Challenges don’t get bigger than the Colorado Avalanche. The Avalanche are one of the most dominating regular season teams this century with only seven losses so far this season in over 50 games. It’s a stunningly good record in the salary cap world.
The Canadiens are no slouch, either, with the eighth best record in the league. Montreal had something to prove, and did they ever. They tied their season-high mark of goals in a game with seven to beat the Avalanche 7-3.
Wilde Horses
The Canadiens must have known that common thinking wasn’t going to get it done against the Avalanche. Montreal’s goals had a high amount of creativity. Take the first tally of two from Nick Suzuki. Ivan Demidov saw that Suzuki had position in front of the net. His shot was designed to hit the pads of Scott Wedgewood. Suzuki slammed home the easy rebound.
Also creative in thinking was the second Suzuki goal. It was also a special teams marker. The first was on the power play; the second was shorthanded. Oliver Kapanen showed his intelligence. He had a chance to clear the zone, and he didn’t just do it blindly. He flipped it high so it could land in space at the Colorado blue line.
Suzuki won the chase to it and scored with a simple, clean deke for 18 goals on the season.
A third goal in the first was also oozing in creative energy. Lane Hutson won a free path down Main Street to the net, where he faked a shot, then dished to Noah Dobson who fired a slap shot for his 10th of the year. It was the first shift together for the new pairing.
It’s a pairing that makes a lot of sense. Hutson may just be the best distributor of the puck in the world as a defenceman, though Cale Makar supporters would say otherwise. It’s clearheaded thinking to believe the best passer should be partnered with the best shooter. On Montreal, that’s Dobson.
Defensively, it’s a pairing that makes sense as well. It allows Hutson to play on his better left side. Hutson says he doesn’t care which side he has, and he can do both, but the numbers say otherwise. Hutson is a point-and-a-half-per-game player on the left. Dobson brings the size and the defensive acumen to cover for Hutson when he pushes forward.
The offensive creativity continued in the second period. The Canadiens are third in the league in goals for good reason. Kirby Dach carried the puck from behind the Avalanche net. He knew that Wedgewood would have a difficult time getting to the near post in time. Dach didn’t have the path for a wraparound, so he banked it off the skate not yet hugging the post.
Dach has moments of brilliance. He teases just enough every time before he gets injured that he could be the player that they traded for. When he’s confident, he’s difficult to take off the puck. He has good stick skills. He’s tantalizing, but then he breaks something.
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The Alexandre Carrier goal was a thing of beauty. Carrier was in front of his own goal when he noticed Suzuki could have an odd-man rush, if he had someone to join him. Somehow Carrier was the fastest, hardest-working player on the ice, beating Avs that were 40 feet ahead of him.
Suzuki waited for Carrier to get in position for the pass, feathered it to him, and Carrier shot it upstairs. Hockey is beautiful.
The only goal that wasn’t creative was Jake Evans moving in with speed to impact Wedgewood handling it behind the net. A quick steal and wraparound for another tally — a shocking night, as Colorado was getting routed by the youngest team in the league.
The Canadiens’ top goal total in a game is seven. They tied it when Juraj Slafkovsky scored his 20th goal of the season. What a breakout year for the former number one pick overall. That ties Slafkovsky’s career high. He has 28 games to set a new goal mark.
Other strong performances of note: Zachary Bolduc continues to improve his overall intelligence and work ethic, Mike Matheson’s decision-making was strong on an aggressive Colorado forecheck, Kaiden Guhle levelled a hit on Artturi Lehkonen that may have been the best of the year, and Jakub Dobes made some sparkling saves.
It feels like they may let Dobes run with it a bit in the net considering he is the hotter of the two. He was hot at the beginning of the year, accumulating a quick plus-9 in Goals Saved Above Expected. However, they wanted their number one to be Samuel Montembeault, so he got most of the starts, and Dobes lost his momentum.
Dobes may have that good vibe back. After Tuesday’s win, Dobes said that he was in his ‘flow’ state. That’s a psychology term for the state of mind when an artist, athlete, or performer is completely in the moment, executing without any anxiety but simply feels free to perform at their peak. The ego fades, worry stops, external judgment passes, and only the game exists to be enjoyed.
Wilde Goats
The only goat would be me, if I wrote some.
Wilde Cards
If the Canadiens don’t make the playoffs this season, it will be on the back of the worst goaltending that they have had this century.
Admittedly, the league-wide save percentage is down to its worst, as well, from a high .915 in 2016 to .896 this year, but still the Canadiens’ save percentage has never been so far below league average. That’s thanks mostly this century to Carey Price. Since he retired, life after Price hasn’t been so bad except for this season.
The Canadiens have a .902 from Jacob Fowler, but they want him to get a lot of work in Laval, so when he hit close to a dozen in the NHL, that was enough of a taste. At 21, Fowler needs repetitions — not to share the net with two others.
Next up is Jakub Dobes who looks unorthodox, but he does have the most wins, and a not-terrible .890 save percentage.
The biggest disappointment is Samuel Montembeault with the third-worst goalie numbers in all of hockey with an .868. Montembeault was a .902 in 62 games last season. For four seasons, he flirted with .900. His collapse this year is unexplainable.
It all adds up to the 26th-ranked goaltending out of 32 teams in the league for the Canadiens. That’s a number so bad someone had to pay.
As always, it’s a coach.
Eric Raymond was fired Wednesday and replaced by Marco Marciano to lead the goaltenders the rest of the season. It is essentially a statement from management that they believe their goalies are significantly better than they are showing.
It also suggests that they think the goalies aren’t developing correctly, technically-speaking, because if they thought this was an emotional issue, they would have found an emotional solution — not a technical one.
Raymond is a long-time goalie coach who led the butterfly standard, and switching to a reverse VH was a learning experience for him as much as it was for his pupils.
Technical aspects of Montembeault this season are extremely puzzling to watch. On long shots, he has been skating the opposite way of the shot. He has often pushed off when he simply needed to remain static, as he was already in the right position. Fans all season have been asking, “Where are you going?”
Firings aren’t pretty. Usually, teams that have the eighth-best record in the league don’t fire anyone, but this had to be done.
It isn’t enough that the goalies were fine under Raymond last season. Sometimes it’s hard to know why it has all fallen apart, but the why doesn’t matter.
All that matters is Montreal is 26th of 32 teams, and that must change.
Brian Wilde, a Montreal-based sports writer, brings you Call of the Wilde on globalnews.ca after each Canadiens game.
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