GDT: Game 5, Montreal vs Washington

[dlbalr]

Projected lines for Montreal:

Left Wing	Centre	Right Wing	Defence/Goalies
Cammalleri	Plekanec	A. Kostitsyn	Markov	O'Byrne
Pouliot	Gomez	Gionta	Hamrlik	Bergeron
Moen	Moore	Lapierre	Gill	Gorges
S. Kostitsyn	Metropolit	Pyatt	Halak	Price

Other Notes:

Injuries: Mara, Spacek

Scratches: Darche, Laraque, Maxwell

Projected lines for Washington:

Left Wing	Centre	Right Wing	Defence/Goalies
Ovechkin	Backstrom	Knuble	Schultz	Green
Laich	Morrison	Semin	Poti	Corvo
Fleischmann	Gordon	Fehr	Sloan*	Carlson
Chimera	Belanger	Bradley	Varlamov	Theodore

Other Notes:

Injuries: Jurcina, Morrisonn*

Scratches: Erskine, Steckel, Walker

Game time: 7:00 PM EST

TV: TSN, RDS

Radio: CJAD,CKAC

Another one of these would be handy tonight:

[dlbalr]

Pretty good shot chart on the Washington Post's site - http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/sport...als/shot-chart/

Filter it to show all goals in the series and tell me if you can't find a trend that stands out right away. 8/12 Montreal goals have been scored within 17 feet, time to make a habit of crashing the net regularly as that's where Varlamov is more vulnerable.

[lazy26]

Hamr - MAB scares me. Especially now that Washington gets the last change.

Hopefully this isn't the last time I say this year, "GO HABS GO!!!!"

[JoeLassister]

In a desperate attempt to save the playoffs run, I shaved my cheeks and neck (the ridiculous parts of my "beard") and kept only the goatee (the almost respectable part of my "beard") for game 5.

Comon' Guys !!!!

[brobin]

Going back to Halak.. will need him to have a huge game and the guys must crash the net.

Hammer.. if you make a dumb pinch on the PP and kill us again, I hope you get an anal fissure all summer.....

[bar]

Going back to Halak.. will need him to have a huge game and the guys must crash the net.

Hammer.. if you make a dumb pinch on the PP and kill us again, I hope you get an anal fissure all summer.....

Haha where as I share the same feelings regarding Hammers dumb pinches...eww nonetheless.

[SOOPAVILLIN]

Go Habs go and go :hlogo: alak go

[bar]

I have no faith in Halak. So not expecting a great performance tonight...terrible call on JMs part. We had one goalie with confidence problems..by starting Halak we now have two. Add this to the list of questionable tactics by JM, including handling of young players vs. vets, line shifting, the list goes on. Round peg is what he wants in a team, and this team is a square hole.

[sakiqc]

Going back to Halak.. will need him to have a huge game and the guys must crash the net.

Hammer.. if you make a dumb pinch on the PP and kill us again, I hope you get an anal fissure all summer.....

hopefully Habs players don't crash their own net

[bar]

hopefully Habs players don't crash their own net

Ha! I'd take that! At least they showed they can do it!

[brobin]

I don't know why people are surprised or upset about Halak playing. Price let in two goals from the high slot, which were considered soft on Halak. The fact remains that Price got his chance and showed that he isn't going to be the difference maker. On top of that, he lost his cool again.

We are going to win or lose based on how the guys in front play. They played much better in the first two periods last night for Price then they did in the previous game. They cleared the traffic better, they were on the rebounds, etc. Most of the caps shots were front the outside. Neither Price nor Halak had a problem with those.

We will probably lose tonight, and people will probably blame the goalie, regardless of which one was put in. The caps are a much better team with at least 50% more offensive power then us. They have ripped up goalies all season long, when they show up. In fact, they have demonstrated several times in this series their ability to turn it on for 10 minutes and take over the game. The only way a goalie comes out looking good is if the D in front help them. Our D has not been good enough to hold back the tide. Its not the goalie fault.

If we wanted to get to the second round, they should have shown up for some of those games down the stretch and avoid Pitts or Washington.

I will send the memo to Spacek..

hopefully Habs players don't crash their own net

[dlbalr]

I will send the memo to Spacek..

Make sure you send it to Montreal and not Washington as Spacek isn't with the team and won't play tonight.

[Fanpuck33]

I don't know why people are surprised or upset about Halak playing. Price let in two goals from the high slot, which were considered soft on Halak. The fact remains that Price got his chance and showed that he isn't going to be the difference maker. On top of that, he lost his cool again.

Agreed. Halak was the #1 heading into the playoffs. He struggles and Price got his shot. Price wasn't necessarily bad, but he also didn't do enough to show he gave them a better chance of winning. Thus, it's back to the guy who earned the #1 job during the season.

[bar]

I don't know why people are surprised or upset about Halak playing. Price let in two goals from the high slot, which were considered soft on Halak. The fact remains that Price got his chance and showed that he isn't going to be the difference maker. On top of that, he lost his cool again.

We are going to win or lose based on how the guys in front play. They played much better in the first two periods last night for Price then they did in the previous game. They cleared the traffic better, they were on the rebounds, etc. Most of the caps shots were front the outside. Neither Price nor Halak had a problem with those.

We will probably lose tonight, and people will probably blame the goalie, regardless of which one was put in. The caps are a much better team with at least 50% more offensive power then us. They have ripped up goalies all season long, when they show up. In fact, they have demonstrated several times in this series their ability to turn it on for 10 minutes and take over the game. The only way a goalie comes out looking good is if the D in front help them. Our D has not been good enough to hold back the tide. Its not the goalie fault.

If we wanted to get to the second round, they should have shown up for some of those games down the stretch and avoid Pitts or Washington.

I will send the memo to Spacek..

The soft goals on Halak was the rebound ones, not the snipes from the high slot from one of the best players in the NHL. I'm not surprised, I am upset, cause Price was one of the only habs who has shown he cares, and to take that and put it on the bench is beyond making sense.

The reason goaltending is being talked about...because what else can we say about the team that hasn't already been said. Slow aging D, slowly aging before our eyes, habs big players not burying chances (looking at you Cammy). I still think they can win, because the Caps have been so far from dominant..they just score with their chances. It would not surprise me to see the habs win three straight, they are a streaky team, have been all season. I just think with the smaller Halak in nets the caps will crash the crease more, causing more rebounds from Halak (which has been his kryptonite all season), and then goaltending will be a factor like it was in 3 and 4.

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

The odd thing about this series is that Cammy has been frequently grumbled-at, yet he's got 6 points 4 games (!); Pleks has seemed like a 'meh,' and lots of posters are talking about trading him or insisting on paying him under market value, yet he's on a PPG pace. The stats don't seem to bear out what we/I'm seeing on the ice, i.e., that Gomez and Gionta are out two best forwards shift after shift, and that out top-6 is somehow inadequate. Indeed, according to the numbers it's our bottom six (and our D) that's killing us:

http://habsloyalist.blogspot.com/2010/04/small-world.html

As for tonight's game, there is NO reason for optimism. None. (Not to say the Habs can't win it, just to say that it's a total, wild, ungrounded leap of faith to say that they will). If they're smart they'll have packed golf clubs on the trip so they can salvage something:

http://www.montrealgazette.com/opinion/edi...oons/index.html

[xXx..CK..xXx]

I actually expect a really strong game from our team tonight. I think our weakest link will probably be our defense. Goals will come in bunches and Halak will make some game saving stops. In the end we will come out with the victory. You heard it here first.

Let's go boys, one week of playoffs is certainly not enough!

[kenadian]

So long boys.....see ya next year

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN2C6L9v2XM

[bar]

The odd thing about this series is that Cammy has been frequently grumbled-at, yet he's got 6 points 4 games (!); Pleks has seemed like a 'meh,' and lots of posters are talking about trading him or insisting on paying him under market value, yet he's on a PPG pace. The stats don't seem to bear out what we/I'm seeing on the ice, i.e., that Gomez and Gionta are out two best forwards shift after shift, and that out top-6 is somehow inadequate. Indeed, according to the numbers it's our bottom six (and our D) that's killing us:

http://habsloyalist.blogspot.com/2010/04/small-world.html

As for tonight's game, there is NO reason for optimism. None. (Not to say the Habs can't win it, just to say that it's a total, wild, ungrounded leap of faith to say that they will). If they're smart they'll have packed golf clubs on the trip so they can salvage something:

http://www.montrealgazette.com/opinion/edi...oons/index.html

I know my opinion doesn't mesh with the numbers, but really Cammy needs to come up bigger, I know he has 6 pts, but didn't he have like 3 of those in game 2. He fans on a lot of shots that need to go in. People say the goaltending has to be absolute for us to win, we need more timely goalscoring as well.

[Habsfan84]

Well as much as I hate to say it, I will sit down at 7:00 tonight and watch the last Habs game of the season. It was a tough season. Just don't have the feeling that they will pull it out tonight, as much as I hope they do.

GO HABS GO!!!!!!

[Colin]

I just spoke with a whole bunch of Sens fans who all told me not to give up yet because if they can do it against the Pens and continue the series, we can do it against the Caps. Funny, I'm getting a morale boost from Sens fans. LMAO

[lazy26]

I just spoke with a whole bunch of Sens fans who all told me not to give up yet because if they can do it against the Pens and continue the series, we can do it against the Caps. Funny, I'm getting a morale boost from Sens fans. LMAO

ugh. I hope you took a shower afterwards!

It's funny that you mention it though, because animosity between myself and Sens' fans is at an all-time low. There seems to be a shared belief in the conspiracy that the NHL is out to get our respective teams, as "they" want a Pittsburgh/Washington matchup, and that the Habs and Sens are getting screwed over in the process.

[bar]

The first 10 minutes will tell me all I need to know about the habs chances for a comeback series win. I firmly believe if they dominate for a FULL 60 minutes tonight I feel good about the rest of the series. We as fans think.. what if? What if, they held on in game 2. What if, they didn't have that shorthanded goal against them in game 3 and 4. It seems like a lot of us have mentally checked out, I've been reading some of the comments from the habs and caps, and I'm feeling more optimistic..my glass is starting to fill.

3-1 is not the end of the world...teams do come back, remember 2004 and the Bruins. I want that epic feeling again, how happy I was. This series has been too close to be done in 5. This NEEDS to be a 7 game series...the habs have far too much left in their tanks to let it end this way. We as fans should at least be able to match that! These are tough times..I'm not ready to give in...this is what Gomez/Gionta/Gill/Moen was brought in for, this is when they earn the money they are getting paid. I want to be amazed again by Halak, prove me wrong, make me look foolish for doubting you. I'd rather look like a fool and be proved wrong than to be right and have to suffer no more habs til September.

TLDR version: It's not over, there's no fat lady yet. Go HABS Go!

Edited April 23, 2010 by bar

[Habsfan]

The caps are a much better team with at least 50% more offensive power then us. They have ripped up goalies all season long, when they show up. In fact, they have demonstrated several times in this series their ability to turn it on for 10 minutes and take over the game. The only way a goalie comes out looking good is if the D in front help them. Our D has not been good enough to hold back the tide. Its not the goalie fault.

If we wanted to get to the second round, they should have shown up for some of those games down the stretch and avoid Pitts or Washington.

Couldn't have said it better myself!

I will pray for a miracle tonight...but let's just say i'm not very confident...and that has nothing to do with our goalies. Like I said in other threads, our goalies ARE NOT THE PROBLEM!

GO :hlogo: GO!!!

3-1 is not the end of the world...teams do come back, remember 2004 and the Bruins. I want that epic feeling again, how happy I was. This series has been too close to be done in 5. This NEEDS to be a 7 game series...the habs have far too much left in their tanks to let it end this way. We as fans should at least be able to match that! These are tough times..I'm not ready to give in...this is what Gomez/Gionta/Gill/Moen was brought in for, this is when they earn the money they are getting paid. I want to be amazed again by Halak, prove me wrong, make me look foolish for doubting you. I'd rather look like a fool and be proved wrong than to be right and have to suffer no more habs til September.

TLDR version: It's not over, there's no fat lady yet. Go HABS Go!

To be honest with you, I believe the only way we can beat the Caps tonight is if the Caps don't show up...or they play a lousy game. We've seen it on numerous occasions, as soon as the Caps decide to turn it up a notch, our boys can't follow.

Let's hope that the Caps will take our boys lightly tonight, and we can surprise them! Oh yeah, it would be nice to be able to beat Varlamov as well!

Edited April 23, 2010 by Habsfan

[jrhabs]

You gotta love they way the habs play with goalie confidence.

When will JM get it ! It's not the goalies !

Look at the horrid D-men

Edited April 23, 2010 by jrhabs

[bar]

To be honest with you, I believe the only way we can beat the Caps tonight is if the Caps don,t show up...or they play a lousy game. We've seen it on numerous occasions, as soon as the Caps decide to turn up a notch, our boys can't follow.

Let's hope that the Caps will take our boys lightly tonight, and we can surprise them!

The caps have not shown up the entire series, or more to the point the D has held them at bay for 40 minutes of most games. It's finding that extra 20 minutes...come now show some optimism.