Petry up to the task in first home game with Habs
The lasting image Canadiens fans take away from Tuesday’s 1- 0 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning might not be a terribly flattering one for Jeff Petry.
Lightning forward Tyler Johnson put the puck between Tom Gilbert’s legs and circled around the net. With Johnson having freed himself from any defensive coverage, Gilbert and Petry doubled up on Nikita Kucherov, wrestling him away from the Montreal net.
But before they could remove the Lightning player, Johnson finished his loop around the net and fired a shot toward the struggling men.
The puck bounced off Gilbert’s skate before sliding past goalie Carey Price.
On a night where Price carried his team into overtime, it took 36 shots and one weird bounce to beat the goalie.
“I didn’t even, I didn’t know, I kinda got tangled up with ( Gilbert) in front and I dunno, it went off his stick or his skate,” Petry said. “It’s a tough bounce.”
It was an odd play, yes, and an unfortunate one for Petry who was otherwise one of the lone clutch players on a team that was gradually suffocated by a far superior Tampa Bay squad.
By the time the Lightning headed to their locker- room and the Bell Centre fans filed out of the arena, maybe they’d almost all forgotten a much nicer play by Petry just an hour earlier.
After the Lightning won a faceoff to Price’s right, a brief defensive lapse left a Tampa Bay forward alone, with the puck on his stick just in front of the Montreal net. Before he could capitalize on what would have been an easy goal, Petry came seemingly out of nowhere to lift his stick and clear the puck.
In the excitement of the moment, a colleague suggested the Canadiens should call a timeout so general manager Marc Bergevin could rush to the ice and sign Petry to a contract extension on the spot.
It was a crucial, potentially game- changing play in what was billed as Montreal’s most important match of the season. With the Habs and Lightning competing for first spot in the Eastern Conference, Tuesday simulated the gruelling conditions of a playoff contest and Petry seemed up to the task.
With the entirety of his National Hockey League career spent with the bottom- feeding Edmonton Oilers, Petry has never actually made it to the NHL post- season. The last time Petry competed in any sort of playoff game, he was lacing up for a farm club in Oklahoma City.
Yes, they have professional hockey in Oklahoma, it isn’t just racist fraternities and college football in the Sooner state.
In any case, Petry made his presence felt in the opening seconds of Tuesday’s game.
After catching a puck near the Habs blue line, Petry saw Jacob De La Rose sneak behind the Tampa Bay defence. Without a moment’s hesitation, he delivered a crisp, 90- foot pass directly to the tape on De La Rose’s stick. The play fizzled out but it showed a flashier side of Petry’s game he doesn’t generally get credit for.
“This final stretch here is the closest thing I’ve experienced to the playoffs since being in ( the American Hockey League),” said Petry. “They’re a good team. We gave them some opportunities and they kept the pressure on us.”
Later in the opening period, during a Lightning power play, Ondrej Palat carried the puck into the Canadiens zone and tried getting around Petry. The Habs defenceman poked the puck from under Palat and knocked him backward with a stiff bodycheck.
Just a few seconds later, with the Lightning buzzing around Price’s net, Petry knocked Kucherov off the puck, and sent it to the corner. When Johnson tried to recover it, Petry ran straight through him, crushing the young forward as thousands of fans screamed.
In the end, Petry gave the Canadiens 23: 36 of ice time. They were hard- fought minutes, too. He delivered four hits, four blocked shots and a shot on goal throughout the 1- 0 loss.
And with so much playing time going to Petry, Montreal was finally able to rest the top pairing of Andrei Markov and P. K. Subban. Both had been averaging near 30 minutes on the ice every night before the Petry acquisition.
In fact, on Tuesday, both Markov and Subban played less than 25 minutes and split their time almost evenly with Gilbert and Petry.
It certainly wasn’t a pretty game. Coach Michel Therrien gave the Lightning credit afterward and seemed to blame the loss on jet lag, given that his team just returned from a West Coast road trip.
If there’s a bright spot, it’s that Petry’s presence is having the desired effect at the Canadiens blue- line.
“I’m getting more comfortable, it’s getting easier for me out there,” he said.
“But it was a tough one.”