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‘Put It In the Garbage’ | RECAP: MTL @ MIN

Montreal Canadiens vs Minnesota Wild, Game Recap: Habs, Line-up, Score, Statistics, Highlights, Post-game, Interviews, NHL, Three-Stars

FINAL | Game 41, Away Game 25 | Monday January 24, 2022
Xcel Energy Center, St Paul, MN

CANADIENS

Montreal

2-8

WILD

Minnesota

Cayden Primeau (Photo by Bruce Kluckhohn/NHLI via Getty Images)

Canadiens Lineup

Forward lines

Artturi Lehkonen – Nick Suzuki – Tyler Toffoli

Rem Pitlick – Jake Evans – Josh Anderson

Laurent Dauphin – Christian Dvorak – Mike Hoffman

Michael Pezzetta – Ryan Poehling – Cedric Paquette

Defence pairings

Ben Chiarot – David Savard

Brett Kulak – Jeff Petry

Alexander Romanov – Chris Wideman

Goaltenders

Cayden Primeau – Michael McNiven

Scratches

Sami Niku, Kale Clague

Injuries

Jonathan Drouin (upper-body), Sam Montembeault (upper-body), Jake Allen (lower-body), Paul Byron (hip), Brendan Gallagher (lower-body), Mathieu Perreault (lower-body), Joel Edmundson (back), Carey Price (knee), Shea Weber (multiple injuries)

COVID-19 protocol

Joel Armia, Cole Caufield

Taxi squad

Lukas Vejdemo, Corey Schueneman

Game Report

Following the game, the head coach said that it was a game that could be thrown in the garbage. Will it be so easy to forget the shellacking that the Habs took to end the seven game road trip? And easy to forget the fact that they won just one of the contests?

Dominique Ducharme freely admitted that his strategy during the 10-day trip was to give up quantity over quality shots. The plan hinged on his goaltenders making plenty of saves on low-danger shots. It worked, somewhat, as the Habs kept contests close over the past three games despite being considerably outshot.

But tonight was a struggle for Cayden Primeau giving up three soft goals and five goals in total before he got the hook. It didn’t get easier when Michael McNiven replaced Primeau for the third period. McNiven allowed three goals on seven shots admitting  afterwards that he was surprised by the quick releases of NHL shooters.

The other fatal flaw of Ducharme’s game plan was that the Canadiens have been spending far too much time in their own zone. Chasing the play can be fatiguing and by the final game of the road trip, Ducharme’s skaters were exhausted.

Post-game Josh Anderson said that the Wild skaters were doing circles around them in their own zone. Anderson was probably thinking about Kirill Kaprizov taking two laps of the Canadiens zone after a turnover by Jeff Petry.

Spending all that time in their own zone, by design, means that the Canadiens aren’t creating offence. After two periods of play, they had recorded just ONE high-danger scoring chance. 

Up Next

It appears that Canadiens fans are prepared to accept losses during a rebuild watching exciting young prospects play an up-tempo brand of hockey. Tonight’s game was the opposite of that. It will take a change behind the bench before Kent Hughes can claim that he is putting together a modern organization.

The Canadiens completed their seven game road trip and have returned to Montreal. They will host the Anaheim Ducks on Thursday in front of an empty Bell Centre. 

Plus

▲  No players

Minus

▼  Cayden Primeau, David Savard, Michael Pezzetta, Laurent Dauphin, Jeff Petry, Cedric Paquette, Nick Suzuki

Game Preview

Check out the game preview here: Last Road Stop | PREVIEW: MTL @ MIN

The Numbers

Game Statistics
CANADIENS   WILD
21 Shots 39
39 Face-off % 61
0-for-2 Power Play 1-for-5
23 Penalty Minutes 29
33 Hits 27
28 Corsi For 57
Scoring Summary
FINAL 1 2 3 OT SO T
Canadiens (8-26-7) 1 0 1 2
Wild (25-10-3) 2 3 3 8
Scorers Goalies
  • MTL: Hoffman (7), Pitlick (8),
  • MIN: Spurgeon (4), Foligno (17), Dewar (1), Sturm (7), Zuccarello (12), Boldy (3)-PPG, Benn (1), Fiala (11), 
  • MTL: Primeau (L) (1-4-1), McNiven
  • MIN: Talbot (W) (16-8-1), Kahkonen

Stars of the Game

Official NHL Three Stars
  1. Nico Sturm  MIN
  2. Connor Dewar  MIN
  3. Jared Spurgeon  MIN

Watch

Video Highlights

What Did They Say?

Post-game Quotes

Dominique Ducharme

  • “We’ll put this one in the garbage. They were faster than us, better than us, they were on all the pucks in all aspects of the game.”

Josh Anderson

  • “I found they were doing circles around us in the zone, it kind of looked like shinny hockey there for most of the game.”
  • “That’s on us as players – we got to compete, we got to be physical, win 50/50 puck battles – we just got beat all over the ice tonight.”

Quotes courtesy of NHL.com

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