by a hair

I remember a few years ago when Cherry called Saku "Koivoi" during one of his coaches corner segments... Time seems to be treating Don well!

ughh.. I hate the idea of Dandy playing as a forward, time to say bye bye to him instead

Habs got my vote

Does anyone see Huet playing backup to Price, with Halak being traded? Huet himself has said that Price is the Number one of the future. I wonder what Gainey would do if he is offered a sweet deal involving Halak from a team not interested in Huet...

Lines: Seems to me there are three 2nd lines and one 4th line on the habs since about mid November,

I remember Hack Shodd from his days of not going to a single Expo game all season... frikin guy... unfortunately all you can do is not read what he has to say... at first it is tough, reading his inane rants give you a sick thrill, the thrill of disgust, a feeling of superiority... really the guy is kind of a pick me up... but once you give up on the Toddenfraude for a while you begin to feel a weight off your shoulders each an every time your eye darts from Hickey to Fisher without bothering to stop even for an instant on the CAPSLOCCKKIN HACK SHODD!!!

I must have missed something, I thought Leighton was brought in specifically to play IN hamilton, so we can get a good look at Halak vs. the 'my new nhl 2'*. Does he have some kind of one way contract or something?? *copyright: le pêcheur rouge.

I agree, this is the bad karma finally coming back for that home run swing he took at Cleveland Barons defenceman Garrett Stafford's dome back in 04, once Parishogan gets past this it's all upside! *Stafford currently the top point getting defenseman for the AHL's Worcester Sharks, home to Montreal native Mathieu Darche.

10 bucks on Sammy playing before Huet.

first time in a long time i've said "oh mon dieu" out loud and it was after kosty's behind the back pass... good game, and more importantly, a good momentum boost and a half. :hlogo:

I think a good nickname for him is "T-Plex". :hlogo:

You have to imagine that such quotes come from leading questions posed by reporters, questions brought on by comments from Carbo as to why Samso is sitting in the press box. This has gone on all season, since the very beginning Samso has either been forced to sit out of games or had his ice time cut severely after a bad 1st period. Yeah he has played poorly, much of that is due to conflicts between his matured natural 'free wheeling' style of play and Carbo's tried and true defensive role playing system. I'm not the first here to say it, what did Gainey & co. think they were getting? You have to assume they thought he would be better able to adapt to the system, but he hasn't. At what point do you decide to instead adapt your own system to the players you have? One of the things that makes me think Carbo is a little too stuck in his ways is the sort of attitude he displays towards the referees, quite the yapper mr.Carbo is. He's been penalized for it earlier this season. Meanwhile the Habs happen to be suffering from penalty-itis, especially once our legs got too tired to keep up the short handed scoring we enjoyed the first few months of the season. You've got Carbo giving off bad vibes like some kind of gulag acid trip mishap and the refs seeming to enjoy watching his blood boil. You would hope that in lieu of his hardnosed attitude towards the refs he might instead try more of an old-boy vibe with them to try and keep the whistles in the pockets, but alas no. I would also accept that much of this anger towards the refs is misdirected disgust with his team, but that is beside the point. Point is that Carbo is the kind of guy who is gonna stick to his ways, and you can easily argue that that is a good thing. Point is that Samso is the kind of guy who can only really play one style, a style you could easily argue would benefit almost any NHL team. So in conclusion, it is so clear that Carbo is set in his ways, and that Samso's playing style doesn't fit in, and that if it is true, as Samso has said, that “[He] thought this was going to be a better fit, because of the guys in the lineup and the way management portrayed things." Then why is it surprising that after being benched, again, he would have to admit "..it was never meant to be.” This isn't any real inflammatory statement, it is just the way it is, Samso knows it, Carbo knows it, we know it. They put the 3.5 million dollar man on waivers, geez. I would imagine that had teh Kovalev incident not happened within recent memory, that this would have been far less of a story. All the best to Samso, the nhl hasn't seen the last of him.

and just what is this glass half full of? cause it doesn't smell like spring water...

haha yeah, I'd love to see Jack Todd fumbling over this reference... and if Todd ever did have anything reasonable to say I would point to the broken clock that is right once a day...

Hate to say it but yeah I agree, Carbo seems to have run out of moves, so he sticks with what he knows... Im not sure this really affects Kovi, more than in just making him feel like his time is wasted here, but I can guess that it is really affecting all the youth on this team.. with the exception of T.Plex, most of the youth on our team has seen their performances get worse throughout the season... This even goes back to LaTendresse being sent back after his great training camp a few years ago (a Gainey move if im not mistaken)... Higgins, Perezhogan, micheal "e-z wider rolling papers" Ryder, LaPierre, all look worse for this years NHL experience.. who knows what fate awaits Kostytsn and Garbowskii, more of the same i imagine... Media abuse, authoritarian coaching... what can be expect for these kids, certainly not a top 4 division contender, let alone a playoff team... But how do we explain the 1st 30 or so games of the season? Was it all Huet's pads and Souray's shot?

Do give a long term contract to: Micheal "easy wider rolling papers" Ryder, Maxime "screaming eagle" Lapierre, and Andre "4000" Markov. Do NOT give a fat contract to: Sheldon "soft hands" Souray or Sergei "never had a chance" Samsonov... also: maybe they should bury a maeWest under center ice.. Youppi needs to step his game up, he's clearly not giving 100%... Ritual slaying of Jack Todd... ps. Jaques Demers needs to go back to his old glasses frames, his current frames were designed for space exploring 100 meter sprinters, not for be-jowled broadcasters..

The question is what do we do with David Albatross come the renewal of trade talks? Price, Halak, Huet, one of them should be traded as well to upgrade our D.

I say they are playing the rope-a-dope with their eastern conference rivals, stanley cup here we come!

Part of the problem stems from the loss of the Expos, and the seeming disintrest that these media outlets show towards amateur sport. With a ravenous readership to keep fed and little coverage of anything but bleu blanc rouge it is only a matter of time before these journos, desperate themselves to keep their gig (free habs tickets), fall back to sensational reporting. But that's not the only reason players don't want to come here. Language, salary, education system... these are all factors that play heavily against the 514 for most north american anglo nhl'ers. (Euro players on the other hand feel comfortable in this environment as many have at least a passing understanding of French, don't mind their kids learning it, and will trade a lower salary for a higher quality of post game restaurant/strip-club) I think the Habs need to play up these things that attract euros, we should get ourselves a european assistant coach. Maybe Kirk "is work" Muller will be moving on soon, a perfect opportunity to enlist someone from overseas (I'd rather keep Jarvis). Lord knows there are more than enough great european players out there for us. Francophone players will almost always feel passionate about the habs, I think this is a good time for the team to really play up it's international nature and enlist the Kovalchuks and Ovetchkins of the world to grasp the torch from faltering franco fingers...