Michel Therrien announced this morning that Carey Price will miss the remainder of the team's Eastern Conference Finals series against the Rangers. Price is sidelined due to the injury he suffered, which looked to be to his right knee, when hit by Chris Kreider at 3:15 of the second period Saturday.
The video of the incident now has a Zapruder-like feel (see this link for it )given how it's been slowed down and enhanced to show the close up of the contact by Alexei Emelin's stick to Kreider's skate and attempted contact by Dale Weise. It's gotten to the point where we now know how fast Kreider was going was he approached the net, the time between contact to the skate and him hitting Price as well as time between release of the puck and contact.
I understand the anger and consternation by Therrien and Canadiens' fans, it's the same we would feel if it happened to Henrik Lundqvist. Montreal has lost their elite goaltender, one who leveled the plane between the pipes in the series and who was a big reason why they advanced this far. The belief is that Kreider was reckless, that his prior "incidents" (word purposely in quotes) with Craig Anderson and Marc-Andre Fleury show a pattern of recklessness that should have been penalized harsher and resulted in one in the game, which wasn't called. In addition, it almost feels as Montreal believes that Kreider deserved a suspension for the act, especially when factoring the aforementioned two cases.
I get all that. I also understand the Rangers and their fans view who state that Kreider has no time to stop or avoid contact. That he is not a reckless player, especially when factoring in that the Fleury contact occurred after being cross-checked and that he has only has one goaltender interference penalty called on him. In addition, Kreider had no time to stop, it looked as if he slid to try and avoid plowing into Price standing up, though the contact pinned Price's ankle against the post, resulting in the injury.
The battle lines have clearly been drawm. Montreal will look to create traffic in front of Lundqvist and if contact occurs - legally or illegally - so be it. Kreider, as others have referred to him on twitter, becomes this generation Adam Graves against the Penguins, though in that Graves was suspended and Mario Lemieux did come back in the series in 1992. The pressure now on the referees to police the game tonight properly and on the league reaches another level.
For Montreal, they now have their rallying cry of win it for Price. Peter Budaj, who relieved Price to start the third period Saturday, or Dustin Tokarski, more likely, will start Game 2. If they do win Game 2 and whoever starts excels, it will boost Montreal's confidence level heading to MSG. If Alex Galcheyuk, who looks ready to return from his injury, does play tonight, if Brandon Prust, who Therrien said would be scratched plays, it's a further indication of what type of game we could see tonight.
For New York, the pressure now shifts to them. With Price out, they now become the favorite. If they do win the series, the reason given by many is that it occurred because Price was hurt. If they lose, they choked away a major opportunity, though any of us who have watched the Rangers the past several years know that back up goaltenders seem to stone them repeatedly.
Whichever side you root for, tonight's game just took on a whole new turn and focus.