Montreal 1 Washington 5 (Bell Centre)
“A fool flatters himself, a wise man flatters the fool.” ~ Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton
Washington coach Bruce Boudreau was in a good mood after the game. He had every reason to be with his Capitals cruising to a game three victory. They chased Jaroslav Halak, regained home ice advantage, and sent disappointed Canadiens’ fans home early.
Boudreau was frank about his team’s power-play, saying “we suck” but then doled out a series of compliments. He acknowledged the Capitals strong play on the road, called the Bell Centre crowd “crazy good”, but saved the most generous words for his opposing number.
“They’ve got one of the smartest, if not the smartest, coach in the NHL,” said Boudreau who seems to be a wise fellow.
No doubt that the Washington coach appreciated Jacques Martin’s dizzying intellect which determined that Marc-Andre Bergeron was the defense partner needed by Andrei Markov who would play more than 20 minutes instead of Ryan O’Byrne.
On the surface, O’Byrne has been solid all season paired with Markov, leads the defense corps in hits for the season by a wide margin, and at 6’6″ can effectively clear big forwards from the front of the goal. You may have noticed that Washington has a few of those.
Boudreau was so impressed, that he seemingly honored Martin’s deployment of Bergeron by having his players dump the puck to the defenseman’s side of the ice at every opportunity.
I know what you’re thinking. Bergeron looked awful on the second, third and fifth goals by the Capitals and finished the night at minus three. It’s true, that sounds bad. We must be missing something. There’s a greater purpose, perhaps.
Monsieur Mensa thought it was a good idea to rush Glen Metropolit back into the lineup and chose to sit Sergei Kostitsyn. When Metropolit was injured on March 27, it was stated that his separated shoulder would need six to eight weeks to heal. Now that estimate appeared to be accurate as Metropolit didn’t win a faceoff tonight, lagged behind the play, and played just over five minutes. But what do we know?
Metropolit’s linemate Mathieu Darche was on the ice for 2:22 without recording a shot or a hit and was a minus one. Sergei Kostitsyn, with five Molson Cup star selections in the month of March, was deemed to be press-box worthy.
Undoubtedly many of you are saying, those lineup choices don’t make any sense. Remember, we are in the presence of a genius. How can we be expected to understand?
From his perspective, the Canadiens’ scholarly coach thought that his team played their best period of the series in the first. The Habs outshot the Capitals and led in scoring chances 7-to-4. Martin felt that the game unraveled during a 12-minute stretch in the second period.
Not to contradict our resident sage, but the Canadiens came into this game with a very fragile psyche after the third-period meltdown in game two. The seeds for tonight loss were sown by giving up five goals in just over a period of play in Washington.
It didn’t take much for doubt to be ignited when the Capitals scored on a second period short-handed goal by Boyd Gordon. The mettle of the Habs was shattered by giving up two more goals that resulted from poor defensive play and sub-average goaltending.
Jaroslav Halak left the game having surrendered three goals on 13 shots. In the last two and a half periods, he has given up eight goals on 30 shots. Halak seems to have lost his confidence winning only one of his last six starts, with all of them being very meaningful games.
Trailing 3-0, in the second period, the broken and frustrated Canadiens lost their composure. They took penalties including a 10-minute misconduct by Scott Gomez. Few in the Bell Centre held their breath for a Capitals-like comeback.
In the third period with the Canadiens threatening to regain momentum Boudreau called a timeout to refocus Washington. I’m sure that the gifted coach Martin would have done the same. Although it was curious that Martin didn’t instruct his players to get a whistle early in the third period power-play so that Gomez could exited the penalty box and joined them.
I’m sure that he had a good reason.
The two teams played like they were separated by 33 points in the regular season standings. Washington has some wind in their sails and seem happy with the way the series is unfolding. The Canadiens will have a hard time putting Jack, back in the box to replicate the tone and performance of game one.
Will coach Martin make any changes for game four? Far be it from me to be able to read the thoughts of a mastermind, but Martin didn’t seem to give his number one goaltender a ringing endorsement, “Halak played a strong first game and he had a good first period tonight.”
As is custom, Dr. Martin will keep us guessing until Wednesday.
Rocket’s three stars
1. Brooks Laich
2. Eric Fehr
3. Matt Bradley
Player quotes from wire services were used in this report.
(photo credit: Getty)
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I guessed I missed everything too. Martin's lineup choices were puzzling to say the least. When it was said that Metro would play, I looked at my wife and said "It's way too soon, he's not ready". I hate it when I'm right. He was borderline useless, and I only say borderline because Darche was even more futile out there.
We don't have a wealth of history to go on with Martin as Habs coach, but we do know he's a stubborn one, so should we expect to see Sergei Kostitsyn and / or Ryan O'Byrne back in the lineup? While common sense says yes, we can't have any confidence that Martin will actually do anything.
To me this feels like inevitability setting in. The Habs blew their chance to potentially take the series on Saturday by blowing a 3-goal lead. They gave the Capitals their swagger back and completely undid all of the good work they had done. I know that if the Habs win the next one it's tied up and it's a best 2-of-3. I get that. But the Canadiens need herculean efforts just to get to overtime. This ain't 1993.
I'm not going to blame this all on Martin though. He HAD to like what he saw in the 1st period last night, and I'd bet my last dollar that he didn't encourage his troops to do the opposite, but that's precisely what they did. Halak, for his part looks finished. He can look good to start a game, as he has in each of the 3 games, but fades quickly once the Capitals really get rolling. The crease crashing doesn't help, but it's quite clear that he's tired, rattled and unable to handle the big Capitals forwards. Price got steamrolled himself, so I'm not sure if it really matters, but at this point Martin has nothing to lose by going with the guy who took 5 of 8 points from the Capitals.
Finally, I can appreciate what Scott Gomez is doing. He's known for elevating his game in the playoffs, and he's done that…when he's been on the ice. Fighting Poti on Saturday was dumb, and getting a 10-minute misconduct yesterday shows an immaturity that he should have done away with long ago being a Pat Burns disciple. He needs to be on the ice, and has now missed 15 minutes of ice time in the past 2 games. Not good enough from him.
It goes without saying, but if they don't win game 4, it's over.
I will vault myself from section 410 and punch Chocula square on the button if I don't see Price, Sergei, and Rhino out there on the ice Wednesday. Not that it'll make much of a difference if the team continues to play like they're already done…but for one the ice seems way more calmer when Price is out there.
And fans gotta stop the conspiracies. Bettman didn't tell Spacek to do his best Hamrlik impression and bowl the puck into his own net. Bettman didn't grow Jaro into a 5'10" 170lbs goaltender or tell him to play deep in his net and pay more attention to the traffic in front of him than the puck. Bettman didn't leave Ovechkin all alone waiting to do what Cammalleri is supposed to do. Bettman didn't smack Pouliot with the "I forgot how to play hockey" stick. Bettman didn't tell Bergeron to give the puck away FOUR TIMES while in his own zone for a beautiful string of scoring chances in the dying minutes of the game.
Speaking of Bergeron, is he terrified of shooting the puck? What ever happened to the term "one timer"? The man has no business doing board battles and FFS LOOK WHERE YOU'RE PASSING x_x
When a team shows flashes of what we praise and like then it becomes somewhat more difficult to blame the coach. I am not defending Martin because he has given us a good dose of the bizarre but as has been alluded to already drops in performance, especially from period to period as opposed to one game to another talk more about fitness, attitude and moral.
@Number31 – I agree 100%. People blaming the refs need their heads checked. Admittedly I was VERY frustrated with the officiating last night, but I never said that they're at fault for the Habs loss. You are right when you point out that Bettman didn't make the Habs do (or not do) all those things. Bettman also didn't call them in the 1st intermission and tell them to do the opposite of what they did in the 1st 20 minutes. Bettman didn't tell Gomez to mouth off, and he didn't say that to Plekanec, either. The Habs are masters of their own demise at this point, or they're being overwhelmed by a better opponent.
And by the way – there's nothing wrong with 5'10", 170 dudes! :)
Very well written blog spot, made me laugh all the way through. I started on the the Habs after reading Fire on Ice or was it Lions in the Winter. Anyway Go Habs GO!
Hey Steve, thanks for stopping by. Be sure to bookmark All Habs. You are welcome to comment anytime.
Likewise RG! It's good to see you here. It's very hard to know if the team plays well when they follow Martin's system or when they improvise. I do know that there is still a push-pull struggle between the coach's style and what plays to the player's strengths, even though we are 85+ games into the season.
Number31: I laughed each time I read and re-read your sentence: "I will vault myself from section 410 and punch Chocula square on the button if I don't see Price, Sergei, and Rhino out there on the ice Wednesday."
I agree that the trio puts the Canadiens in a better position to win but its been a complaint over his career that Martin does just the opposite with his players.
I, too, have been very disappointed in the play of Pouliot. He has been playing very soft all series.
I agree with all of your comments Kyleroussel which unfortunately includes your reference to the inevitability of what may be around the corner. The Canadiens had their chance, and the Caps are unlikely to give them another one now.
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