It was a late night like you often see in a bottom-ranking team. The final siren is heard, the players converge on their guardian and congratulate each other, comfort each other in defeat.
In the pile of red jerseys, Alex Belzile walked over to Sean Farrell and whispered a few words in his ear.
“I just said ‘good job’ to him,” Belzile said after CH’s 5-2 loss to the Florida Panthers. “It’s hard to keep your head up when you lose like that, but I was happy for him. You see more and more flashes. The vision of the game is hard to learn, and he has it, that’s for sure. »
At first glance, everything sets them apart. Belzile, a Quebecer, never drafted, rolled his bump in the minor circuits before scoring his first goal in the NHL at 31 years old. Farrell, a Boston-area American, comes to the big leagues at 21, a star in the college ranks, an Olympic Games appearance behind the tie, and now he scores his first NHL goal – a gift from the goalkeeper, we hear – from his second game.
They have little in common, but Belzile didn’t stop there. “He’s been amazing with me,” Farrell said. I’m sitting next to him in the locker room this week, he’s the one who drove me from the hotel to the arena. He’s taken really good care of me these past few days. »
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Sean Farrell (57) celebrates his first career NHL goal.
You have to understand the context in which Farrell arrives in the NHL. He just spent the last two years at Harvard. This season, his line with Matt Coronato and Joe Miller has remained pretty much unchanged. As if that weren’t enough, he had even played with Coronato and Miller in Chicago, in the USHL, before finding them in the red brick of Cambridge.
He comes from a winning team and played in a playoff game last weekend. Now he has just participated in two more or less memorable duels, two defeats for CH, and he has already gone to six different line partners in six periods. If Martin St-Louis wanted to take him out of his comfort zone, he succeeded.
“Just being in the league, you get out of your comfort zone,” recalled the head coach of the Canadiens.
In this context, a welcoming committee is essential, and Belzile is very happy to be part of it.
“I was lucky, I played with good veterans when I was young, recalls number 60. I needed anything, a lift, I had questions … I try to do the same. It’s natural for me. It’s important to give young people confidence, and the faster you are, the more it shows on the ice. »
Farrell may be affable in interviews, but Belzile describes him as a young man who is “embarrassed” in road trips.
It’s normal. I put myself in his shoes: you come from college, early twenties, and a guy in his 30s is talking to you! It’s not the same reality, but I still have a young heart. He’s a good young man, super nice. It happens quickly for him. I don’t know if he had thought of scoring his first goal on such a devastating shot!
Alex Belzile
Did he point out to him that he, Belzile, had waited until he was 31 to experience what Farrell experienced on Thursday night? “Not yet, but I’ll tell him, for example!” he replies, laughing.
We often see the leadership of a team simply through the players who wear a “C” or an “A” on their jersey. This is less the case with a mature team, like the 2021 edition of the Canadiens, which reached the final with an army of veterans, but in this edition, filled with rookies, it is normal to believe that the leaders of men are basically Nick Suzuki and his deputies.
“When you have so many new players, you try to make them feel welcome,” Suzuki said. We have a very good group of players here and we try to build a culture. »
Belzile and Farrell’s story reminds us, however, that these attentions can come from any player, regardless of status.
It’s also the kind of useful information when projecting the Habs from 2023-2024, a popular exercise at the end of the season. Young people with intriguing potential is one thing, but the quality of the coaching is also worth its weight in gold. We saw it with David Savard and the young defenders this season. It remains to be seen if Belzile will have the chance to be part of this framework next fall.
Up: Jake Evans
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Jake Evans (71)
The veterans sometimes find it difficult to draw their energy from the circumstances of this end of the season, but not him.
Down: Nick Suzuki
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Nick Suzuki (14)
Aleksander Barkov will have given him headaches all year. Suzuki ends the four-game series against the Panthers this season with a -8 differential.
The number of the match: 27
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Aaron Ekblad
The Panthers have scored 27 goals against the Habs this season. The 5-2 win was their shortest victory of the season against Montreal, which says a lot about the pace of the other three games.
In details
Savard tried hard, but…
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
David Savard
In the morning, David Savard’s status was uncertain at best for the game at the Bell Centre. The seasoned defender tried hard, to the point of taking part in the warm-up period before the game, but he ended up walking off the ice, unable to continue. It was therefore Chris Wideman who took his place in the Montreal squad. Wideman was the least often used player by Martin St-Louis Thursday night against the Panthers, with a modest playing time of just 9:38. “It’s a bit of bad luck, summed up the Montreal coach Thursday evening. There are injured players coming back, and then you lose Josh [Anderson]you lose [Kirby] Dach, and there we lose [David] Savard […] We lose big chunks. It’s the league. The league, she doesn’t care, the league continues, and it’s not easy. »
The case is ketchup for Tkachuk
PHOTO GRAHAM HUGHES, THE CANADIAN PRESS
Matthew Tkachuk (19)
Casually, Matthew Tkachuk is having a no worse season. Thursday at the Bell Centre, he had a hat trick, in addition to adding an assist to his record, to bring his total points to 101 for the season. That makes him two seasons in a row of more than 100 points, he who had obtained 104 points last season with the Calgary Flames. He suddenly becomes the fourth player in the history of this league to collect two consecutive seasons of 100 points with two different clubs, after Wayne Gretzky, Jimmy Carson and Mike Rogers. “To be quite honest, it’s not a stat that means much to me, unless we can participate in the playoffs, replied the forward after the game. I think any player in this league would have that same reaction. I’m sure I’ll have the chance to think about all this later, at another time…”
A departure not at all like a lion…
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Alex Lyons
With his parents in place for the game, Panthers goaltender Alex Lyon felt like looking good. But his game started with a very bad goal awarded to Sean Farrell, the kind of shot that a goalkeeper likes to have the opportunity to see again. But Lyon eventually recovered. “Sometimes it’s the goalkeeper who allows the club to recover, but this time it’s the guys who gave me a chance to replace myself,” explained the goalkeeper. I conceded a very bad goal when I left, but we can get out of here with the victory… and besides, my parents were there! »
They said
We were flat. At the end of the season, the league is tough mentally. The Panthers are playing with the energy of desperation and so much energy has to be deployed. You have to manufacture this energy a bit, because the level of emotion is not the same for the two teams. We will have to find this energy to finish the season.
Martin St Louis
It’s a bit of bad luck. You start getting players again, and you lose Josh [Anderson]you lose [Kirby] Dach, and there we lose [David] Savard. But the league doesn’t care, the league goes on. It is not easy. But these are repetitions that cannot be bought. Our young people gain experience.
Martin St Louis
You’re just happy for the youngster, it reminds you of your own first goal. I just hope he will enjoy it. He will go home with a big smile. You’re in the NHL, you play at the Bell Center and you score your first goal, which always comes with a nice ovation.
Brendan Gallagher on Sean Farrell’s first goal
The thing that is impressive with Matthew [Tkachuk]is that he never cheats, he never waits behind the play. He is always involved in the play. He could have managed a goal or two more… he has good hands around the net.
Paul Maurice, Panthers head coach