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In Hainsight: Out of Comebacks |
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Follow me @KarineHains for all updates about the Montreal Canadiens and women's hockey
The Coyotes are having a better start to the season than expected and last night, they handed the Canadiens a 3-2 loss. Montreal came out strong and had 10 shots on goal in the first eight minutes, but they gave the first goal on a penalty shot after Justin Barron put his hand on the puck in the crease in a desperate attempt to prevent a goal. About a minute later, Sean Monahan scored in the fourth consecutive game on a nice screening play from Tanner Pearson and a pass from Brendan Gallagher. It was a goal signed by the third line, like many goals this season.
Arizona dominated the second frame, testing Jake Allen 18 times over the 20 minutes. As he has since the start of the season, he put up a great fight but in the last minute and just as Joel Armia’s penalty was expiring, the Coyotes took the lead through Lawson Crouse. Montreal came back once more just three minutes into the third as Brendan Gallagher scored a power play goal with assists from Pearson and Newhook. Unfortunately for the Canadiens, Nick Schmaltz scored his second goal of the game on the power play barely three minutes later to take a 3-2 lead which they would hold until the end of the game. It was a shame for Jake Allen who was playing his 400th career game.
The loss doesn’t hurt as much as the loss of Raphael Harvey-Pinard’s who crashed in the boards legs first late in the first period. He didn’t finish the period but came back in the second, but as soon as he was hit, he had to go back to the locker room. To me, his crash in the first looked like a high ankle sprain, an injury that can take some time to heal, but we’ll probably know more in the next few days, for now the Canadiens are calling it a lower body injury and saying the gravity is still being assessed.
Once Harvey-Pinard was injured, a lot of players got an opportunity to play alongside Caufield and Suzuki; Anderson, Newhook, Yloven all had a turn, but Slafkovsky’s turn never came. Personally, I thought this would have been the perfect opportunity to give him an opportunity to skate with the dynamic duo. The second line is not producing, and the young Slovak could have been given a confidence boost by just getting a few shifts with the team’s top two forwards. Seems like a wasted opportunity there.
Gallagher’s goal was his 400th career-point. He’s now only eight points behind Rejean Houle who’s 36th in the most career points with the Canadiens list. Houle was the first overall pick in his draft year while Gallagher was picked 147th in the fifth round, talk about a good pick. Jake Allen said yesterday that Gallagher was back to his old self while Gallagher credits his health for his performance. Fingers crossed he can keep it up in the coming weeks as he’ll likely lose his center when Christian Dvorak returns.
Speaking of Dvorak, he’ll be eligible to return tomorrow and when he does, there should be some change to the lines. Personally, I was hoping to see Monahan join Caufield and Suzuki on the first line, he’s the one who’s got the hockey IQ to best complement them, but considering the second line isn’t producing, I think he’ll land between Anderson and Slafkovsky. Perhaps he’ll be able to do what Newhook couldn’t, get them producing. As a result, Dvorak should center Gallagher and Pearson while Newhook gets a spot on the top line. It’s not ideal if you want to work for the future and get experience at center for Newhook, but something’s got to be done to get Anderson and Slafkovsky going.
Martin St-Louis was less than impressed with his men’s performance, especially after they played such a good game in Vegas on Tuesday. Once again, the Habs took too many penalties and that’s probably why they lost this game, and lost a second game in a row for the first time this season. Montreal will be back in action on Saturday night against the Blues in St-Louis.
Montreal Canadiens Blogger • 
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