Assign Your Habs First Quarter Grades
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As part of our quarterly report cards, we want to hear from you. What grades would you give Montreal’s players through their first 21 games of the season?
As part of our quarterly report cards, we want to hear from you. What grades would you give Montreal’s players through their first 21 games of the season?
After a five-game week, Laval got a small break on the schedule with only three although they were all on the road. The Rocket weren’t able to come away with a win but managed to get to overtime in all three games, making it a reasonably successful week in the standings.
The Habs had their California portion of the schedule this past week, a stretch that typically causes them some difficulty. While it certainly didn’t end well, they still came out of that portion of the road trip with a pair of victories.
The Habs looked to make it a clean California sweep on Saturday as they took on Los Angeles. Instead, they put forth one of their ugliest efforts of the season, falling 4-0.
Montreal’s prospect pool has certainly gotten deeper over the last few seasons as a result of the extra draft capital they’ve had. We go similarly deep in our annual rankings as we begin with the players ranked outside the top 40.
The schedule makers weren’t kind to Laval last week, putting them in a tough situation of playing five games in seven days with two separate road trips in there. To their credit, the Rocket did relatively well, picking up a trio of victories despite a long list of injuries.
With the Canadiens needing an extra body on the back end for their upcoming California road trip, they recalled Jayden Struble from Laval. To make room, Rafael Harvey-Pinard was placed on injured reserve.
The Habs continued shuffling their lines and their goalies in an effort to get the team back in the win column. Neither approach worked, however, as they dropped all three games despite some quality contributions from some of their role players.
After falling to Calgary on Tuesday, the Habs looked to get back in the win column as they hosted Vegas on Thursday. They held the lead for more than half the game but a late penalty proved costly as they fell 6-5.
Starting extension talks with Samuel Montembeault so early in the season might seem a bit strange after no movement on that front in the summer. But it just might be the domino that needs to fall to solve the three-goalie challenge.