by Michael Ham-Fan, Staff Writer, All Habs Hockey Magazine
MONTREAL, QC. – I initially nixed the idea of calling this article “Unsung Hero” thinking that calling Montreal Canadiens defenceman Tom Gilbert a “hero” was a bit overblown. So, the next option for a title was “The Obscure Contribution of Tom Gilbert,” but then I did some research on statistics to support what I have been seeing from Gilbert, and I think that my initial title was more appropriate.
Tom Gilbert, or “Bobby Gilbert” as his teammates now like to call him in reference to Bobby Orr, after the fantastic Orr-like goal he scored against Jonathan Quick a couple weeks ago, has been generally underrated ever since he signed with the Canadiens. He rarely gets media exposure and isn’t the most popular player among fans, but he has been quietly doing his job.
On July 1st, 2014, the Canadiens signed Tom Gilbert to a two-year contract worth $5.6 million. I remember being very happy of the signing, as Gilbert was a defenceman I enjoyed watching ever since his Oilers days. Then, I started listening and reading to other people’s comment on the signing, and a lot of them were perplexed about the move. I remember hearing on RDS, ex-Habs player Guillaume Latendresse saying that he wasn’t a fan of the deal and said that paying 2.8 million per season for a defenceman like Gilbert, with whom he had played with, wasn’t worth it.
With 69 games played as a member of the Canadiens, Gilbert has been a reliable defenceman. He had a rough start of the season, and had some people wondering if he was ever going to fit in the Habs’ team as he was a healthy scratch for a couple of games. Then he, gradually, caught up to the Canadiens’ system and really bought in the style of play. At this point of the season, Tom Gilbert is third amongst Habs’ defenceman in total ice-time, and fifth on the whole team, trailing Andrei Markov, P.K. Subban, Max Pacioretty and Tomas Plekanec.
The 6-foot-2 defenceman only has 11 points this season, which is low for his standards considering that he generally averages around 30 points. Nonetheless, he has been very efficient in helping the offensive transition for the Canadiens.
Beyond the points, the 32-year-old veteran has reformed himself into a better defensive player than he has ever been in his career. I have been very impressed in the way that he has played in the defensive zone as of late. He is a tall and lanky defenceman who does not often throw his body around, but even without hitting the opposing player, Gilbert has been very efficient in puck battles. He often gets out of them with the puck, simply with his stick-work. He is also extremely effective at blocking shots.
In fact, Tom Gilbert currently ranks 10th in the NHL on blocked shots with 157. He is second on his team in the same category, trailing only Andrei Markov with 159 blocked shots and they are both considerably ahead of the rest of the team. This is even more impressive when you consider that defencemen, who are known around the league to have great defensive instincts like Dan Girardi, Chris Tanev and Karl Alzner, all trail behind Montreal’s Gilbert.
Also, because of his willingness to block shots, the Minneapolis-native has been a regular player on the Montreal penalty kill this season, ranking fourth in penalty kill ice-time among Habs defencemen averaging 1:56 of ice-time in theses situattions.
Since Habs’ General Manager Marc Bergevin acquired Jeff Petry, Gilbert has been paired with his ex-Oiler teammate and the tandem has been logging a lot of tough minutes for the Canadiens. In fact, since the trade, Gilbert has been averaging 22 minutes a game, and the most impressive part is that he has been playing on his wrong side. Being a right-handed defenceman, just like Petry, Gilbert had to play on the left side to facilitate his partner’s adaptation to the Habs’ style of play.
Gilbert is currently sidelined with an upper-body ailment, likely a facial injury, suffered in Saturday’s game against the Sharks when he blocked a shot with his face. He did not accompany the Canadiens on their short road trip but is expected to be available for Saturday’s game at the Bell Centre.
The only doubt I have on the Canadiens defense is their playoff experience as a group. Playing in his 10th season, Gilbert has only seen a total of five playoff games, all with the Minnesota Wild in 2012-2013. Jeff Petry and Greg Pateryn have never played in a playoff game and Nathan Beaulieu has had seven. Granted that Markov, Subban and Emelin have been fixtures on the Habs defense for their last two playoffs trips, they will still need contributions from everyone. I, for one, believe that Tom Gilbert will be a very important part of the Habs defense this post-season, just as he has been during the regular season.
Sources:
HockeyDB :http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/pdisplay.php?pid=64499
Yahoo Sports :https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/nhl/players/3268/
ESPN : http://espn.go.com/nhl/statistics/player/_/stat/defensive/sort/blockedShots
NHL.com : http://www.nhl.com/ice/player.htm?id=8470104&view=splits
http://www.nhl.com/stats/player?fetchKey=20152MTLDADALL&ord=desc&sort=blockedShots&viewName=rtssPlayerStats
http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=724769