Despite losing both games at home, the Habs
didn’t fold and won a hard fought Game 5 to extend their season. The
Bulldogs also extended their season, winning Game 6 in OT to move on to the
second round of the Calder Cup playoffs. With Montreal set to play Game 6
on Monday, the Series Synopsis looks at 3 keys to victory, while the Final
Thought looks at the coaching situation moving forward. This, plus the
power rankings, in the Recap.
|
Power |
The PPR’s are on a cumulative basis with
some bias towards the current week. The prev. column represents the last
ranking for the player; players not on last week’s list will be slotted back
where they were when returning from injury/benching/recall (italicized numbers).
Thus, multiple players may have the same previous ranking. These power
rankings are carried forward from the regular season, no new ones will be started.
Rk |
Player |
Prev. |
Comments |
1 |
Brian Gionta |
2 | Finds a way to hit the scoresheet almost every game somehow. |
| 2 | Tomas Plekanec | 1 | Decent, but needs to pick up the offensive production for Game 6. |
3 |
Jaroslav Halak | 3 | Struggled in Game 3 but certainly made up for in with the Game 5 win. |
| 4 | Mike Cammalleri | 5 | The best offensive threat this week though being -4 in Game 3 stings. |
5 |
Scott Gomez | 4 | Nice that he’s passionate, but needs to use that edge to produce. |
| 6 | Carey Price | 4 | You can’t blame him for the Game 4 loss but he needed to be better. |
7 |
Josh Gorges | 9 | Really stepped up his game when Martin shortened his bench. |
| 8 | Andrei Markov | 7 | Getting better as the series goes on; hopefully we haven’t seen his best. |
| 9 | Andrei Kostitsyn | 6 | Didn’t score but at least competed defensively, especially on Friday. |
10 |
Dominic Moore | 10 | Stat of the series so far: He leads the Habs in hits with 11 (2.2/game). |
| 11 | Hal Gill | 12 | He’s blocked enough that you could make the case he deserves a SV%. |
12 |
Benoit Pouliot | 8 | When the coach says to drive the net, drive the net already! |
| 13 | Travis Moen | 15 | Was quiet until Game 5 where he played his best game in quite a while. |
14 |
Ryan O’Byrne | 14 | Did everything asked of him – hit, block shots, and clear the crease. |
| 15 | Jaroslav Spacek | 13 | As odd as it is to say given his play this year, the Habs could use him. |
16 |
Glen Metropolit | 15 | Struggled his first game back but at least set up a key goal in Game 4. |
| 17 | Roman Hamrlik | 14 | At 15 minutes a game, I think he can help the team in Game 6 and beyond. |
| 18 | Marc-Andre Bergeron | 11 | He handles the puck as if it were a live grenade, just shoot already! |
| 19 | Tom Pyatt | 17 | He hustles and doesn’t make many mistakes, hard to complain with that. |
| 20 | Maxim Lapierre | 16 | The Habs need to try and gain a physical edge, he can provide that. |
| 21 | Sergei Kostitsyn | 18 | If he plays with an edge, good things happen; rarely has an edge though. |
| 22 | Mathieu Darche | 19 | Showed why no one expected him to be in the NHL at all this year. |
Dropped from the rankings: N/A; the fact
that three players returned to the rankings means that players may have dropped
despite having a good week.
|
The Dog |
Hamilton wasn’t able to carry over the momentum
from a Game 2 blowout but did play well enough to take the series in 6, setting
a season high in shots on goal in Game 6.
|
Results: |
| April 19 | 1 |
2 | 3 | Tot |
PP |
SOG |
| Hamilton | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 1/8 | 36 |
| Manitoba | 2 | 2 | 3 | 7 | 4/8 | 24 |
Attendance: 7,546
3 Stars: 1) Desbiens – MTB 2) Schroeder – MTB 3) McGinnis
– MTB
| April 21 | 1 |
2 | 3 | OT1 | OT2 | Tot |
PP |
SOG |
| Hamilton | 1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 1/4 | 45 |
| Manitoba | 0 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 1/4 | 42 |
Attendance: 7,501
3 Stars: 1) Stevenson – HAM 2) Bliznak – MTB 3) Palushaj – HAM
| April 23 | 1 |
2 | 3 | Tot |
PP |
SOG |
| Hamilton | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 1/4 | 30 |
| Manitoba | 1 | 1 | 3 | 5 | 1/3 | 22 |
Attendance: 6,927
3 Stars: 1) Schneider – MTB 2) Olvecky – MTB 3) Sexton –
MTB
| April 25 | 1 |
2 | 3 | OT | Tot |
PP |
SOG |
| Manitoba | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0/3 | 27 |
| Hamilton | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 2/7 | 49 |
Attendance: 2,791
3 Stars: 1) Stevenson – HAM 2) Olvecky – MTB 3) Subban – HAM
|
Stats: |
When a team is down, they go to their big time
scorers to lead the way which is exactly what David Desharnais did this week.
I should also note that AHL signee Grant Stevenson scored the series winner in
OT.
|
SKATERS |
| # | Player | GP | G | A | +/- | SH | PIMS |
| 4 | Michael Vernace | 4 | 0 | 0 | -3 | 5 | 2 |
| 5 | Alex Henry | 4 | 0 | 0 | +2 | 1 | 0 |
| 6 | Chad Anderson | 4 | 0 | 1 | -1 | 10 | 0 |
| 7 | Yannick Weber | 1 | 0 | 0 | -1 | 3 | 0 |
| 10 | J.T. Wyman | 4 | 0 | 0 | -3 | 8 | 2 |
| 12 | Andrew Conboy | 4 | 1 | 0 | +1 | 4 | 14 |
| 14 | Olivier Fortier | 1 | 0 | 0 | E | 2 | 0 |
| 15 | Mike Glumac | 4 | 2 | 1 | -4 | 18 | 4 |
| 18 | Dany Masse | 3 | 0 | 1 | -1 | 1 | 0 |
| 19 | Brock Trotter | 4 | 1 | 1 | E | 18 | 2 |
| 20 | Ryan Russell | 4 | 0 | 1 | -1 | 4 | 0 |
| 25 | Ryan White | 4 | 2 | 0 | -2 | 11 | 19 |
| 26 | Grant Stevenson | 4 | 1 | 3 | -1 | 13 | 0 |
| 28 | Aaron Palushaj | 4 | 0 | 2 | E | 7 | 6 |
| 32 | Frederic St. Denis | 4 | 0 | 0 | -1 | 8 | 4 |
| 42 | Hunter Bishop | 3 | 0 | 0 | -2 | 0 | 4 |
| 44 | Shawn Belle | 4 | 0 | 1 | +1 | 4 | 10 |
| 51 | David Desharnais | 4 | 2 | 3 | -1 | 16 | 2 |
| 61 | Andre Benoit | 4 | 1 | 3 | -4 | 8 | 4 |
| 76 | P.K. Subban | 4 | 2 | 3 | -4 | 19 | 4 |
|
GOALIES |
| # | Player | Record | SV% | GAA |
| 30 | Cedrick Desjardins | 2-2-0 | .857 | 3.54 |
| 35 | Robert Mayer | 0-0-0 | .813 | 4.83 |
|
Leaders: |
Goals: Mike Glumac (4)
Assists: Andre Benoit/P.K. Subban (6)
Points: P.K. Subban (9)
+/-: Shawn Belle (+4)
PIMS: Ryan White (23)
Shots: P.K. Subban/Brock Trotter (25)
|
Round 2: |
Schedule and opponent to be
determined (winner of Abbotsford/Rochester).
|
Series |
Like last week, a series of quick notes on the
series with an eye on some stats as well:
3 Keys for Game 6:
1) Early energy – The crowd will be behind the Habs to start, use that to
your advantage and give them something more to cheer about.
2) Change the PP – We all know the strategy on the powerplay, send it to the
point and bomb away. Guess what, the Caps have figured it out. If
they’re overplaying the point with their 2 forwards at the point, force the play
down low and create a mini 3-on-2. It’s enough of a change to throw the
Caps for a loop.
3) Don’t play with fire – Washington has averaged just under 5 PP’s per game
this series (24 PP’s in 5 games) and had the best powerplay during the season.
Eventually, they’ll figure out how to score on this; don’t give them as many
opportunities and this gets negated somewhat.
– Right now, the top faceoff man (minimum 10 faceoffs) for the Habs is Mike
Cammalleri (57.1%). Perhaps they need to consider using him over Plekanec
(38.0%) in some instances?
– Only 7 players have scored in the series for the Habs so far. I said
this last week and it still holds true now, secondary scoring (and defence
scoring) will be critical to Game 6/7 success.
|
Final |
Through 5 postseason games, I think GM Pierre
Gauthier has got a pretty good sense of what he needs to accomplish this
offseason. I’m not sold that one of those things involves changing the
coach though like many suggest. Sure, Guy Boucher looks like he’ll be a
good coach down the road but if someone else wants to give him a shot first, so
be it. Every new NHL coach has a learning curve; is it so bad if he goes
through those growing pains elsewhere, away from the spotlight in Montreal?
Personally, I think there’s some benefits to keeping Martin around regardless of
what happens with Boucher. For one, there’d be some sense of stability,
something the Habs haven’t had a lot of lately. Also, the team now knows
what he demands in terms of conditioning – they weren’t in "his" shape at the
start of the year but they are now. They’d be starting much further along
the learning curve next training camp which inherently should lead to some
better success early on in the year. It’s also easier to move a few
players for those to fit the system rather than to change the system and hope
the players can adapt. I’ll leave the money aspect out of it aside from
mentioning that I’m not sure when the last time was that the Habs were paying 3
head coaches at the same time, if it’s ever happened before.
One thing’s for sure, any teams interested in Guy Boucher will have to wait a
little while longer as the Bulldogs will be playing for a few more weeks yet.
Hopefully we’ll be able to say the same about the Habs soon enough.
If you have a question regarding
this article,
please feel free to drop me a line at
b.larose@habsworld.net.