Canadiens searching for answers
Are the players or the system the problem? Pacioretty doesn’t know, and he’s not alone
Max Pacioretty was a man searching for answers after the Canadiens’ 3-1 loss to the Hurricanes Wednesday night in Carolina that marked the 21st time in 37 games this season his team had scored two goals or fewer.
Canadiens fans have probably been searching for the captain, who was minus-2 against the Hurricanes and had only two shots as his goalless streak reached 10 games.
Is it a problem with the players or the system?
“I don’t know,” Pacioretty said after Wednesday’s game. “I don’t want to answer that the wrong way.”
That’s not a good sign coming from the captain, who had only one goal in his last 19 games and with eight goals was on pace for 17 this season after four straight years of at least 30.
“We’re sitting back too much on our heels,” Pacioretty said. “We’re trying to play strong defence, but I think when we do that we just sit back on our heels instead of trying to play in their end. I think the best way we can defend is trying to sustain some O-zone pressure and make plays and keep the puck down there. That hasn’t been there and that’s my job and it hasn’t been there at all, all year. So I guess we have to watch tape and find ways to produce because the O-zone pressure just really isn’t there.”
When asked if there was a sense of frustration in the lockerroom, Pacioretty said: “Yeah, absolutely.”
We haven’t even reached the midway point of the season and the Canadiens’ playoff hopes are fading away quickly with each loss. Going into Thursday night’s game against the Tampa Bay Lightning, the Canadiens (1617-4) were nine points behind the Toronto Maple Leafs for the third and final playoff spot in the Atlantic Division and were in 12th place in the Eastern Conference, eight points behind the New York Islanders for the final wild-card spot. The sportsclubstats.com website had the Canadiens’ chances of making the playoffs listed at 4.7 per cent.
All the moves Canadiens GM Marc Bergevin made — or didn’t make — during the off-season have backfired on him so far. Pacioretty looks lost without Alexander Radulov on his wing, while the Russian has 12-17-29 totals with the Dallas Stars. The defence has struggled badly without veteran Andrei Markov, who is now playing in the KHL. Carey Price got off to a terrible start after being given a new eightyear, US$84-million contract that kicks in next season. Jonathan Drouin, who was supposed to fill the No. 1 centre role, has had bad growing pains in his new position with 5-13-18 totals and a minus-15 heading into Thursday’s game, winning only 41.2 per cent of his faceoffs.
To make matters worse, Mikhail Sergachev — the 19-yearold defenceman Bergevin traded to Tampa for Drouin — had 8-1523 totals, including five gamewinning goals, and was plus-12 heading into Thursday’s game.
Murphy’s Law has become Bergevin’s Law with the Canadiens.
Even the GM’s decision to fire coach Michel Therrien last February and bring in Claude Julien hasn’t made the Canadiens a better team following a first-round playoff loss to the New York Rangers last season.
“Playoffs!?” as former Indianapolis Colts coach Jim Mora said in his famous rant following a 40-21 regular-season loss to the San Francisco 49ers in 2001. “Don’t talk about playoffs! You kidding me. Playoffs? I just hope we can win a game.”
Julien might have been feeling the same way after Wednesday’s loss in Carolina. The Canadiens coach even hinted at the possibility of putting Alex Galchenyuk back at centre, although on Thursday morning in Tampa Julien said his comments had been exaggerated.
“I never said I was putting him at centre,” Julien said. “Again, it’s running away with whatever you want to take. But we know he can (play centre) and all I can say about Alex is he played his best game last night that I’ve seen in a long time and he was playing it on the wing, so there’s no issues there.”
But there have been issues with Drouin at centre.
“I think the times he’s gotten himself a bit in trouble has been when he’s tried to make those blind passes and that’s a part of his game that is easy enough to correct and I think he’s very capable of doing that,” Julien said about the 22-year-old. “He’s got great potential, we know he’s a good player, and we’re probably going to see him get better and better here. But he’s had a lot of little setbacks here and there at the beginning of the year injury wise that maybe slowed him down a little bit. But there’s no doubt in the second half here we need him to be at the top of his game and I think he wants to be there as well.”
That’s a lot easier said than done.
Pacioretty isn’t the only one in the Canadiens’ locker-room searching for answers.
We’re trying to play strong defence, but I think when we do that we just sit back on our heels instead of trying to play in their end.