some great saves. I hope we don’t see Price for a long time.
LOL, can’t resist slipping the knife into Carbonneau at every opportunity. Whatever his record “after the All Star break” until about a month and a half later, Carbo has the best career record of any coach in Montreal since Scotty Bowman. Including Alain Vigneault who was on a worse streak than Carbo at about the same time, survived similar calls for his head, and has the Canucks playing better than any other team in the league since. Including Claude Julien who has gone on to turn the sad sack Bruins into the best team in the East. Including Michel Therrien who took the Penguins from the basement to the penthouse in the East a year ago. Especially including current coach Gainey who would have to win out the season and more just to reach the .500 level for his career as an NHL coach.
I could understand Gainey if he fired Carbo sometime in the middle of the slump (which nearly every team in the league has gone through at one point in the season), but he waited until THE TEAM WAS WINNING AGAIN, AND INJURED PLAYERS WERE DUE TO RETURN.
Do you think the Habs under Carbo might have done a bit better at the time with Alex Tanguay to light a fire under Kovalev’s lazy stupid ass? Or having Gui Latendresse on hand to make the third line a scoring threat? Those are the two biggest factors in the limited success Gainey has had since taking over, and they weren’t available to Carbonneau during the slump. As it is, Gainey has still managed to cost the team two positions in the playoff race since the change, with no guarantee that Canadiens will make the post season. Try a little objectivity for a change.
You could be right. Maybe they could have done better under Carbs with Tanguay pushing some buttons. But isn’t that exactly the point? Wasn’t it Carbs’ job to be lighting the fires, and not just under Kovalev but the whole team?
Bob stepped up and did what he had to do. Not to say he did anything phenomenal, accomplished much or turned anything around single handedly. But he was instrumental in setting the stage. Renewed spirits. Renewed energy. Renewed playoff hopes.
Montreal had won 4 of the last 6 games before Bozo replaced Carbonneau with HIMSELF. The last match Carbo coached was a tough 2-1grind it out win on the road. Those are the type of games where coaching comes to the fore.
Even if the Habs go all the way to the Cup, you won’t convince me that the move was justified or necessary at the time it was made. You can look at the example of the Vancouver Canucks who were in the identical position to the Habs a couple of weeks earlier, and have been the best team in the NHL after NOT FIRING Alain Vigneault at the time.
Anon,
Glad that you had such a good time in Long Island..maybe too good. Halak wasn’t really a factor in the game as the majority was played in the Islander zone. Halak made a few good saves but wasn’t really tested. And he did give up another soft goal.
Prepare to be disappointed. Once Price is recovered from the flu, you won’t be seeing too much of Jaro.
Rob,
You should actually watch the games before commenting. Anyone who has will know that the Canadiens are playing very well right now…and at a level we have not seen this season.
Is the return of injured players being the only reason the team is playing well. Of course not. It is clear to everyone that Gainey has mad a major impact (to everyone except you and Rejean Tremblay).
Your comments have always been bizarre but are becoming even more ludicrous now. Carbo and Bowman as the two best Canadiens coaches? The two shouldn’t be mentioned in the same breath. Seems you never heard of guys like Blake and Irvin either.
You are way off base saying that I don’t pass up an opportunity to skewer Carbonneau. I chose not to comment on Carbo’s ridiculous and completely self-serving news conference after he was dumped.
My favorite part of the news conference was when Carbo said how shocked he was at being fired. He was the coach with the worst record in the East since the All Star break and yet he didn’t have a clue it was coming. Says a lot about him.
I’m not sure what the list of former coaches has to do with anything. Perhaps you hadn’t heard but Therrien was fired in Pittsburgh. Vigneault has been on the hot seat all season in Vancouver. Julien is doing great things in Boston but that was after failures in Montreal and New Jersey. He is not the same coach now as he was when with the Canadiens.
Your comment about objectivity is laughable and ironic especially for someone who defends sensational, irresponsible and agenda-driven ‘journalism’.
Well, I don’t know whether or not to classify your efforts here as “journalism”, but I think all the adjectives you supplied hold true. I said that Carbo had the best winning percentage as a Hab coach since Bowman, nothing more than that. You supplied all the other hyperbole.
The point in referencing the previous coaches is that all were fired for “not performing up to expectations in Montreal”, and all have been successful elsewhere. So the problem in Montreal may not be the coaches at all. Plus the fact that Carbo did better than any of the others mentioned, had the team in fifth place in the Conference, with a winning record, DESPITE SOME KEY INJURIES, and still got blamed. Not only blamed, but CONSTANTLY RIDICULED by armchair experts like yourself.
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