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In Hainsight: Florida Never Suits the Habs |
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Follow me @KarineHains for all updates about the Montreal Canadiens and women's hockey
If Florida suits the snowbirds from Québec, it certainly doesn’t suit its hockey team. Year after year, the Canadiens head to Florida post-Christmas break and the result is almost always the same, tough defeats. To be fair, Tampa is a well-oiled hockey machine and one that is superior to most teams in this league, but it’s not an excuse for the pitiful display we saw last night.
Anyone who’s ever played in the NHL will tell you, it’s hard to shake off the rust after a Christmas break where everyone indulges. The Canadiens’ vets must have known so and now, their 5 rookie blueliners are also in the know after seeing the Bolts easily skate around them all night. Mind you, the loss wasn’t their fault, the group didn’t perform well enough to make this a contest.
If you want to beat a powerhouse like the Lightning it’s imperative that you take advantage of all the chances you are given, that includes scoring on the power play which the Canadiens didn’t do, even though they deployed their man-advantage 5 times. Right now, the Habs are dead last in that department with a 13.6% success rate, the 31st team is the Flyers at 15.2% that’s quite a gap.
The power play has been an issue for years in Montreal, ever since Markov left, the man-advantage has struggled, being unimaginative and predictable. Considering how bad things are, one would have thought that St-Louis would have given Justin Barron (the best PP defenseman in the AHL at the time of his recall) a shot. After all, the old saying “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” certainly doesn’t apply here. But no, St-Louis stuck to his guns, using a 5 forwards PP on the first wave and Xhekaj on the 2nd wave.
Having all forwards on the man advantage can bring dividends but it’s unlikely to happen when a power play just doesn’t click. Then it just becomes a momentum killed as we’ve seen with the Habs stuck in their own zone even when up a man. Tampa Bay’s penalty kill was more aggressive than the Canadiens’ power play and that goes to show how badly things are going for the man-advantage. What’s even worse, captain Nick Suzuki was at times used on both waves in yesterday’s tilt spending lots of time and energy in a lost cause.
The Canadiens will have to turn over a new leaf quickly as they are back in action tonight in Sunrise against the underperforming Panthers. After seeing Connor Bedard’s performance at the World Junior Championships last night (3 goals and 4 assists as Canada smoked Germany 11-2), Kent Hughes must be ecstatic that the Habs own the Cats’ first round pick at the upcoming draft. If you combine the Canadiens’ and the Panthers’ odds of winning the lottery, the Habs are currently the team with the 4th best odds to go home with the big prize and if last night is any indication, those odds are going to get even better.
Montreal Canadiens Blogger • 
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