‘Our legs started getting heavy’
There was a time when teams feared coming to Montreal to face the Canadiens.
But that hasn’t been the case this season.
The Canadiens are in contention for a playoff spot because the team has played well on the road. Their 14-8-3 record is among the Top 5 road records in the NHL.
Playing at home is a different matter. After Saturday night’s 5-2 loss to the lowly Philadelphia Flyers, the Canadiens are barely over .500 at the Bell Centre with a 13-9-3 record.
“If you want to be a playoff team, you want to be in a situation where teams don’t want to come here and play us, but that hasn’t been the case this season,” said Jonathan Drouin. “We’ve been playing well on the road and we have to figure a way to play the same kind of game here.”
A win would have put the Canadiens in second pace in the Atlantic Division, but they finished the night in the first wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference, tied in points with third-place Boston and one point behind the Toronto Maple Leafs. Boston has the edge over Montreal because it has played one less game, while the Leafs have two games in hand after losing to the Coyotes on Sunday.
The Flyers game was one of those trap contests. The Canadiens were playing for the second time in two nights after posting a solid 4-1 win in Columbus. The Flyers, on the other hand, were rested after they waited for the Canadiens to come home.
“We knew we had to come out strong and we did that,” Drouin said. “We were the better team at the beginning of the game, but our legs started getting heavy in the second period and then they scored those two quick goals.”
Drouin’s comments were echoed by captain Shea Weber.
“It was a good start, just couldn’t get anything going,” Weber said.
When asked if the back-to back games were an issue, Weber replied: “I don’t know. I don’t know what it was. Definitely had a great start and maybe they got going a little bit after that. It’s hard to say exactly what it was, but they got themselves going somehow and it was too late by the time we got going.”
The Canadiens had shots — they outshot the visitors 11-1 in the first period — and had a 22-11 edge when Travis Konecny opened the scoring late in the second period. Drouin said one of the problems was the Canadiens ran into a hot goaltender in rookie Carter Hart, and they didn’t make life difficult for him by getting players in front of the net.
That’s what the Flyers did to take the lead. Konecny scored on a rebound, while James Van Riemsdyk made it 2-0 when he deflected a shot.
Among the missed opportunities for Montreal was a first-period power play that produced one shot on goal. The power play has been a problem all season. The Canadiens are last in the NHL and, as is the case with the record, they are better on the road. After coming up empty on their lone power play Saturday, the Canadiens have nine goals in 86 opportunities at home for a 10.4-per-cent success rate. They score at a 16.1-per-cent rate on the road.
Coach Claude Julien said the problem with the power play can be traced to bad decision-making. He noted the Canadiens put their 10 best players on the ice and the same guys who are among the league leaders in even-strength goals can’t score with the man advantage.
“Tonight, we had one power play and it was a dead one,” Julien said. phickey@postmedia.com Twitter.com/zababes1