Canadian 4 — Blue Jackets 2 | A journey that formed youth

(Columbus) Was it the California air? Getting together with friends for ten days away from home? Or, flatly, facing teams at the back of the rankings?



Still, like any good episode of Scoody-Doothis long journey of the Canadian had a most unexpected outcome.

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Gustav Lindström and Joel Armia

Unexpected because, it should be remembered, this series of five games on foreign ice rinks began with a fiasco in Boston, at the end of which Martin St-Louis described his team as “soft”. The adjective is rarely a compliment; it is, at best, purely descriptive when used to describe a mattress or an ice cream.

However, this same team, on Wednesday, was able to afford to play I Won’t Back Down, by Tom Petty, in his locker room. The mood was such that even the ultra shy Joel Armia appeared in front of the cameras and stayed there for a good three minutes. He was no longer a tribune, but nevertheless displayed a broad smile.

Even Cole Caufield, not always talkative after games, stayed to talk. He was grinning when asked about a three-on-two surge he took advantage of with his line when the Blue Jackets completely botched a change. “It was weird. I had no idea what happened! I asked Martin to tell me what happened,” Caufield said.

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Cole Caufield (22)

Such was the mood in the locker room of the team that had just won 4-2 over the Blue Jackets. Montreal concludes its five-game road series with a 3-2-0 record. Purists will point out that this wasn’t a five-game trip per se, as they returned home after the beating they suffered in Boston.

These are three victories in four outings since they left Brossard, but we note that these three victories were signed against Columbus, Anaheim and San Jose, among the six worst teams in the NHL in the standings.

“The important thing is victory,” proclaimed Caufield, clearly not in the camp of those in favor of the process. You have to find ways to win. We come back with a good record, even if we have things to correct. We have to put this back [ce jeudi]. »

Progression

However, collectively and individually, the team took advantage of the strange schedule at its disposal to perfect its work. Rare are trips, like this one, where a team enjoys four full practices.

“In recent days, we have been working on things that have given us misery in California, in backcheck [repli défensif]so as not to give too many cross-field passes, and I think that helped,” noted Samuel Montembeault.

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Samuel Montembeault

“We worked a lot on our forecheck and we were strong,” added Mike Matheson. Wednesday resulted in a team that was able to bottleneck the Jackets for a few long stretches. During one of them, Juraj Slafkovsky found himself right in the middle of the slot with two high-quality shot opportunities. If he was slow on the first, he drew at full speed the second time, again an element that had been worked on in training in recent weeks.

Speaking of Slafkovsky, here’s one who has taken steps in the right direction. During the famous match in Boston, he was one of the worst players in his camp, even if he finished the evening with two points. He was employed alongside Sean Monahan and the sauce never really took off.

Now he has just spent the last four games with Caufield and Christian Dvorak. It’s not exactly Marchand-Bergeron-Pastrnak, but the very first pick in the 2022 draft had a good week overall. Against Columbus, he made the zone exit which led to Caufield’s goal.

At 22, Alex Newhook is one of the young people, even if his experience suggests otherwise. He returns to Montreal with three goals in his last four outings. “He is making good progress, he is integrating into the team, into our concepts. He still has a lot to learn, but I like his commitment,” praised St-Louis.

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Alex Newhook (15) and Boone Jenner (38)

Kaiden Guhle continues to play with impressive aplomb for a guy who was at his 62 on Wednesdaye game in the NHL. Justin Barron ate up minutes while limiting blatant blunders. Even Jayden Struble, in a more discreet role, had good sequences on Wednesday. He returns to town with his first four matches under his belt.

However, it will be interesting to see how the veterans react over the next few days, because if there are any who are dragging their feet, it is within this group. Some must have left Columbus encouraged. Monahan, for example, skillfully set up Armia’s winning goal by calmly controlling the puck, as he did so well in October. Armia himself undoubtedly enjoyed his end of the evening, with this somewhat lucky goal, we hear, then an important play in the back of the territory which led to the insurance goal in an empty net.

However, it also remains enigmatic for Josh Anderson, whom St-Louis tried to energize by delegating him with the first trio to start the match against his former team.

We will have the answers before long, because CH gets back to work this Thursday evening against the Panthers.

Rising: Kaiden Guhle

PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES

Kaiden Guhle

For the fourth time this season, he was the most employed player in his camp, spending almost 25 minutes on the surface. He certainly committed a turnover on the Jackets’ second goal, but repaired several blunders.

Down: Tanner Pearson

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Tanner Pearson

Another erased evening for the veteran, who has only 2 points in his last 17 games.

The number of the match: 37

PHOTO PAUL VERNON, ASSOCIATED PRESS

Elvis Merzlikins blocks Juraj Slafkovsky’s shot

That’s the number of stoppages in play in this match during which the poor descriptors didn’t get much respite. This explains why the match was played in 2 hours 12 minutes.

In details

The unfortunate people are having a blast

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Patrik Laine (center)

The cases of Patrik Laine and Johnny Gaudreau have been the talk of Ohio in recent weeks. Yegor Chinakhov, for his part, aroused fewer reactions, but according to colleague Brian Hedger, from Columbus Dispatch, the attacker wants a change of scenery. “He doesn’t feel they trust him,” Chinakhov’s agent wrote to Hedger. Perhaps he will change his mind if he discovers the pins Mechanical Co. bowling alleys, but until then, his performance will not suffer, quite the contrary. The Russian scored in a second straight game and almost broke the 2-2 tie at the start of the third period. Laine also found the back of the net and has three points in five games since Pascal Vincent sent him into the stands.

An undeserved point

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Gustav Lindström

The differential statistic is criticized for several reasons, good and not so good. Laine’s goal will certainly serve the critics of this measure. Gustav Lindström, who had the game in front of him, nevertheless decided to go to the bench, even though he had been on the ice for around forty seconds. Lindström therefore jumped over the boards to prevent his team from being caught at fault, but poor Justin Barron, who relieved him, was obviously wrong-footed and could only watch Laine thwart Samuel Montembeault and set off the damn cannon. Barron therefore inherited a -1 which should not have gone to him, the equivalent of an unearned point in baseball. And Lindström got off without a blemish on his record. Something to think about when we note that he ended the evening at +2.

The ups and downs of Caufield

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Cole Caufield and Boone Jenner

Evil tongues will say that Cole Caufield, renowned for his scoring skills, discovered his passing skills in the first period. His passes to Zach Werenski and Johnny Gaudreau were indeed straight on the tape, the only problem obviously being that both bipeds were wearing blue sweaters. “We committed too many turnovers in the first period,” commented Caufield, without naming names. The fact remains that little number 22 came back strong in the second period, playing with significantly more explosion in his skating. His efforts came true when he scored, although he would probably have to offer a good chianti to Elvis Merzlikins, who gave him a generous return from Christian Dvorak’s shot. Shots “in the dog”, like this, should not generate such returns. It was only Caufield’s third five-on-five goal this season, but second in his last three games.


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