Canadian 4 – Flyers 3 | These finds on waivers

(Philadelphia) When he was nominated, Martin St-Louis said he could put himself in any player’s shoes, because he had been through everything in his 1,134-game career.

Guillaume Lefrancois
The Press

It’s easy to argue that this explains Cole Caufield’s offensive explosion under him. The small winger also added a layer, Sunday, by scoring the winning goal in overtime in a 4-3 win for the Canadian against the Flyers, on a quiet Sunday at the Wells Fargo Center.

But it is also true for the left behind. And that’s good: we find some of these left behind, in the tricolor uniform. In Sunday’s game, there were three players that CH acquired through waivers: Paul Byron, Samuel Montembeault and Rem Pitlick.

If the first was discreet, the other two played a central role in the triumph of Montrealers. Montembeault blocked 27 of the men’s 30 shots in orange, but he especially shone at the right time, for example in the final moments of the third period to preserve the equality.

And Pitlick, he created it, the equality, in addition to preparing the winning goal by stealing the puck from Morgan Frost in the neutral zone. “It could have been a two-on-one on the other side, and he went and took the puck from the other player to give it to Cole. He really played a good match,” commented Montembeault.

Luckier than St-Louis

With his harvest of a goal and an assist, Pitlick now has 16 points in 23 games since the Minnesota Wild put him on waivers and the Canadiens claimed him there.

“I won’t lie, I love Minnesota, I’m from there. It was a dream come true to play there and overnight, I arrive in Montreal. I said to myself that my brother [Rhett] is part of the organization. You get to town, you see the tower with the logo, this is hockey town, this is where it all started,” Pitlick recalled.

But beyond these romantic considerations, the blond went from attacking too much in Minnesota to a player employed in all sauces, in the center moreover. Since the exchange of Tyler Toffoli, he comes to 4^and rank of attackers in the team for the time of use. His mere presence at the end of the third period, when his team was looking to tie the game, and then in overtime, speaks volumes about the coach’s faith in him.

And that obviously inspires confidence. Take his state of mind when he was sent on the ice with Nick Suzuki for a face-off in the defensive zone, with one minute left and his team shorthanded due to the penalty to Chris Wideman. “Nick and I looked at each other at the face-off and we thought we were going to score,” he said.

“The waiver is made exactly for that, recalled Montembeault. Both of us were in similar situations. In Minnesota, they had a lot of forwards, a lot of depth. Same thing for me at the guards [en Floride]. It’s fun, with the waiver, to have a chance elsewhere. Both are going well and we are trying to seize our chance. »

Which brings us back to Martin St-Louis, able to understand what his players are going through. He recalled that Pitlick was stuck in Minnesota, in part because the Wild wanted to make room for rookie Matthew Boldy, “a first draft pick,” he added.

“Like me, I got squeezed in Calgary, there were two first-round picks, that got me out of Calgary,” he said.

St-Louis therefore found itself on waivers in the middle of summer. Ignored, he became a free agent, signed a contract with the Tampa Bay Lightning and the presence of a plaque with his likeness somewhere in Toronto suggests that the rest of things were fruitful.

“It’s important to know where these guys are who are being squeezed and to bring them. I tip my hat to Gorts [Jeff Gorton] for picking up this guy on waivers. »

There has often been talk of the rapid rebuilding Gorton achieved with the New York Rangers, but the revival was accelerated by the attractiveness of the New York market, which favored the acquisitions of Artemi Panarin, Adam Fox and Jacob Trouba. Until proven otherwise, Montreal does not exert this same attraction on players, but there are nonetheless market inefficiencies to target in order to find players.

Pitlick will never become a Panarin or a St-Louis. But if No. 32 keeps going, Gorton will have targeted one of those inefficiencies.

In details

Two other injured

Martin St-Louis said he had a few questionable cases for the meeting and Artturi Lehkonen was one of them. The Finnish striker withdrew after a few minutes of warming up, injured in the upper body. His situation will obviously be followed in the next week, since he is one of the players who could earn Kent Hughes an interesting return in the event of a transaction. His absence allowed Laurent Dauphin to return to training, to the left of Ryan Poehling. Except that Poehling in turn fell in battle, after being tackled firmly by Justin Braun. He too is injured in the upper body. It will be interesting to see if these absences will open the door to Mathieu Perreault, left out for the third game in a row, despite all the absentees up front. Last week, Perreault said he was open to the idea of ​​playing for a team that will participate in the playoffs, but it will be difficult for him to find optimal form under the circumstances. The 34-year-old veteran has only played three games since mid-December, also due to injuries. But recent developments show just how far he has fallen in the team hierarchy.

An offensive Chiarot

Casually, Ben Chiarot now has nine points in his last nine games, which is far from the worst news for Hughes, who is openly looking to trade him by next Monday. His points aren’t “empty calories” either. Last week in Calgary, he scored the game-winning goal in overtime. This time, his pass to Rem Pitlick allowed the Habs to tie the game with 43 seconds left in the third period. “He has an interesting creative side,” Pitlick noted. In Calgary, he went straight for the net, and tonight he made a really cool play. It’s not easy to step out of the corner, hold your head up high and look the other way like he did. »

Firing lines sought

The Canadian certainly scored on the power play, after a disastrous evening in this regard on Saturday. But the two units did not generate tons of threats. One of the problems to be solved: the famous lines of fire. The CH players had six shots in seven minutes on the power play, but five other attempts were blocked by rivals. The colossus Rasmus Ristolainen used his big size to block a few shots, but it will still be important for the players to ensure better decision-making. With the net scored by Nick Suzuki, Montreal is 1-for-14 with the man advantage in its last three games.

They said

Rising

Brendan Gallagher

The presence of Nick Suzuki within his line certainly helped him, but he already had a good start and caused two penalties to the Flyers.

Falling

Laurent Dauphin

He had an unexpected chance to play with Lehkonen’s injury, but ended his night with a -3 rating despite only playing nine minutes on the ice.

The number of the match

4-3

Martin St-Louis has divided the season into series 4 of 7 since taking office, in order to give the games a stake. After showing a 4-3 record in the first seven games, the CH presented the same record in the series which ended on Sunday.