All Habs GameDay: Wednesday March 27, 2013

On this day in hockey history… In 1952, Rookie Bernie Geoffrion scored three goals in a 4-0 win over the Bruins, in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup semi-final. Gerry McNeil had his second career playoff shutout.

PROJECTED LINE COMBINATIONS AND GOALTENDERS
(Will be updated following game day skate.)

No game day skate for the Canadiens today.
Bruins claim Kaspars Daugavins off waivers from Ottawa. He will not play tonight.
Michael Blunden will play tonight while Alex Galchenyuk will be a healthy scratch. (Head scratcher)
Upon further review, Galchenyuk is in and Gabriel Dumont will be a healthy scratch. 

TOP SCORERS

► Habs playing well despite first back-to-back regulation losses of the season: 

• The Montreal Canadiens have suffered their first back-to-back losses of the season losing to the Pittsburgh Penguins on Tuesday, while having lost to the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday.
• Despite the two losses, what’s reassuring is that they’ve been playing rather well against both the bottom of the barrel dwelling Sabres, and soaring Pittsburgh Penguins.
• The Canadiens had first outshot the Sabres 34-21, giving up only 11 shots in the second, third and overtime combined.
• Against the Penguins, who were on a 12-game winning streak including 9 straight at home, the Canadiens lead the shot clock 37-25 and only gave up one goal against what is clearly the most powerful offence in the league.
• If this was to serve as a measuring stick, people would have difficulty convincing me that either team is that far ahead of the other. Obviously, if the Penguins also had Malkin in the lineup, it could change a few things.
• On Wednesday against the Bruins, the Habs will look to not match their season high losing streak of three games that happened between February 6 and 9, when the Habs lost 2-1 to the Bruins, 5-4 to the Sabres in shootout and the famous 6-0 loss the Toronto Maple Leafs.

► Carey Price quietly having a great season:

• Losing 1-0 to the hottest team in the league when your team gave a notable effort is usually a somewhat easy pill for goalies to swallow.
• Nobody hates losing, but their are contexts where it’s more tolerable.
• Despite having a save percentage and goals against average that rank him 22nd and 12th in the league respectively, Carey Price has dominated at even-strenght, where 80% of the game is played.
• That’s why even-strength save percentage is such an important stat, it’s where most of the game is accounted for.
• Carey Price has given up an average of 1.72 goals per 60 minutes played, good enough to rank him fourth in the league amongst goaltenders who have played a minimum of 15 games.
• The three goalies who currently lead the league are: Craig Anderson (OTT) 1.42, Jonas Hiller (ANA) 1.60 and Martin Brodeur (NJD) 1.61.

► Jeff Halpern shows what he was obtained to do:

• It’s quite clear that Marc Bergevin snatched Jeff Halpern from the waiver wire in order to help the team’s struggling face-off percentage.
• On Tuesday, Halpern demonstrated exactly that winning 11 of 18 draws for 61 per cent on the night.
• He played a total of 14:51 on the night.

► Rookie Watch:

• Tuesday night against the Penguins, Brendan Gallagher and Alex Galchenyuk were both held off the scoresheet again.
• Gallagher totals 9 goals and 9 assists for 18 points on the season.
• Galchenyuk totals 3 goals and 11 assists for 14 points on the season.
• Respectively, they rank third and tied for seventh amongst rookies in the league.

Top 10 NHL Rookies / Total Points

1. Cory Conacher (TBL): 9G, 14A, 23PTS
   
2. Jonathan Huberdeau (FLA): 12G, 9A, 21PTS
3. Brendan Gallagher (MTL): 9G, 9A, 18PTS
4. Brandon Saad (CHI): 4G, 12A, 16PTS
5. Nail Yakupov (EDM): 6G, 9A, 15PTS
6. Justin Schultz (EDM): 5G, 10A, 15PTS
7. Patrick Wiercioch (OTT): 4G, 11A, 15 PTS
8. Vladimir Tarasenko (STL): 6G, 8A, 14PTS
9. Alex Galchenyuk (MTL): 3G, 11A, 14PTS
10. Jakob Silfverberg (OTT): 8G, 5A, 13PTS

Sidney Crosby on his goalies keeping them in the game:

“To win that many, your goaltenders have to steal a game or two over that time period,” said Crosby. “Sometimes we’ve had tough periods and they’ve bailed us out.”

Carey Price on keeping a positive view despite the loss:

“We’ve got to take the positive out of it,” admitted Price. “We keep playing the way we are, we’re not going to lose that many games like that, so I think we’ve just got to stick to it.”

Michel Therrien on Sidney Crosby’s game winning goal and bounces not going their way:

“He’s the best player in the world, so we got beat tonight by the best player in the world, by the perfect shot,” said Michel Therrien.

You need a break if you want to win some hockey games,” added Therrien. “Certainly we didn’t have any break tonight. Twice (we) hit the crossbar. It’s a matter of inches to get out of the building with a win.”