(Montreal) Kent Hughes and Jeff Gorton said as early as the Canadian’s golf tournament that they saw David Reinbacher spending the season in Europe. Saturday night, after the Canadian’s 3-1 defeat against the Maple Leafs, they moved from words to action.
Reinbacher was indeed one of five players cut by the team. The Austrian will join the Kloten team in the Swiss national league, the country’s top division.
The decision is hardly surprising, because defensemen who establish themselves in the NHL full time at age 18, the season following their draft, are very rare. Since the start of the new millennium, only 4 have played 40 or more matches in a season. Two of them – Rasmus Dahlin and Aaron Ekblad – were talents then considered exceptional, drafted first overall.
Reinbacher played his second preseason game of camp on Saturday. Apart from an error reading the game which allowed the Leafs to score their second goal of the match, the young man did well alongside Kaiden Guhle.
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Nicholas Robertson (89) and Kaiden Guhle (21)
He met with the media after the match, but the decision on his dismissal had still not been communicated. Everything suggests that he did not yet know his fate, but some of the questions led him to take stock of his achievements after three weeks of camp.
He particularly insisted on the importance of “decision-making. You have to know where to send the puck before you even receive it. “It’s an important part of being successful.”
Moreover, he agreed that “expectations are high. It’s the NHL. You have to prepare yourself mentally and physically. Everything is faster than at home. Our practices and intrasquad games helped me a lot. You have to make good decisions on the ice, think quickly.”
Reinbacher concludes this camp with two matches behind the tie. In the first game, he had an assist in 15 minutes of play. On Saturday, he was shut out in 16 minutes. He also played two games at the rookie tournament in Buffalo.
A life experience
On a human level, he understood quite quickly that his future adopted city only lives on hockey. “Montreal is a hockey-crazed city. It’s good, I like it, but I have to concentrate on what I do on the ice,” he said.
As Reinbacher began his meeting with the media, his blue line teammate Johnathan Kovacevic was just explaining how a first NHL camp is a life experience for a young person just out of adolescence.
“Obviously I’m from Canada, so it was easier for me. But I see these guys coming and I have sympathy for them, noted the charismatic defender. They are far from their family. Guys don’t think about that often. »
You spend three hours a day at the arena and the rest of the time, you’re out of the arena and you have to adapt to a new life. Maturity, mindset, how to deal with ups and downs, it’s crucial and I’m happy to have learned that in professional hockey. David has a good head on his shoulders.
Jonathan Kovacevic, on defender David Reinbacher
On the ice, he seems to have charmed those around him. Kovacevic again: “His maturity, his way of reading the game, it’s impressive. With his stick, he makes plays worthy of a much older player. Looks like this is his fifth camp, not his first. You will see it by watching him play, but we see it in training: he has a very good hockey head. »
Guhle noted progression. “In the first match, I think both of us were a little stressed,” he agreed. It was my first match in a long time, and it was his first match with the Canadian. But we simplified our game tonight and he played very well. »
And Martin St-Louis? “He has the calm of a guy much older than that,” said the Habs head coach. Having this calmness is a special maturity for an 18-year-old defender. »
It will be interesting to watch what happens next. Last year, the Habs decided that their first choice, Juraj Slafkovsky, would spend the season in Montreal, rather than returning to Turku, Finland. The organization had observed that Slafkovsky was not necessarily a priority for the organization in Turku, particularly in terms of usage. He ultimately amassed 10 points in 39 games, before being injured mid-season.
With Reinbacher, we obviously make a different calculation. It will take a few years before the results can be compared.
In details
And the ax falls
David Reinbacher can rest assured: he was not the only one to be asked to leave the Bell Center on Saturday. The Austrian is one of 35 players to have been removed from the CH camp. After the 30 players announced in the afternoon, the Habs announced five other departures, including that of Reinbacher. The others: goalie Jakub Dobes, forwards Sean Farrell and Riley Kidney, as well as defenseman William Trudeau. Farrell clearly needs more time, despite his successful college career. Again on Saturday, the small winger was invisible, as he has been since the start of camp, at the rookie tournament in Buffalo as well as at the end of the season last spring. Kidney and Trudeau didn’t play a bad game on Saturday, while Dobes gave nothing in 20 minutes of play in the third period, even receiving some well-fed applause.
Knies: it promises!
Easton Cowan was the sensation of the first half of Maple Leafs training camp. But as is often the case with 18-year-old players, it gets more difficult as opposing teams bring in more veterans. On the other hand, Matthew Knies will be 21 years old in two weeks, he is 6’3″ tall and weighs 217 lbs. In short, he is physically ready for the NHL and he has shown it well so far in camp. He beat Samuel Montembeault to put Toronto on the scoreboard in the first period, and was threatening the rest of the evening. He also made fun of Trudeau for getting a quality shot. No wonder Sheldon Keefe gave him 21 minutes of play. He now has five points in four preparatory games. We bet that we will see this choice of 2e Leafs tour in 2021 somewhere in the top two lines before long.
The more it changes…
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Cole Caufield
If the Canadian’s numerical advantage was a comedian, he would perform at the Bordel, because he is in training. Although something tells us that the entertainment dollar offers a much better return there than at the Bell Centre. After four games, CH displays an atrocious 10% on the power play, a sweet memory of the last two seasons. Saturday, in nine minutes of play with a man advantage, Montreal only got three shots. And when Juraj Slafkovsky attempted one at the end of the power play in the second period, he missed the target and allowed Nicholas Robertson, who was coming out of the cell, to escape on a breakaway. Is Mike Matheson that key to unity? It seems so, especially since his replacement, Mattias Norlinder, is not an NHL player. Except that the rest of the first unit was, again on Saturday, made up of the usual suspects Nick Suzuki, Cole Caufield and Kirby Dach.