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There was no Carey Price between the pipes last night in Montreal and it showed. Samuel Montembeault has showed himself to be a capable NHL goaltender at times but other times, he’s unable to shut the door in key moments and to give his team a chance to win. Whenever the Habs scored, the Capitals were able to come right back. The loss isn’t entirely on Montembeault, but a few of the goals were soft and should have been saved. In his post-game presser, Marty St-Louis said he didn’t want to pull his goalie because it was too late for it to change anything by the time things got out of hand, but I think the more likely reason was there’s no point in making Price play 2 games in a row when he’s just come back from injury.
Martin St-Louis répond en direct aux questions des médias.
— Canadiens Montréal (@CanadiensMTL) April 17, 2022
Martin St-Louis is live taking questions from reporters.#GoHabsGo https://t.co/EMc9Dyi9jJ
It was a disastrous night for the Romanov-Savard pairing who was on the ice for 6 of the Capitals’ goals, including the 5 first ones. The young Russian has progressed by leaps and bounds this season, but last night, he had a bad game in his system. His defensive coverage was off, and he was just unable to make the right decisions. His veteran partner wasn’t much better mind you, at times he was making a remarkable impression of a headless chicken.
Whenever you play the Capitals, 2 names immediately come to mind, Ovechkin for obvious reasons, but I think Tom Wilson also does now. The man is a constant menace with huge hits on the ice and plays an intimidating game. A few times last night, he rocked Jake Evans and it was nice to see Josh Anderson stand up for his teammate, not so long ago, a Hab that was taking abuse was on his own, that’s no longer the case. In a lost season, St-Louis has somehow managed to bring back a team spirit of sort in that locker room and it bodes well for the future.
There were a couple of positives from last night’s game though, Ryan Poehling got himself a pair of goals through hard work, whenever your 4th line produces 2 goals, it’s a bonus. Christian Dvorak also made a very good zone entry early in the 2nd which led to Jake Evans’ goal. Quietly, the center has found his game under St-Louis, he’s got 10 points in his last 13 games while he 16 points in his first 37 under Ducharme. Still, that wasn’t enough positives to get a win and the Canadiens lost 8-4 to a better, faster and more powerful team.
Jake marque son 11e but de la saison et inscrit le Tricolore au tableau indicateur!
— Canadiens Montréal (@CanadiensMTL) April 17, 2022
Jake Evans gets his 11th of the season to get the Habs on the board!#GoHabsGo pic.twitter.com/xGtVDvhtWe
While this was the Canadiens’ 5th consecutive loss, that’s still not enough to “keep down… with the Coyotes who keep on clinging to the 32nd place 2 points behind Montreal and lost 9-1 to Calgary last night. The Canadiens remain 31st and are now 3 points behind Seattle who’s 30th but won its duel with the Devils 4-3 in the shootout yesterday. It really is time that this season ends, there are now 6 games left before HuGo can roll up its sleeves and get on with serious business.