Canadiens Lineup

Mike Hoffman – Nick Suzuki – Brendan Gallagher

Jonathan Drouin – Christian Dvorak – Josh Anderson

Tyler Toffoli – Mathieu Perreault – Cole Caufield

Artturi Lehkonen – Jake Evans – Joel Armia

Brett Kulak – Jeff Petry

Ben Chiarot – Chris Wideman

Alexander Romanov – David Savard

Jake Allen – Sam Montembeault

Sami Niku, Adam Brooks, Cedric Paquette

Joel Edmundson (family), Carey Price (player assistance program), Paul Byron (hip), Mattias Norlinder (lower-body), Shea Weber (multiple injuries)

Game Report

The Canadiens lost another game in front of a less than capacity Bell Centre. But this was not any ordinary loss. It turns out that going 0-5 to start as season has historical overtones. The Canadiens have tied the worst start in NHL history for a team who went to the Stanley Cup Final during the previous season.

And of course, the Habs lost to their shiny new rival, the Carolina Hurricanes. Marc Bergevin has an 0-2 record vs the Hurricanes in the offer sheet category as he came out on the losing side twice. Yet curiously, Bell Centre fans were intent on voicing their displeasure at Jesperi Kotkaniemi rather their inept general manager.

No matter. Kotkaniemi scored his first goal of the season and his first goal in a Hurricanes jersey. The target of the Canadiens anemic offer sheet, Sebastian Aho had two goals and an assist on five shots and was 80 percent at the faceoff dot. 

For the Canadiens historic franchise, their apathetic owner and their lame duck general manager, this was a humiliating loss.

The inexperienced head coach, Dominique Ducharme, returned to his favorite stock phrase to describe tonight’s performance saying, “We paid cash for the mistakes we made.” The words are as hollow as his coaching strategy.

Any signs of hope?

There were a few positives to acknowledge. The fourth line of Artturi Lehkonen, Jake Evans and Joel Armia was tenacious and tough to play against all night. Tyler Toffoli, despite being on the ice for three Carolina goals, scored his first goal of the season breaking Montreal’s goalless streak of 108:33 minutes. And the Canadiens scored a power-play goal to improve their success rate to 5.3 percent with the man advantage.

All eyes on the seventh floor

So what now? Fans will learn whether Geoff Molson believes in accountability. Given that the season is already in precedent-setting territory (in a negative way), the owner can only conclude that this is a failed experiment by the hockey operations department and take appropriate action.

It’s too expensive to fire a general manager and a head coach who just began a three-year contract, you say? Overheard somewhere: one must pay cash for the errors they made.

And one more thing, the Carolina Hurricanes marketed the hell out of the win with a new website, merchandise and a clever promo code. Don’t blame the Canes as they are playing to their fans. Blame the folks with the CH lapel pins who allowed this humiliating situation to happen.

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