dlbalr

Laval will look to sweep the weekend as they're in Bridgeport to take on the Islanders (RIP, Sound Tigers). Tory Dello is injured so Carl Neill draws in on the third pairing. (Lines are from last game) Harvey-Pinard - Dea - Martel Roy - Dauphin - Belzile Pezzetta - Vejdemo - Bourque Baddock - Beaudin - Gignac Ouellet - Belpedio Fairbrother - Schueneman Bisson - Neill Primeau (Lines are based on last game's +/- data and some guesses) Terry - Czarnik - Dal Colle Holmstrom - Koivula - Golyshev Durandeau - Andreoff - Coskey Jenkins - MacLean - Brown LaDue - Bolduc Helgeson - Wotherspoon Salo - Vande Sompel Appleby Puck drop is at 3 PM.

Dauphin scored midway through the 3rd and Gignac added the empty-netter, 4-0 Laval is the final. https://theahl.com/stats/game-summary/1022679

He's having a quiet game and I mean that in a good way. He's known for his defensive blunders and instead, he has been relatively safe so far while still being good in the attacking end.

No scoring in the second period. McNiven has 22 stops so far.

2-0 Rocket after 20 minutes. Fairbrother and Ouellet with the goals.

I can't take credit for the graphic - I found it through an image search. My original plan was to do something in MS Paint but I got lazy.

Recently seen on Ducharme's white board for game strategy: Will this simple idea work against Detroit? We'll find out tonight.

That's my guess.

Good to see Harris is ready to return.

No Jesse Ylonen for these two games due to COVID protocol; he wasn't allowed to make the trip with the team.

For the first time in more than a year and a half, Laval has crossed the border into the US as they're in Providence for a game against the Bruins. (Lines are from last game with some guesses with Ylonen out) Harvey-Pinard - Dea - Martel Roy - Dauphin - Belzile Pezzetta - Vejdemo - Bourque Baddock - Beaudin - Gignac Ouellet - Belpedio Fairbrother - Schueneman Bisson - Dello McNiven (Lines are based on last game's +/- data and some guesses) Lauko - Studnicka - Wagner Filipe - Senyshyn - Fogarty Hughes - Steen - Asselin Koppanen - Froden - Voyer Ahcan - Lewington Vaakainen - Wolff Ness - Lyle Booth Puck drop is at 7 PM.

You do remember Montreal's record against a tanking Detroit team in 2019-20, right?

Everyone's over the floor so that's not a concern. In order to acquire Weber, a team would need to be $7.857M under the cap before making the move which basically gets rid of a lot of suitors. If a team wants to expand their existing LTIR pool (they have some room and send some money back to cover the difference), it's an option. But Montreal has recapture to consider through the end of 2022-23 - that's the time to move him, not now. Gallagher won't waive his NMC, Drouin's deal isn't long enough to offset Eichel, so that'd be Anderson. Sure, that'd cover the money element. There's no more ability for an acquiring team to not absorb a pending trade protection clause, that was removed in the CBA. It's coming with him no matter what. Buffalo doesn't care about value this season and getting players to help now - they're trying to tank. There's no increased benefit to them to make the move now for less than they might get by dragging it out. We're only a few weeks away from him being probably ruled out for the season which negates that pressure. Whoever gets him is planning for 2022-23. That's the case whether he's moved next month or in June; his value shouldn't change. The narrative is that Buffalo's under the gun to get this done but I think it's the exact opposite. That doesn't solve the problem though as they lose the LTIR cushion. They'd be at about $83M in spending for 2022-23 with 12 players under contract. How are they fitting the other 8-11 players in when they're already over? They need to match money with healthy players and then use Weber's cushion to try to fill out the roster.

Some assets are going to be conditional but those will be the secondary assets, not the primaries. Unless they get a top young player or top prospect, they're going to keep waiting it out. Their deadline is the start of the 2022-23 calendar year when his trade protection kicks in (mid-July) and with this being a planned tank year for them, they don't care about having him sit on IR all year. And again, even if an offer centred around Dvorak as a primary piece going the other way, it still blows up Montreal's cap for next season. It would put them just under $90 million to 14 players. Even with an LTIR'ed Weber, they're already basically at next year's cap ($82.5M) with more than a third of the roster still to be signed. At a minimum, that would cost another ~6M or so and that would mean Romanov or anyone else worth more than the minimum would be gone. They have to match money on trades and at some point send more money out; buffalo has unequivocally stated that under no circumstance will they retain anything on Eichel's contract, by the way. He may go for less than what the Sabres are asking - he probably will - but it won't be a trade with Montreal.

It's dead now but it was running after the game. I suspect someone from the league stepped in on that one.