Mar 06 NHL - Montreal Canadiens Lost in More Ways Than One in 2-0 Loss to Thrashers

While coach Guy Carbonneau mentions that he was encouraged by the better play in this game versus the lacklustre performance against Buffalo, I am still trying to see where the improvement is.

I still maintain that Carey Price was definitely NOT the reason why the Canadiens lost against Buffalo, even though I have been challenged on this opinion, however I challenge anyone to try and pin this one on the young man, who made 26 saves, some spectacular, with one goal beating him on one of the 5 power-plays the Thrashers got in the first period, while the second goal was scored while Price was on the bench in the dying seconds of the game. The Habs, and their fans, could not ask much more of the 21 year old Price.

Also, I still saw many turnovers in the neutral zones with outlet passes not connecting and even worse, more sloppy defensive plays leading to pucks being coughed up in their own end. The difference tonight? The opposing team was not as opportunistic as the team before them. Bear in mind, this WAS the team in second to last place in the eastern conference, a team Montreal should not have had any problems beating.

While I'm ranting, I've been lamenting quite often this season that the team does not seem to be a unit, that there is no team philosophy, or team spirit for that matter. Take the example of when Gorges was pasted to the boards in that game against L.A and no one so much as skated near Denis Gauthier, the culprit who later would be suspended for the act. What about against Buffalo? On 2 separate incidents, Carey Price nearly had his head taken off by a Sabres player's elbow and Alex Kovalev got crunched so hard into boards that the impact knocked his helmet off.... nothing! No one did anything. Is it me?? I mean, these guys are supposed to be brothers in arms and that usually means you stick up for each other, right? I mean, I could literally hate my best friend at a certain point in our lives, but the moment someone else tries to hurt him, there are no questions asked, I am in there making sure this does not happen. I guess that's why Carbonneau did, in fact call out his players after the Buffalo game.

For those of you out there that may be thinking "yeah, but they fought for each other yesterday", well, let's take a look at who did the fighting shall we? Maxime Lapierre was given a 10 minute misconduct, and I don't think anyone can say this guy has not shown up for his team game in and game out. The other two notables were Gregory Stewart and Ryan O'Byrne, two call-ups from the farm team, where the notion of "Team" still reigns supreme. Remember last year when the Sergei Kostitsyn's, Mathieu Dandenault's and Steve Begin's would drop them for the sake of the team? Well that isn't happening this year. Our 1.5 Million dollar enforcer, Georges Laraque, with all due respect, turned out to be a lemon, now injured for the rest of the season, and he was actually paid to enforce. You'll notice not even Tom Kostopoulos is throwing down any more. That has to say something about the spirit on this team.

But I digress. Usually a road trip is supposed to bring a team together. The recent two have seen the Habs lose way more than they have won and while it can be argued that the road swing in the west was against slightly better teams, the last two losses against teams below them in their conference, can not really be explained. And you can't blame the goaltending this time guys. It's hard to win games when you are averaging less than a goal per game. But then again, maybe this is the Habs' strategy; lull Boston into the false sense of security, tank it right to 8th place and then sweep 'em in the first round of the playoffs on their run to the Stanley Cup. Yeah, that's it...

Montreal-Thrashers NHL game recap    

Tags: Atlanta Thrashers \ Carey price \ Georges Laraque \ Guy Carbonneau \ habs \ Montreal Canadiens \ NHL \ team spirit