tomh009

Why is Ducharme playing Perry for 22-23 minutes? Edmundson 21+, Weber 20+. Especially once we are behind by three goals, give some ice time to the kids -- who were holding their own anyway.

I figured out how to get this from naturalstattrick.com -- and Ducharme's preaching is not working, at least not yet. 19 total assists for the D-men under Julien, but only 15 so far under Ducharme.

Doesn't matter who we put in goal, if the skaters can only produce 18 shots as opposed to 16 giveaways. Need some defensive discipline.

While it may be a lost cause, I hope they come out fighting for the third period.

Petry has been on the ice for all three goals, Evans and Drouin for two each.

I don't fully trust the accuracy of the takeaway/giveaway stats on nhl.com, but it looks pretty stark tonight: one giveaway by the Jets, 14 by the Habs.

Pretty much, yes. Under Julien it was 0.182, which would rank 22nd in the league (mind you, I'm pretty sure it was worse yet last year). Under Ducharme, it's 0.234 up to and including last night, which would rank ninth in the league. That includes a 13-game stretch pre-COVID break at 0.345, and then the six-game drought after that (including Gallagher and Armia injuries) at 0.056. I don't think 0.345 is sustainable, but neither is it a 0.056. Including both coaches, we are smack-dab in the middle in the PP rankings at 16th, with an average of 0.206. And, yes, we can certainly still improve. My point was that it really has not been sh!t under Ducharme, it's one of the areas were he has made a significant positive impact.

In the end, Tobie Paquette-Bisson got credit for the goal, his first in the AHL. 4-3 final after the Marlies pulled their goalie and scored a late one.

His game in Laval is far better than last year. Whether that carries over to the NHL level is something that we’re about to find out.

At least Leskinen will shoot. And occasionally even score.

If someone has the time, I would love to know whether those numbers are the same or different for Julien and Ducharme.

The smaller the sample size, the easier it is draw conclusions. Last six games the PP has had neither Gallagher or Armia, so could it be that the absence of Gallagher has an impact, too, and not just “our PP sucks”? Because Ducharme has improved the PP.

Is this a real problem? I don’t know where to find this as a team stat, so I added up D goals and assists for the Habs and the Leafs. Points/game is very similar but our D have more goals (Petry!) while the Leafs have more assists. Am I looking at the wrong stat? Or do the Leafs have the same issue?

Let me just add one more point here ... Our PP was running at 18.3% under Julien. After Ducharme took over, it's been 23.4%, which is better than 20 other teams in the league.

I’m thinking about the next 10 years, not just this season. I’ll trust the Habs’ judgement on this.

There is no question that he has far more skill than Poehling. In my mind, the real question is whether one AHL game is enough, and whether now is the right time to move to the NHL.

5-3 Laval final score. Caufield first star with 2+1 (notably Weal is third star with 0+2). For sure he played a great game. In the AHL. But Poehling scored a hat trick in his NHL debut as well, and he definitely wasn't ready for the Habs after that. Is Caufield? I think Bouchard and Ducharme can figure out whether the right time is now, or sometime later.

No prospect comes with a guarantee. Look at the past top-three NHL draft picks, regardless of the team, and see how many of them have fizzled out. That said, we have some promising prospects. Some of them might even be capable of playing in the top pair. But we don't know that yet.

Yes ... but the AHL is what it is, a mix of prospects and veterans. Montreal has one of the best prospect pools in the NHL, and our AHL team is one of the best in that league. But that doesn't mean that we have multiple elite prospects on the team -- that would be very rare in the AHL. Many elite prospects (including Suzuki and Kotkaniemi) spend little time in the AHL.

If Caufield is anything close to what we hope, he's unlikely to be playing for the Habs on the same line with Poehling. Top six vs bottom six.

At the AHL level, Weal is quite competent: he leads the team with 19 points (5+14) in 23 games.

Mysak is on the road trip, but sitting out one more game?

But ... do you still have rope? We were looking for that back in February!

Duh! That's right, he waived it in the Subban trade.

If he's willing to waive his NMC ...