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No doubt that the Leafs were better tonight, but their shot total was REALLY inflated, they were putting the puck on net as soon as they crossed the blue line. I like Plekanec... good defensively, comes to play every night, works his ass off, never complains... and you know, he might eventually grow into a decent 2nd line centre. But if he's playing on a scoring line, he needs to be judged first and foremost on his offensive output... and 2 points in 9 1/2 games on the second line simply isn't cutting it right now. Given how Kovalev/Samsonov/Perezhogin clicked tonight, it seems pretty clear that those three should be given an extended run together. Plek should fit in nicely with Bonk and Johnson, with Latendresse back on the 4th line. Hopefully Kovalev is up for the challenge of playing centre... and I'm talking more about defensive responsibility than anything else. Great game by Aebischer. I am extremely, extremely, extremely happy with the Habs goaltending situation right now. I don't think it's a stretch to say that we have two of the 20 best goalies in the league playing for us right now. That is a very, very good thing. Can't say the same thing about the D. We've been debating on a few threads about whether or not getting rid of Ribeiro was the right move. The way the D is playing now, it seems pretty clear that we needed help back there. Perhaps Niinimaa was the wrong guy to acquire, but it seems pretty obvious (well, to me at least) that dealing Ribeiro for D help was the right idea. I thought Mark Streit was very good tonight. Considering how badly some other blueliners played, perhaps more ice time is warranted for #32? For people that watched HNIC tonight... did Greg Millen annoy the hell out of anybody else with his complete lack of knowledge about the Habs? This really is just a reprise of our old "they report what the Leafs had for breakfast and they never say anything about us!" lament, but Millen literally sounded like he hadn't seen a Habs game, talked to any Habs players, or dealt with anything Habs-related so far this year. He kept saying that the Russian line was "reunited"... when THEY HADN'T PLAYED A SHIFT TOGETHER ALL YEAR. That's kind of a glaring error, no?

That's funny considering Gui scored 2 goals in 3 games against the Remparts last year. Radulov has quite the big mouth for someone who's played one or two NHL games.

There is no way Boston trades Bergeron. Not unless they want even less people to show up at TD Banknorth Garden or whatever the hell that place is called now...

Pretty good. At least it's not hysterical. I'd like it if he delved a bit deeper into his analysis, though. For example, he writes that "Samsonov won't produce as much as we'd like", which is a perfectly acceptable conclusion, but I'd like to read the reason why he came to that conclusion... saying that's he's not as good as Daniel Brière isn't good enough, 99% of the players in the league aren't as good as Brière. But overall, decent article.

Perezhogin has been very good so far this year (how many posts has he hit now? Three? Four?), and that's good for him because this year hay have been his last chance to make an impression on Mr. Gainey. I personally interpreted that 1-year deal he signed in the off-season as a "put up or shut up" offer... and if he didn't produce, then he would be gone in the off season, to be replaced by Kostitsyn, Grabovsky or one of our other young forwards. I'm personally glad Perezhogin is succeeding; I've been a big fan ever since I saw him play in the World Juniors for Russia.

Word, beliveau1. We should start a thread about all the things going well so far this year...

I like Kovalev as much as the nexy guy, but these are the facts: he is 33 years old, and makes $4 mil+ per year; he has a reputation for loafing/being lazy/not playing hard every night; he hasn't scored 30 goals since 2002-03. Kovalev would be an important and useful player for any team that trades for him, but I simply don't think he would net very much. Remember, the last time he was traded, it was for Josef Balej and a 2nd round pick.

He also gave the puck away in the offensive zone a whole bunch of times, and was yanked at least twice off the PP by Dave Lewis. But yes, many Habs were worse. Like the entire D corps.

Correct.

Savard was horrible tonight. He's been bad all season. I guess he's OK with loafing now that he's signed his fat contract...

The dudes on CKAC just pointed out that Carbo yaps at the refs too much and needs to button his lip a little bit more... they just compared him to Therrien in that respect, yikes.

Well, that's asinine too. The Bruins killed us that game, there's no way we should sweep the 3 stars.

3 stars: 1. Huet 2. Huet 3. Huet (with all do respect to the 1st line)

Highway robbery. If we complain about the refs, we gotta thank them for their help sometimes too. That was a weak penalty call.

PP time! I'd love to steal the points here...

I guess you're stuck following it here then. I find that CJAD's feed screws up from time to time, it probably happened 10 or 15 times to me in 05-06.

Well, in that case I'm glad you're not the GM.

Yes, I'm switched to CKAC.

??? Patrick Traverse? Karl Dykhuis?

This is the worst effort of the year. By far. Thank goodness for Huet.

Whoever said earlier that Murray Wilson was being overly critical of Latendresse was right. Which is not to say that Gui is having a good game... but Komi is having a shocker tonight and he's barely said anything about that.

I wouldn't hold my breath...

Huet has been wonderful tonight.

Wonderful. Just wonderful.

*GASP* Invermere is awesome. That would be an awesome life jetsniper.