Penguins 6 – Canadian 0 | The hole at the bottom of the hole

“Did you think you were deep down? Tell yourself that there is always more hollow. ”

Simon-Olivier Lorange
Press

Guillaume Lefrançois
Press

It had nothing to do with hockey, but when singer Mononc ‘Serge said these words in 1998, he unknowingly launched the foundations for a critical summary of the Canadiens’ 2021-2022 season after 19 games.

As incredible as it may seem, the Habs on Thursday offered their worst performance of the season by offering themselves to the Pittsburgh Penguins, who left the Bell Center sated with a 6-0 victory.

(Re) read our live coverage View the meeting summary

No need to look far to analyze the meeting. Head coach Dominique Ducharme did it for us: “We were bad. ”

But still ? “In all situations, both offensively and defensively, coming back to our zone, on the counter-attack, with and without the puck. […] We weren’t good. ”

So much for that. There is no need, in the circumstances, to list the culprits, because we could go through the entire training. Take Cole Caufield, for example, possibly his club’s best striker in the loss. “With the puck, he had a few flashes and a good offensive explosion,” said Ducharme.

If the coach could have underlined the words “with the puck” on the yellow marker, he would have done so. Because without the puck… it was less that, let’s say.

Falling back, Caufield looked confused at his blue line on the Penguins’ fourth goal. On the next, he never disturbed Brock McGinn who was able to deflect the puck behind Cayden Primeau. And on the sixth and last, he joined forces with Ben Chiarot to annoy the cunning Teddy Blueger as little as possible.

However, it is certainly not for him to bear the weight of this 13^e loss of the season, a 15^e even if we include the two setbacks suffered in overtime.

Because there is something decidedly strange about the moment it arrives, this defeat.

Brendan Gallagher, undeniable leader of this team, has already mentioned several times the “hole” that the Canadian has dug since the start of the campaign and indicated to what extent he and his teammates are aware of the depth of the hole. Each time, he made it clear that the group knew what they had to do to get by.

Faced with the test of real life, this statement ages very badly. If the CH had been 11-5-2 before the game against the Penguins, we could accept, perhaps even with an amused smile, the good old excuse “we forget and we move on to the next game”.

However, under the circumstances we know, it is at best strange, at worst worrying. As he prepares to complete the first quarter of his season, the Canadian languishes in penultimate place in the Eastern Conference, eight points (one game behind) behind the Detroit Red Wings. , current tenants of the last place giving access to the playoffs.

Thursday’s game was a hole in the hole. One more shovel in a pit that we are supposedly trying to backfill.

In previous games, the Canadian had at least been competitive. Not this time. Result: For the eighth time this season, he has allowed five or more goals. “Where is the solution? A journalist asked Ben Chiarot.

“If we allow so many goals, it is because a lot of things do not work,” replied the defender, without adding anything. It was all said, anyway.

Norlinder, Caufield

In order to leave us on a somewhat positive note, let us mention that despite the circumstances, the Canadiens’ training made a good place for young players from his organization.

We will not write that the torch is being passed to the next generation, because it is not true. At least not yet. Mattias Norlinder is a phone call away from finishing the season in Sweden, Ryan Poehling and the fourth line have played little – and badly – and Cole Caufield was still a member of the Rocket on Wednesday night.

Still, Norlinder had a frankly encouraging game. His skate was not overestimated, nor was his offensive instinct. These are two of its obvious strengths.

While his professional North American experience boiled down to three small games at Laval, one wondered what he would look like against NHL players. It didn’t look bad at all. With David Savard, he favored simplicity in defense, which served him well during the 18 minutes he played. We expected him especially in the power play, but the visitors were fined only one penalty.

“For a first game, it was okay, there was some good and some bad,” Norlinder said simply. His coach was more talkative, pointing out that the defenseman had “shown great things”, and that despite the limited sample, he had displayed “good vision and good confidence with the puck”.

As for Caufield, it has already been stated how much he struggled in defense, but it would be unfair not to highlight how transformed he has appeared compared to the lame start to the season that earned him a dismissal in the American League.

The official scoresheet only grants him two shooting attempts, but in reality he should have been given at least four. The violence of the backhand shot he fired early in the second period was a reminder of how much he could punish goalkeepers from anywhere in the opposing zone. The streak that followed could certainly (should?) Have ended with a goal from Tyler Toffoli.

The rest of Caufield’s game may not have been the one he dreamed of, but no one will say no to an offensive spark during the long journey through the desert that looms between now and the end of the schedule. Not his trainer, anyway. And especially not the supporters.

In details

It’s bad, reason n^o 246

The good news for the Canadiens: the power play did not suffer too much in this loss. The bad news: he had only one chance. In fact, in the last three games, the Habs have enjoyed just four power-play superiorities, one Thursday, two Tuesday in New York and one in Boston on Sunday. In addition, that of Thursday occurred following a very banal play of recovery of the puck in the corner, in the defensive zone. It was therefore not the type of penalty where a player, by his intensity or by creating a chance to score, “forces” the opponent to commit an irregular gesture. We will therefore have to do it again on Saturday if we want to better analyze what Mattias Norlinder has to offer in these circumstances.

The victory of the support staff

It might have been Sidney Crosby who opened the scoring, but the rest of the evening was the business of the Penguins’ support staff. The fourth line, piloted by the unsuspected Latvian Teddy Blueger, generated three goals, while the third, which center is former Sabers glory Evan Rodrigues, was responsible for nearly 80% of the shooting attempts. It’s another flower for these players, who make up the bulk of shorthanded units, a category where the Penguins are second in the NHL this season (88%). After the match, the members of trios 3 and 4 were treated to a nice tribute from Sidney Crosby. “They’ve been strong all year. A lot of those players are on the penalty kill and they’re doing a good job there too. In addition to being hard to face, they pass penalties and score goals. They help us in many ways. ”

The dark hero

It is quite rare that a goalkeeper who has a shutout is not among the three stars, but such is the reality of a goalkeeper who wins his match by six goals! Tristan Jarry still had his say in this triumph, not so much in terms of quantity (only 24 shots aimed at him), but in terms of quality. In the second period, with a mark of 3-0 Penguins, the Habs still offered some form of opposition and had good moments offensively. Cole Caufield pulled Chad Ruhwedel out of his panties twice rather than once, Jake Evans got a shot from the top of the slot, Josh Anderson and Jonathan Drouin knocked on the door … In short, on more than one occasion, the CH could have raised the score to 3-1 and made spectators believe that they were getting their money’s worth. But Jarry stood up every time. “The game in Washington left me with a bitter taste. You don’t want to allow six goals and I made it personal, admitted Jarry. I wanted to improve myself. Against Buffalo and tonight was better, I kept the puck in the middle of my body, and the guys blocked shots. ”

On the rise: David Savard

Like his team, he hasn’t had a great game, but he’s one of only two regular players on his side who haven’t been on the ice for no Penguins goal, so that he was playing alongside rookie Mattias Norlinder.

Down: Jonathan Drouin

He hasn’t been much worse than the rest of his club. However, the 92 did not break anything at all in attack. His club needs him.

The number of the match

7

This is already the seventh time, in just 19 games, that the Habs have scored a goal or less. Nothing foreign to the fact that the team now points to 31^e and second to last place in the league for the average goals per game.

They said