tomh009

Six even-strength goals, and a 27-save shutout for Poulin. Sweet! No points for Ouellet or Niku but the two were +4 and +3 on the night.

At least Gallagher still has a good attitude and works his ass off every night.

I guess they don't want to raid TR for another goalie ...

And the play in the D-zone was at times very much like the Ducharme era, especially when the Laine line was out on the ice.

Not going to win many games with 20 shots, though. Especially against a team with strong goaltending.

4-3 loss in OT. Still second place in the north division. Need to wake up before the second intermission, though.

3-3 at the end of regulation, going into OT. Ylonen 1g+2a so far, Poulin 29/32 saves.

Two and half minutes left to get to 20 shots on goal.

Nice PK work by Armia.

They should just put Montembeault on waivers and play Primeau instead. Maybe he can at least make a save once in a while.

2-0 Rochester after the first.

A stinker, wasn't it? Easy shot with good visibility and he just blew it ...

Looking at our disaster of a year... With Ducharme: 8 wins 12 losses by 1 goal 3 losses by 2 goals 22 losses by 3 or more goals That's an (at least somewhat) lopsided loss almost every second game, which is indeed pretty regular. Although some of those are with one or two empty-netters. With St-Louis: 12 wins 7 losses by 1 goal 3 losses by 2 goals 6 losses by 3 or more goals That's a lopsided loss every 4.5 games. Or by another measure ... With Ducharme: 8 games with 0-2 goals allowed 18 games with 3-4 goals 19 games with 5+ goals With St-Louis: 9 games with 0-2 goals allowed 12 games with 3-4 goals 7 games with 5+ goals That's 5+ goals allowed every 4 games.

Very happy to hear that he's in Montreal, that's a strong indication that they are expecting him to play this season yet.

If it's every time, yes, it's a problem. But Montembeault and Primeau (or even Red Light Racicot!) have good games, too, the question is just the percentages.

Every goalie has bad games from time to time. Montembeault has them more often than Allen, but less often than Primeau. Is there a specific frequency threshold at which the young D-men's confidence will collapse?

Five-year average, yes. February-April (15 games) has two games where he was pulled plus one significantly poor outing (5 goals on 32 shots vs Buffalo). So, the short-term average is less frequent. We'll find out soon which one holds.

At this point in time, I would give it to Edmundson. Assuming that Hugo plans to keep him around.

I don't expect Price to return for the Columbus game tomorrow. Could it be for the home game vs Islanders on Friday? I wouldn't expect him to start against the Caps' offence on Saturday night. The number of return options is rapidly shrinking now. And of course it's by now quite possible that he won't be ready at all this season.

St Louis believes that it is possible for veteran NHL players to still learn and improve their hockey IQ. Maybe it's possible to improve a goalie's goalie IQ as well?

Same as for Caufield, no? 😉

5-1 final after 3rd-period goals by RHP and Roy (a three-point game for RHP). 20/21 saves for Poulin.

Looking at the 15 appearances in the St Louis era, he's about .919. Two clunkers (Arizona and Winnipeg) but about half his appearances are .920 or better. Not a disaster, I think -- and good enough for a rebuilding year.

3-1 after two, on goals by Martel, Mattinen and Martel again. Poulin (recovered from whatever it was) has 15 saves on 16 shots so far.

I think that would have been this year! 😁