Blogging About The Montreal Canadiens and Canadiens Hockey

After last nights horrible loss against the Sabres, the Montreal Canadiens hope to come back with a win against the Boston Bruins at home as they celebrate 100 years of glory.

Carey Price will get the start tonight and will be dawning a special centennial mask. Price is 7-2 in his career against the Boston Bruins during the regular season with a .915 save percentage so he’s been pretty solid. In his last appearance against Boston earlier this year he had a shutout going until the end of the third period where Bergeron netted a goal off the faceoff.

I’m impressed with how Sergei Kostitsyn has rebounded since his return to the NHL. He has yet to score a goal but he’s notched 3 assists in the 5 games that he’s played since his return including a nice feed to Scott Gomez in last nights game against the Buffalo Sabres.

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I think it’s safe to say that Kovalev is comfortable in his new digs as he opened to scoring of a game which would inevitable end in a 6-1 loss for the Canadiens. Mike Fischer added a hat-trick to a disappointing loss.

It was great for Spacek, however, who added a goal on the Powerplay to give him his first goal as a Montreal Canadien.

Continuing on with the 5-in-5, the Canadiens faceoff against the Boston Bruins in Quebec City, Quebec, and for those of you who missed the game on the live stream last night you’ll be pleased to know that this game WILL be televised on RDS.

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I’ve heard mixed reactions about the pickup of Paul Mara by our Montreal Canadiens this off-season and if anyone was pleased then they weren’t excited, but just “O.K.” with it.

Personally, I think that the 6′4″, 212lbs defenseman will play a bigger role on this team then most people believe. He’ll definitely round out our Top 4 most likely playing with Roman Hamrlik on the second defensive pairing unless we trade him, which I doubt. He’ll see time on the second PP unit and possibly some time on the PK.

Taking a look at his stats he HAS had some pretty rough years like when he went a -22 in the 2006-2007 season with the Boston Bruins, where he was traded after playing 59 games with them and finished off the season with a +6 in just 19 games. If you take a look at his last three years with the New York Rangers he’s averaged 2.67 goals, 11.67 assists, and has averaged a +3 in plus/minus. The numbers aren’t staggering but they’re at least on the positive side.

Besides, that beard is godly!

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If I’ve said this once, I have said this a million times. The referees in this league are ridiculous, and I’m not saying this because we lost, I’m saying this because Chris Lee should be fired from the league and sent to Zimbabwe to referee there. The final score in this one was 3-1 for the Boston Bruins, with the only goal for the Montreal Canadiens coming from Andrei Kostitsyn on the Power play.

The first period was excellent besides two obvious penalties including a high stick on Steve Begin and a hit from behind against Matt D’Agostini which went uncalled. Subsequently Chipchura fought Stuart over that hit and actually held his own; It’s good to have a guy like that on your time.

The Canadiens’ Andrei Kostitsyn took a questionable penalty in the second period which lead to 5 minute Powerplay which was then turned into a 2 minutes 5 on 3 in which Boston scored their second goal of the game. The call was a joke, the Bruins player went into the boards sideways, at most it was a 2 minute minor.

Halak isn’t ready to be a starter, we really need Carey Price back.

Related Links:
Bruins ends Habs win streak – CANOE
Bruins overpower Canadiens – CBC.ca
Mistakes proce costly – The Daily Hab-it
The big game – Soft European
The Bruins keep avenging last year – All Habs
Bruins Team up with Refs to Beat Habs – All Habs
Maybe The Bruins Should Buy Their Goalie A Beer – Dennis-Kane
Well… the effort was there – Shifts and Sets
Bruins 3, Canadiens 1 – canadiens.nhl.com
About last night … – Habs Inside/Out
Chara scores twice as Bruins keep edge with 3-1 victory over Montreal – NHL.com
Bruins beat Canadiens 3-1 on Chara’s two goals – NHL.com
NHL – Bruins defeat Canadiens – Yahoo! Eurosport
Power play lifts Bruins at home – Journal Gazette
Bruins flatten Canadiens – Boston.com
Chara leads Bruins over Canadiens – National Post
Duca: B’s hurting, but still winning – Cape Cod Times
Bruins get better of Montreal Canadiens, again – Boston Herald
Chara double trouble for Habs – New England Hockey Journal
Bruins keep edge with 3-1 victory over Montreal – Associated Press
Chara, Bruins handle Habs – The Sports Network
Chara scores twice as Bruins keep edge with 3-1 victory over Montreal – The Hockey News
Bruins keep edge with 3-1 victory over Montreal – Yahoo!
Chara Nets Two as Bruins Handle Canadiens – TSN

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January 12th @ 7:00pm EST

VERSUS(HD), RDS(HD)

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Injuries: Mathieu Dandenault (Broken Arm), Chris Higgins (Injured Arm), Saku Koivu (Ankle/Foot), George Laraque (Groin/DTD), Alex Tanguay (Separated Shoulder), Carey Price (Lower-Body/DTD)

Injuries: Phil Kessel (Mononucleosis), Patrice Bergeron (Mild Concussion), Milan Lucic, Andrew Ference, Manny Fernandez, Marco Sturm

NHL Preview: NHL.com
HFBoards GDT: HFBoards.com
Watch it FREE online: Atdhe.net, NASN (300k), HabsTV (french), HabsVision (Justin)

This time last year I would have been elated that we were playing the Boston Bruins, but now I’m not so sure. The Bruins are currently first in the Eastern Conference with 10 points up on the Montreal Canadiens as they head into town tonight. This is a very important game for the Canadiens, although not a must-win, it’s a would-like-to-win, if only for the fact that it would help us gain some ground on them.

Since Price isn’t back we’ll be relying on Jaroslav Halak in his sixth straight start, winning his last four. We’ll have the Boston Bruins starting goaltender posted as soon as possible.

Phil Kessel will be out of this game with mono, so that’s one less burden we’ll need to worry about.

Related Links:
Inside the Bruins: It’s Montreal’s move – SouthCoastToday.com
Kessel is out with Mononucleosis – Boston.com

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Last week we were ranked 11th but with our play as of late we jumped back up to the Top 5.

When Saku Koivu is fighting and guys like Matt D’Agostini are scoring, the Habs are tough to stop.

Current Top 10:
1. San Jose Sharks
2. Boston Bruins
3. Detroit Red Wings
4. Pittsburgh Penguins
5. Montreal Canadiens
6. Washington Capitals
7. New Jersey Devils
8. Chicago Blackhawks
9. Vancouver Canucks
10. New York Rangers

Source: ESPN.com

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Game 7 is here, and just like everyone else, I’m scared out of my trees. As much as I believe in my Canadiens, I can’t help but have doubts after the way they have been playing the last few games. The Habs need to get their shit together and play like they want it, not play like they deserve it. Koivu’s return sparked some offense in this team, now we can only hope that that continues into tonight.

Expect to see a similar lineup as last game, with Koivu on the second line with Chris Higgins and Sergei Kostitsyn. Hopefully we can get our Powerplay together, and score some points.

I honestly believe that this is not a breakdown by the Habs, I think the Bruins have just figured out our style of play, and realized that rougher game can slow that play down. If the Habs make it out of this series with a win, I expect to see them back to their old selves in the second round. At that time Koivu should be back to his old self.

The Canadiens need to play on the edge, but not hazardous. They’ve played this role before and have excelled like no other. Once they find that happy median during this game, it’ll be smooth sailing. Going up early will be very important to the Canadiens, so we can only hope for a couple of early goals. These one goal leads are what is killing them, we tend to play the trap too much at that point which we can’t be doing.

It’s all or nothing…I Believe!

Injuries

Changes

Playoff Series: Tied 3-3

Team logos graciously provided by NHL Tournament of Logos.

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We’re in Boston tonight for game 6, with Montreal looking to send the Bruins to the gold course, with them moving on to the second round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. It might be a little easy as Saku Koivu, and Francis Bouillon are both returning to the lineup.

The Bruins will be coming into this game flying high after a dominating win on Thursday night seeing them score five goals compared to the Canadiens one. This Bruins team has shot down our powerplay, and keeping us to only 2 power play goals out of 25 power play chances.

Mark Streit will be a game time decision, but don’t expect him to play if he’s unsure now that Koivu and Bouillon are back. We need to jump out of the gates and score and early goal to let the Bruins know we aren’t playing games anymore. I think that second line of Higging, Koivu, and Kostitsyn is going to produce.

Injuries

Mark Streit is a game time decision, but will most likely not be in the lineup.

Changes

Both Saku Koivu and Francis Bouillon will both be in the lineup tonight.

Playoff Series: Montreal Leads 3-2

Team logos graciously provided by NHL Tournament of Logos.

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Disappointment, would be the easiest word to use when describing last nights game, but it was outright sad. Not a single player on the ice for the Habs looked like they wanted to win and it showed with the outcome. The Canadiens opened up scoring with a nice back hand through the legs of Thomas by Kovalev, but that was all they could muster, as they Bruins scored another five unanswered goals in that time.

The Bruins goals came from Kessel, Metropolit, Chara, Sturm, and Sobotka. This was Kessel’s first game back after being a healthy scratch in the last two. I can’t even fathom what might be going on with the Canadiens right now, but they have been absolutely putrid in the last three games. They definitely are not the Habs that we’ve seen all season.

Price looked looked human last night, making at least two mistakes that allowed two of the goals, it seemed as if he just couldn’t hold onto the puck. This is a rarity for Price who has been a solid starter since he took over the starting job from Huet, and I for one believe that he’ll come back next game and dominate as usual. He’s not one of those types of players who takes a loss like this very well.

Thomas was stellar last night, but Boston’s defense also shut our Powerplay down for another night. Carbonneau is going to have to get some fresh blood on those lines, which means that we should expect to see Grabovski in for the next game. As much as I’d also like to see Stewart, it’s doubtful that he’ll play at all in these playoffs.

The Habs may come out of this series with the win, but they are no doubt going to be scarred with this horrible play.

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The Habs wanted nothing more than to come back to Montreal already having best the Boston Bruins in the first round of the playoffs, but I suppose a 3-1 series lead with do. This is game 5, and we can only hope we’ll put up a better fight against Boston then we did in the last few games. Our best games in this series were played at home, so let’s hope that trend continues. Check out the Game Day Post for the latest.

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