tomh009

Antti Raanta is available with no draft required. 23, never drafted. Won the Finnish league championship this year with a stellar performance (9 shutouts in 61 games, about .950 save percentage). Currently playing for Finland in the world championships. Could make a great backup to challenge Price, at a reasonable cost, or do so after a few years of seasoning in the AHL.

This. Price has the talent, skill and mechanics to possibly be the best goalie in the league. But he needs to get his head sorted out, as right now we never know which Carey Price will show up for any given game. And once he gets into a funk it can take a long time to get out of it. And this doesn't even require a trade or cost any cap room.

It's the six million dollar men (Lee Majors, in case anyone else is old enough to remember!) of whom we need to be able to expect minor miracles. Anderson is only getting paid half that. Not that the rest of the team played at a level sufficient for winning, but Price didn't play like a franchise goalie for most of the series, either. As they say, goaltending is 90% mental, the other 10% is all in your head. Price needs to get that sorted out, otherwise he will never be able to fully utilize his talents.

That's it in a nutshell. An exciting performance for (most of) the regular season, and second seed in the east. Maybe some luck in the mix, but a huge improvement over 2011-2012. We just didn't have it together for the playoffs, though. Neither Price nor the rest of the team. Time for some introspection in the off-season, and hopefully some appropriate changes.

But if that really is the MT narrative, then you have to go to Budaj for the next game. Otherwise it would make no sense. (I don't know that Budaj would have won the game for us, either, when we only scored a single goal, though.)

Yes, the injury risk is a valid point. A few minutes rest, not so much, I think. I doubt exhaustion is Price's main problem anyway.

... not that I really know much about the game tonight. On vacation in the south, no TV coverage, so I'm relying on this forum and nhl.com to figure out what's going on.

Alas, I don't think six minutes' rest will really make all that much difference ...

Are you suggesting a 911 call to Budaj?

No style points for how it was done, but it's still an awesome achievement.

At least that will make the contract negotiations in the summer easier ...

Price has looked good in tough situations. And the last five games don't even qualify as that difficult. It's as if he brings the pressure onto himself at times, loses confidence ... and then we have an outcome like the last five games.

Exactly. Price is fabulous when he has it all together, but he still doesn't seem to have built up the mental fortitude I would hope for after five years in the league.

If he gets his game back, I agree. But in the last five games, with Price faltering, the entire team has stumbled. Just as you say. So I think we are actually in agreement. The real question is how can Price get back into the groove ...

One could argue that the 2010 team snapped back because they had a goalie behind them that they could believe in. At this point I suspect they don't have confidence in either Price or Budaj.

If that scotch is older than Gallagher, it'll make up for a lot!

I have a vague recollection of the time when we used to do the very same thing ...

Including this game, our two goalies each have a save percentage of about .800 over the last five games (and it would be far worse if not for TB). We've pulled the starting goalie three times so far in those games, will tonight be the fourth? I sure didn't see this particular collapse coming a month ago.

Price 0.250 save percentage, Budaj 0.000 ...

Exactly. It's not the lack of intensity, the Habs are applying lots of pressure. But we have one goal from 11 shots, they have three from four shots.

I'll second that.

A solid start to OT -- but how long can the energy last? Thomas is giving up the rebounds again ...

On to OT we go again ...

Lord Subban!

PK!!!!!!!