Habs News: Hiring a Consultant, PWHA Midseason Awards, Playoff Odds, Anthems on RDS, All Star Game Format

by Chris G, Senior Writer, All Habs Hockey Magazine

LAVAL, QC. — The Canadiens won the only game they played last week, by beating the Coyotes with a 2-1 score on Wednesday night at the Bell Centre. Former Canadiens player, Alex Galchenyuk, scored a goal that would have been the tying goal, but it was disallowed after video review cause there was an offside on the play. It was the right call by the officials but I can’t imagine the storyline after that game if Galchenyuk’s goal would have counted.

The Habs are currently on their bye week following the All-Star break. Montreal returns to practice Thursday at 2 pm. ET at the Bell Sports Complex in Brossard. On the weekend, they will play two back-to-back afternoon games as they host the Devils on Saturday and the Oilers on Sunday.

My top-5 Canadiens takes of the week

Hiring a Consultant

At Tuesday’s practice, Claude Julien ran the power-play drills instead of Kirk Muller and Dominique Ducharme. “Today was one of those days where I got a little bit more involved and made sure that everything is clear, and then it goes back to the guys that are in charge of it,” said Julien after the practice. Was Julien sending a message to the players?

The power play went 1-for-2 on Wednesday night, but that wasn’t enough to get the Habs out of 31st place in the NHL with a 13 percent success rate. I like Muller and Ducharme in their roles and I think they are good communicators with the players but with the power-play being as bad as it is, changes need to be made.

Last Monday, the Blue Jackets announced that Martin St. Louis joined the organization as a special teams consultant. I think that it was a smart move by Columbus, ranked 27th with the extra attacker, and this is the out of the box thinking that the Canadiens need to improve in that category.

A native from Laval in Quebec, I am sure St. Louis would have the interest and the Canadiens had the resources to make it happen.

Habs Ignored by PWHA

On Thursday, the Professional Hockey Writers Association (PWHA) announced the winners of 10 Midseason awards.  In 2018, half of the Midseason Award winners ended up receiving the award at the end of the season. The PWHA votes on five of the ten awards that will be awarded in Las Vegas in June.

I doubt that anyone is surprised or argue that there was no member of the Canadiens organization that won any of the Midseason awards. I am surprised that there wasn’t even any included as nominees.

In my opinion, Marc Bergevin and Claude Julien should be in the discussion for General Manager of the year and the Jack Adams Award (coach of the year). Bergevin made two significant acquisitions via trade during the off season, and Max Domi and Tomas Tatar have made an important contribution to the team’s success.

Julien has taken a team that had little expectations before the start of the season to a team that’s fourth place in the Eastern Conference in points. They have accomplished this with an embarrassing power-play, a weak left defence, Shea Weber and Carey Price missing time due to injury.

If Price continues to put up numbers like he has since December 1st, he should at least be in the discussion, if not win, the Vezina trophy in June.

Playoff Odds

According to sportsclubstats.com, there’s a 78.7 percent chance that there’s playoff hockey this year in Montreal. According to their model, the Habs have a 52 percent chance of finishing third in the Atlantic Division or obtain the first wild card spot.

Last season, the last team to earn a playoff spot in the Eastern Conference needed 97 points to clinch a playoff spot. To reach that milestone, the Canadiens would need to get 36 of the possible 62 points in the last 31 games of the regular season.

Unless they get into serious injury problems, I expect Montreal to make the playoffs.

No More Anthems on RDS

My television habit for watching Habs home games was to watch RDS until the conclusion of the national anthems and then switch over to TSN for puck drop. This season, RDS has disrupted my routine as they no longer broadcast the national anthems.

“For the 2018-19 season, RDS has developed new content that is presented during the intermissions,” said Patrick Tremblay, RDS publicist when reached by All Habs Hockey Magazine. “These segments forces us to reconfigure certain parts of the show. As a result, the national anthems are not presented every game.”

Considering that 30 per cent of the players in the NHL are not from Canada or the United States, I wouldn’t be opposed if the national anthems were no longer played prior to games. Until that decision is taken, I think the national anthems in arenas like in Montreal, Chicago and Philadelphia provide an energy to the building that we can feel through the television.

TVA Sports broadcasts the anthems at home games, so we will be able to watch them on television if the Habs advance to the playoffs.

All-Star Game Format

I have read many negative comments on social media about the All-Star Game. I certainly understand the complaints as the goalies look bad in those games, players don’t give their 100 per cent, they don’t affect the season at all, and there’s no physical play.

The All-Star Game won’t go away as the NHL hosts the event for their corporate sponsors that invest a lot of money into the league.

The NHL has tried several formats, but I would suggest that the NHL invites the top 20 prospects of the upcoming Draft to the event. The prospects along with the top 20 NHL players would be split into two teams and face each other in a game. They can even take part of the skills competition that takes part over the same weekend.

The intensity of the game will increase in my opinion as the prospects will be trying to get the attention of the teams that will potentially draft them in the off-season. It will also allow us to see how close the prospects are to be NHL-ready.

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