Senators 4 – Canadian 1 | Reasonable accommodations

(Montreal) The loss of Kirby Dach hurt the Canadian, everyone agrees. “There’s rarely a night goes by that I don’t say to Kent or Martin or someone else on the team: It would have been nice to have Kirby tonight, or Alex Newhook,” Jeff said Gorton, Monday, on TSN Radio.

Tuesday was undoubtedly one of those evenings, and that partly explains why the Canadian offered such timid opposition to the Senators. After 60 minutes of not always intoxicating hockey, the siren sounded, 4-1 Senators. And the Ottawans “turned sword in insult” by celebrating in the center of the ice rink, greeting their mothers in ecstasy in a box, to the sound of loud boos.

Dach or Newhook, therefore, could have helped the Canadian. In fact, a center player would have helped the Habs, period, because the team was stuck with an unusual formation of three centers and nine wingers.

Let’s be clear from the outset: the Canadian was not one Mitchell Stephens away from winning this match. But the absence of Stephens, subjected to the Laval Rocket in the afternoon, led to a multitude of unusual situations.

First, a fourth center would have helped much more than poor Michael Pezzetta, who only made four appearances in the entire match, all four in the first period.

After the match, Martin St-Louis recalled that his team had already played with 3 centers, on certain evenings where he deployed formations of 7 defenders and 11 attackers. “I might have done that, but I wanted to have Pezz on my bench,” he said, because “historically, it can stir up a little more” against the Senators.

Is St. Louis transforming into a modern-day Fred Shero, or did he simply want to elegantly defend Pezzetta, a teammate who accepts his thankless role? Who knows. That’s not the point.

It was actually a question of flexibility that brought the coach into this situation. St. Louis did not have this flexibility that so many employers value. None of his nine wingers in uniform have played center in recent years, in living memory. Ditto for its only reservist up front, Jesse Ylönen.

Result: the head coach had to juggle his combinations all evening. This sometimes led to incongruous situations, for example his second power play unit which was made up of four wingers and a defender. Such a formation can work very well once the play is established in the offensive zone, as wingers can do the work along the boards, in front of the goalie or at the top of the slot.

But it was special to see Brendan Gallagher come out for the initial faceoff of a five-man attack in the middle of the match, just as CH was trying to get back into the game. Gallagher lost the faceoff – his success rate for three years is 36% – it was the only faceoff on this power play and the Habs did not get a shot during the 120 seconds.

After the game, Nick Suzuki and Josh Anderson dismissed the three-center excuse. “It’s up to us to find ways to get through this,” Anderson replied. We have to work harder, smarter, know who is on the ice, things like that. »

“I think the management is trying to send the best players,” added Suzuki. I like playing with three centers, because it gives me more minutes of play (he played 21 min 47, slightly more than his average of 21 min 6 s). It’s different playing without a center on the power play, but Anderson and Gallagher have a pretty good success percentage. »

“Is it easier to roll four trios? Yes, but playing with three centers can also bring something,” added St-Louis.

Suzuki, however, said he was surprised to have seen Stephens’ name on waivers on Monday (he was supposed to go there before being demoted to Laval). “It was a shock because we no longer had a fourth center, so I wondered what we were going to do. It’s not our decision, obviously. We must do our best. We have already played three centers. »

The reason there was no more room for Stephens was because Tanner Pearson was coming off the injured list and returning to the 23-man roster. With 23 players, a team can count on 3 extras. However, one of the surplus positions has been occupied, since the start of the season, by a goalkeeper, the result of a certain menage a trois that you may have heard about.

Ménage a trois which served the Canadian rather well until very recently. But the three goalkeepers have just delivered ordinary performances in quick succession. That of Allen, Tuesday, came eight days after a brilliant outing against the Colorado Avalanche. Eight days to wait, rather than being able to build on its successes.

So that makes several accommodations, which we will describe as “reasonable” because it gives a punchy title, in order to manage the presence of the three goalkeepers.

Kent Hughes has historically been well served by his patience, in cases where he was “caught” in trading a player. But it will be interesting to see how far his patience goes, now that the situation is becoming more and more restrictive.

Rising

Jayden Struble

After a very rare poor performance on Saturday in Boston, the rookie bounced back. Struble stopped many of the Senators’ attacks.

Falling

Jake Allen

He started the match by allowing a bad goal to Ridly Greig. Controlling his returns was problematic all evening.