by Christopher Nardella, Staff Writer, All Habs Hockey Magazine

BROSSARD, QC. — On the day before the Canadiens’ Red vs White scrimmage at the Bell Centre, the team put on a show in front of its fans.

Pre-Game

As Zachary Fucale did the day before, Michael Condon was the first person on the ice followed by fellow goaltender Dustin Tokarski and Habs goaltending coach Stéphane Waite. The trio was on the ice one half an hour prior to the rest of the team. Jarred Tinordi was the first skater on the ice working on his puck control and stickhandling in preparation for the practice. The most newsworthy moment of the morning was when Alex Semin appeared out of the locker room before any other forward but just stood next to the bench drinking water. Leading the team’s on-ice stretches was Greg Pateryn.

During the drills, Jarred Tinordi fell backwards awkwardly into the boards while receiving a pass from his defence partner. The thud and resulting gasps from the fans echoed throughout the arena as Tinordi grimaced in pain and knelt on the ice. Fortunately Tinordi was able to finish the practice and participate in the scrimmage.

Before taking in the practice I was able to get brief footage of Max Pacioretty skating with group “C.” Pacioretty skated in short intervals and took long rests in between drills. The 6-foot-2 forward also took shots, albeit not at full force.

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The Scrimmage

The game started out in a comedic way when P.K. Subban batted a puck that was way over his head right at Carey Price which drew laughs from both sides of the glass, most notably from Lars Eller. The first goal of the game came off of the stick of Jeff Petry who received the puck from his defensive partner Alexei Emelin then pump faked a wrist shot that fooled Bud Holloway, so much so that it had him on his rear end. Petry fired a wrist shot past goaltender Michael McNiven for a 1-0 Team Red lead.

In the scrimmages rather than assessing minor penalties, officials awarded penalty shots. After Tomas Fleischmann drew a call, he was given a penalty shot on Team Red goaltender Michael Condon. Fleischmann pump faked a wrist shot sliding it right through the wickets of Condon to tie the game at one.

At Friday’s scrimmage, Nikita Scherbak was almost invisible in the first period and made a slight appearance in the second 25-minute half. On Saturday, he was one of the better players on the ice (saving the biggest superlatives for Lars Eller and Alex Galchenyuk.) Scherbak was doing a good job generating scoring chances by himself.

At one point Scherbak went from the defensive zone, took the puck up to the blueline, chipped it between two defenders and continued his way on the forcheck. Once he chipped the puck in deep, he retrieved it down low and killed some time on the clock as his linemates jumped on the ice.

When Jeff Petry had the puck at his own blueline, Scherbak stole the puck from him and went in on a partial breakaway but was stopped by Mike Condon. Off of a faceoff Scherbak stick-checked the puck away from an opponent made a deke around him and found P.K. Subban who was stopped by Condon. To cap off his day he took the puck coast-to-coast, went around the defenceman and slid the puck back in front of the net where Michael McCarron failed to put it away.

Lars Eller put home the third goal of the game after he forced a turnover, found the puck in his feet and went from backhand to forehand where he snapped it stick side on McNiven.

The Eller-Galchenyuk-Semin line had another great game with its weakest link being the Russian snipe. At one point during the game Semin picked up the puck in his own slot took it to the opposing team’s slot, undressed Carey Price to the point where he was out of his crease but the former Washington Capital lost handle of the puck at the goalmouth.

The team’s most entertaining skater, P.K. Subban, was granted a penalty shot in the second and with the whole rink anticipating that he would make multiple fakes he just walked in the slot and leaned into a slap shot from the hash marks that went right between the standing Tokarski’s legs.

For the game’s final goal, Alex Semin picked the puck up on the half wall during a break out, saucer passed the puck to Alex Galchenyuk then he saucer passed the puck over to Lars Eller who fired a very accurate shot over the left shoulder of Carey Price.

The NHLers saw limited minutes in this one as the rookies had the majority of the minutes.

Post-Game

The second practice of the days was rather monotonous despite the group mostly being comprised of NHL players. During the shoot-around the team does before the practice starts, Carey Price fell as he was attempting to fire one in the net, which drew the imitation from Brendan Gallagher.

Scherbak’s nice day continued after the scrimmage as he slid across crease pass to Brendan Gallagher that was so nice that it drew a groan/celebration from the relatively few fans that were still in attendance.

The scariest moment of the day came when Scherbak was coming in off of the right wing and he took a wrist shot right off of the cage on Price’s helmet and he went down. However everything ended up being alright and Scherbak wasn’t cut from the team immediately.

The crown jewel of the weekend takes place on Sunday at the Bell Centre when team Red takes on team White at 1:00 pm.