Habs News: Review of Canadiens Season, MVP Carey Price, Marc Bergevin On Missing Playoffs, Max Domi, Tomas Tatar, Failed Power-play, Jonathan Drouin Unacceptable
ROCKET SPORTS MEDIA | LAVAL, QC. — The Canadiens finished off the 2018-19 season with an exciting 6-5 shootout win against the Maple Leafs. A game that will be remembered for Ryan Poehling‘s NHL debut as he scored a hat trick and scored the winner in the shootout. With that win, Montreal finished the season with a 44-30-8 record, which placed them ninth in the Eastern Conference, and 14th in the NHL.
On Saturday, I joined the Canadiens Connection podcast to review the Habs season. Here are some of the issues that were discussed.
Failed Objective
The message delivered by the players and Marc Bergevin was that of disappointment for missing the playoffs, and positivity for the future. Many observers deemed this season a success as the team got an additional 25 points in the standings compared to the previous season.
Even though that there was a lot of positives this season for Montreal, I think that the season is considered a failure. Ever since the golf tournament in September, the organization publicly stated throughout the season that their goal is to make the playoffs. They were in the playoff picture for 151 of the 184 days of the regular season. They were close but failed to reach the goal that they set.
Price MVP
There was a lot of negativity surrounding Carey Price headed into the season, after Price had an average 2017-18 season. His first 16 games of the season, he was off to a rocky start with a 7-5-4 record, with a 3.17 goals against average and .895 save percentage. The team decided to give Price a night off in order to help him find his game. Did he ever?
Since November 24th, Price played 50 games and had a 28-19-2 record, with a 2.26 goals against average and .925 save percentage. He led the league in minutes played, and his 66 games played ranked him second amongst goalies. Price also became the franchise’s winningest goalie as he kept his team in the playoff picture all the way to the end.
Price was awarded the Molson Cup winner for the year and I think he should be in the conversation for the Vezina trophy.
Impactful Acquisitions
Bergevin wasn’t perfect this season, but his two major acquisitions during the offseason were a success.
Max Domi finished the team’s leading scorer with 72 points. He set personal highs in all offensive categories this season. Domi was Bergevin’s second attempt in as many years to acquire a winger in attempt to play him as a number one centre. I was critical of the fact that Domi was all over the team’s social media, even before he stepped on the ice as a Hab. Looking back now, it was the right decision. Domi loves the attention that he gets from fans and the media, and it motivates him.
Tomas Tatar was the thrown-in when he was acquired as part of the Max Pacioretty trade. Tatar didn’t seem to fit with the Golden Knights as he registered six points in 20 games with them and was a healthy scratch for most of the team’s playoff run. There was a fit in Montreal, as Tatar finished the season with 25 goals playing for most of the season with Brendan Gallagher and Philip Danault. Tatar contributed in all three zones and set a personal high this season with 58 points.
Power-Play
If I had to choose one reason that Montreal didn’t make the playoffs, my selection would be the power play. It ranked 30th in the league with an embarassing 13.3 percent success rate. It was the team’s worst power play since NHL started tracking this statistic in 1933-34. In his season ending press conference, Bergevin said that there’s no relation between the power play and a playoff spot, citing the Islanders (29th) and the Predators (31st) as examples.
If there’s no goal scored with the extra attacker, it should at least give the team some momentum. For the Habs this season, the power play would make them lose momentum. In my opinion, there wasn’t enough done by the coaching staff in terms of strategy or personnel choices to improve it during the season.
Buffalo was ranked 16th in the league on the power play with 19.5 percent success rate. If Montreal’s power play had identical success, they would have scored an additional 14 goals. With Canadiens having lost nine one-goal games, I think those 14 goals would have helped them get the three missing points needed to clinch a playoff spot.
Jonathan Drouin’s Contribution
A lot of focus on Jonathan Drouin during the exit interviews as he struggled in the final stretch of the season. Bergevin was happy that Drouin took ownership of his performance and said that the team will continue to give their players the necessary tools to succeed.
I think that Drouin generally had a good season overall. In his first 55 games played, Drouin had registered 46 points, which would prorate to 69 points over an entire season. That would place him three points shy from being the team’s leading scorer, and would be his personal best.
Instead, Drouin put up seven points on the board in his last 26 games which allowed him to tie his career high 53 points. As a player who’s role is to put points on the board, this is unacceptable. His defensive struggles are well documented and combining that to lack of production during his last 26 games, Drouin wasn’t adding value to his team, which forced Claude Julien to give him fourth line minutes. The timing of his struggles couldn’t have come at a worse time.
If Drouin would have started the season with the slump and concluded with 46 points in his last 55 games, the tone of the talk around Drouin would have been positive during the offseason. Instead, Drouin will be the top storyline heading into next season.
By Chris G., Senior Writer.
All Habs Hockey Magazine
Copyright © 2019 Rocket Sports
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