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When the National Hockey League decided to award a trophy to the best goaltender every season, they called it the Vezina trophy after newly retired goaltender Georges Vezina who had played eight seasons with the Montreal Canadiens. In the last two seasons of his career, Vezina had been dominating posting goals against average of 1.97 and 1.81 and leading the Canadiens to a Stanley Cup win in 1924. Since the inception of the award, it has been awarded 96 times and 29 times, it was taken by a Montreal Canadiens’ netminder.
Given how often the Habs have claimed that piece of hardware, fans have come to expect excellence for the Montreal Canadiens’ goaltender. Granted, there were some years in which an especially strong team made a rather ordinary goaltender look better than he was. Just think of Richard Sévigny in 1981 for instance.
In recent history though, no matter how weak the Canadiens were, there were always some strong goaltenders making them look better and somehow guiding them to the playoffs. Patrick Roy got the Canadiens two unexpected Stanley Cups, José Théodore won both the Vezina and the Hart trophy and for years, the Canadiens’ organization put all its chips on Carey Price, thinking he could guide them to the promise land.
Now that there is a new regime in town though, the thinking has changed. Kent Hughes wants his Canadiens to be a fast-paced team that will score a lot of goals. That’s a clear turnaround on the Habs philosophy and not something current fans are used to. This generation wasn’t born when the Canadiens dominated in the 70s, they didn’t see Guy Lafleur claim the Art Ross trophy three years running as the league leader in points, they’ve not seen Lafleur and Steve Shut score 60 goals each or Stéphane Richer break the 50-goal barrier. For them, Montreal Canadiens’ hockey is great goaltending and a defensive mindset.
Getting used to the fact that this is not the team’s identity will take some time, but this new way of thinking is why the fans shouldn’t be anxious about the situation in net. Samuel Montembeault has showed some great things between the pipes, but chances are, he’s not the goalie who will lead the Canadiens to the Stanley Cup and it doesn’t matter. As long as by the time they are ready to contend, the Canadiens find themselves a goaltender they trust, it will be fine.
The masked man in Montreal doesn’t have to be the Messiah anymore, he doesn’t have to part the sea to guide his team through a scoreless desert. The Golden Knights just won the Stanley Cup with Aidan Hill acting has their number one goaltender, in 2022 the Avalanche did it with Darcy Kuemper and the 2019 Blues did it with rookie goalie Jordan Binnington.
I’m not saying goaltending isn’t important, not at all, but what I’m saying is that it takes time to build a contender and that doesn’t always start from the net out. It’s okay that the Canadiens haven’t settled on the goaltender who will be “the one”, perhaps they never will, perhaps they’ll bet on the whole team to win it all and not just on the guy that wears the big pads and that’s fine by me, give a chance to the type of hockey your dad or grandad used to watch and told you about, you might very well like it.
Montreal Canadiens Blogger • 
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