Let's start with the positive for the day: Marc Bergevin stuck to his plan and didn't give in to the temptation to sacrifice prospects for rental players he might not even have been able to retain. In his press conference he mentioned that discussions were pretty short since most everybody as inquiring about Romanov, Poehling, Primeau or even Kotkaniemi. So, as he did most of the time on trade deadline day, Bergevin stuck to looking for depth and traded Micheal Chaput to Arizona for Jordan Weal. Nothing to write home about so to speak... Let's be logical here, this is not the Canadiens' year and Bergevin did the right thing by refusing to get rid of assets. His "reset" is going as planned, even better than any of us thought it would. Not many thought the Habs would be in playoff contention at this stage of the season and yet they are. Since Bergevin didn't get anything of note on the market today, I was hoping that his team would reward him with an inspired performance for his vote of confidence but that hope was quickly squashed.
Now, on to tonight's disappointing showing... I don't know what was up with Shea Weber tonight but this ought to be one of his worst games with the Canadiens. He was on the ice for both of the Devils' goals (along with Victor Mete) and everything looked like it was going too fast for the Canadiens' captain. When he was handling the puck in his zone, he looked unable to move it before having a player on him. In his post game comments, Claude Julien refused to answer François Gagnon's question about his captain. Gagnon asked if he agreed that for the last 5 or 6 games, Shea Weber's performance had dipped and wondered if he was injured. Julien declined to answer stating that he didn't want to start any rumours and that was it for the media scrum.
The captain wasn't the only one struggling tonight though; Kulak gave the puck away at the top of the zone and had Price not been exceptional on that play, the Devils would have had a third goal. Lehkonen had a breakaway in the first and was stopped by Corey Schneider, both Domi and Shaw took bad penalties and Jonathan Drouin might have had 4 shots on goal but he made several passes that had no chance to reach their intended receiver...As for the power play, is it even worth mentioning that it didn't convert (in 4 outings) once tonight?
At the start of the third, the Devils were leading 2-0 and time was of the essence for Julien's team. Thankfully, Artturi Lehkonen took an elbowing penalty (which to be fair was a pure accident) and Paul "The Roadrunner 2.0" Byron was on the receiving end of a Phil Danault's diving pass to fly to the opponent's net and score a beautiful shorthanded goal. From that point on, the Canadiens really tried to compete and tie up the game but they just couldn't do it. When all is said and done, the Habs had 35 shots but not enough of those were an actual threat. To make matters worst, the Devils played 40 minutes with only 10 forwards as Milles Wood and John Quennville were injured. Add that to the absence of Taylor Hall, Jesper Bratt, Pavel Zacha,Sami Vatanen and to the fact that Marcus Johansson was traded and you’ll know that the Habs should definitely have won the game.
Ti-Paul active la 8e vitesse et fait 2-1 avec son huitième but à court d'un homme.@jpbyron89 turns on the jets and makes it 2-1 with his eighth career shorty.#GoHabsGo pic.twitter.com/gUpqTYu4Qm
— Canadiens Montréal (@CanadiensMTL) February 26, 2019
The Canadiens play again tomorrow night, this time in Detroit. Tonight's loss means that tomorrow's points are even more important to get and I believe Claude Julien might be forced to use Carey Price again. He prefers not to do that when they play 2 games in 2 days but he must give himself the best possible chance of leaving Detroit with the 2 points.
Finally, I'll mention that Columbus really did decide to go all in and keep both Bobrovsky and Panarin for the rest of the season. In the last few months, it has been made quite clear that neither player intends to stay after their contract expire this summer. I'll admit that I'm hoping Bergevin can sign Panarin, he's a great player, bursting with talent and to say that the Habs have plenty of cap room is an understatement. I'm not saying it will happen, but I'd like it very much... I can dream right?