The word that came up often in the Canadiens locker room on Thursday night, in all its forms, is probably the following word: frustration.
Frustration, there was some on the ice, but there was also some in this somewhat confused Montreal locker room, where everyone was talking about frustration, frustrated players, and frustrated players who were talking about frustration , basically.
The day before, general manager Kent Hughes had mentioned the broad concept of patience, and on that frustrating Thursday night at the Bell Centre, we’ll tell each other, it was the Panthers who won hands down, with a victory without 6-2 call.
“We’re frustrated with the way we played,” defender Mike Matheson said. It’s difficult, we try to do well, and then there are all these punishments… it’s hard to deal with that. »
What we had in front of our eyes on this eventful Thursday evening — at a certain point, David Savard was sitting on the ground in the penalty bench, so there was no more room for all the culprits — is the performance of a club that is learning things, perhaps with a view to a brighter future.
Because it’s everyone who learns in this group. Samuel Montembeault learned the hard way that sometimes there are pucks that don’t jump to the right side (“we dropped him”, Arber Xhekaj will say about him), Martin St-Louis learns to know the rules of obstruction against the keeper (in his defense, he’s far from alone in not being sure he understands), and the players themselves will have to learn how to make better changes.
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Evgenii Dadonov and Marc Staal
By the way, there were two penalties in quick succession for having too many players on the ice, a first in memory. On this subject, perhaps the Canadiens should bring Dwight King back to the organization, he who knew how to make the best changes in hockey? The real ones know.
This string of frustration led to three fights, and the Canadian ended up giving four power play goals to visiting Florida. It’s quite difficult to win matches in these conditions.
“The penalties for having too many men on the ice, you have no excuses for that, the players were not alert enough, explained Martin St-Louis. During the first period, we managed the game, but during the second, we shot ourselves in the foot.
“I didn’t think our aggression was a problem; I’m glad we stuck together, in a somewhat frustrating game. It was also our fault that we were angry, because we shot each other in the foot… in the second half we didn’t give ourselves a chance. »
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Carden Primeau stands on a shot from Aleksander Barkov
It was also during this second period that the Panthers scored 5 goals, to take a very solid 5-0 lead. That too, it’s starting to be a worn refrain during the defeats of the Canadian: this inability to play well during the entire game. The moment the Canadian lost his video challenge, the entire club fell apart.
“I’m not sure what to think of this settlement, because really, the result could have gone either way,” noted captain Nick Suzuki. You never know if you can win such a contest, but you have to make sure you keep playing after that if you lose it…”
But the Canadian gave way to a kind of discouragement, and that too is part of learning. As Pat Burns once said: Rome wasn’t built in a day.
So evenings like this, there will be others. It just has to end at some point, ideally sooner rather than later.
Up: Rem Pitlick
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Rem Pitlick
A goal and an assist for this energetic player, one of the few to have responded, Thursday night, in the Montreal squad.
Down: the powder blue sweater
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Cayden Primeau
The worst invention since the new Coke that became the old Coke again. The Canadiens are now 0-5 this season wearing this thing.
Match number: 3
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Michael Pezzetta and Ryan Lomberg
Number of fights between these two teams, who obviously do not like each other. There will be sparks if these two clubs end up in the playoffs…
They said
My check on Staal is something that is part of the game. Then they tried to protect their player and that’s normal…
Mike Matheson
If you play like Radko Gudas does, you should expect to be held accountable, and he didn’t.
Josh Anderson
We should have played better than that in front of Samuel (Montembeault). The referees imposed some dubious penalties but that’s no excuse.
Arber Xhekaj
When it came time to take Samuel out of the net, I just told him not to worry about it, that it wasn’t his fault.
Martin St Louis
I’m sure the league will review the streak (about Mike Matheson’s hit against Eric Staal)
Paul Maurice
In details
Patrick Chèvrefils was ready!
There were no Quebecers in the uniform of the Panthers for this game, but it happened to an injury that there was one. When Sergei Bobrovsky was injured early in the game, National League emergency goalkeeper Patrick Chèvrefils had to go down to the Panthers locker room and put on his gear, in case Alex Lyon had bad luck. . “It’s the time it happened the closest,” Chèvrefils told the two journalists who chatted to him, in a corridor of the Bell Center. Chèvrefils, a full-time police officer, was heading for the catwalk when he learned that Bobrovsky was injured. Paul Maurice, the Panthers head coach, knew who he was dealing with. “Oh, are you talking about Patrick? he asked us after the game. He was in the locker room with us at intermissions. I had to adjust my language so that it wouldn’t reveal our secrets! We even fed him after the game. In the end, Lyon held on, blocking 23 of the Canadiens’ 25 shots. His ultra spectacular save at the expense of Cole Caufield, in the second period, when it was still 0-0, will be part of the games of the week. “That save was incredible. This arena can be very noisy and the shutdown helped calm fans down,” Maurice noted.
A challenge, a turning point
This stop is certainly one of the two turning points of the match. The other ? The challenge refused to Martin St-Louis. It was still 0-0 when Sam Reinhart opened the scoring. But on the game, Samuel Montembeault had come into contact with Matthew Tkachuk while trying to move laterally in his semi-circle. “I thought I had a good chance,” admitted St-Louis. You think it will be 0-0, and you give them a numerical advantage. Sometimes you’re not sure, you don’t dare, you think you’re going to lose it. This one I thought I was going to win. In its explanatory email, the NHL indicated that “the contact between Tkachuk and Montembeault had no impact on the goal, and therefore there was no obstruction against the goalkeeper”. Paul Maurice was fined $25,000 hours before the match for his criticism of the referees on Tuesday. Like a hostage who reads a text, he said, about this same sequence, that he had “total confidence in the NHL so that the right decision is made”.
Different strategy, same result
In the first game between these two teams, three weeks ago, the Panthers had scored three goals in six chances on the power play. This time it was four goals from eight attempts. It was amusing to hear Sam Bennett say, about the players of the Canadian, that he and his teammates had “studied their numerical disadvantage on video”, after the match, because the injuries made it so that the CH defended with different players from three weeks ago. Kaiden Guhle and Jake Evans are now on the injured list, while Mike Matheson, Rafaël Harvey-Pinard and Michael Pezzetta did not take part in this match on December 29. “They changed their penalty kill from the last game,” noted Maurice. They were much more passive in the last game and there they were much more aggressive. Our powerplay wasn’t generating much until we scored. They put a lot of pressure, but we ended up making the right plays, making deflections, cross passes. It took a big adjustment. »