On Saturday night, the Montreal Canadiens had their final home game of the regular season, concluding a four-game homestand. The Columbus Bluejackets were in town and desperate for the win. The result was a 5-2 loss.
Here’s some of what I saw.
The power play is a train wreck.
The current strategy seems to be to get the puck to Caufield and hope he can score from some bonkers angle and find some microscopic hole. It worked once in this one. Mr. Saturday Night can’t resist.
This three-ring circus needs to find a ringmaster within a week.
The questions on D got louder on Saturday.
The Replacements have been holding up pretty well… until Game 80. The giveaways and missed assignments are too many to list. Struble played what might have been his worst of the season, despite having played well since Carrier’s injury. After a great game on Thursday, Xhekaj was not great in this one but logged a lot of minutes anyway. Engstrom has been just okay, in my view.
Once Dobson left the game, it felt highly unlikely the Canadiens would find a way to recover. He has been solid all season, and that goes without mention way too often. I suspect that is about to change,
If Dobson is out long-term, it will be devastating for the Habs.
Speaking of long-term absences, how are those maintenance days going for Kaiden Guhle? We still buying that? He’s getting the kid glove “treatment” because he’s tweaked something or they’re afraid he will before the playoffs.
It looks like Reinbacher will finally get his taste of NHL action. Hopefully he won’t be called upon to do too much because the regulars are out of commission. Ideally, Reinbacher would have got his looks playing behind their best defensive defenseman, rather than being called up because that guy is injured.
About Michael Hage…
Leading up to the game on Saturday night, news broke that top prospect Michael Hage would be returning to college hockey for a third season. Fans and pundits were predicting he would turn pro some time this weekend, and the only question was whether he would be heading to Montreal or Laval. Needless to say, the decision came as a bit of a shock.
If we stop to think about it, our surprise is likely because according to the media, the signing was a foregone conclusion.
Earlier on Saturday I was listening to Craig Button on The Sick Podcast with Tony Marinaro and Button was pretty adamant that Hage is not yet NHL ready. It sounds like player and team agree with that assessment, and that another year in college will serve both well.
Folks, it’s not the worst idea to have a top-six player still on his entry level contract farther into the contention window. If he’s not ready now, it’s better to have him for cheap when he is.
In the meanwhile, I do expect HuGo to try and deal for a 2C this summer, and I don’t think Hage signing would have changed that.
Hab At Her 