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Season Opener: Oct. 7, Habs vs Leafs, 7 PM


dlbalr

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Subban with 3 assists. Two were awesome. The teams stars played like stars tonight. Having said that, if they were playing a team that could finish, they might have been buried in the first 30 minutes.

That last one on the empty net was out of this world. How the hell did he find patches with that one.

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Did Carey really keep us in it? He made arguably 2 big saves and one was late. T.O did miss the net on some golden chances though.

we were out shot and definitely lost the possession battle. With that said I'm not sure we were out chanced throughout the game. We did hit 3 posts and had a goal called back, not mention some big saves by bernier kept it close.

Gilbert was and is a turnover machine

Gallagher looked sluggish I thought

I am just gonna quote this post because it is basically exactly what I was going to say. Although I was going to add I think Semin will find himself in the doghouse soon if he doesn't get the puck deep from the neutral zone.

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Gilbert and Emelin giving plenty of hope for Pateryn and Tinordi.

Couldn't agree more, Pateryn already feels more reliable to me than any of them, Tinordi remains a mystery though. Pateryn plays rugged, smart hockey, while Emelin only plays rugged and Gilbert certainly doesn't play smart.

on a side note, Heck of a game for Subban, Price, Max, and Chucky.

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I am just gonna quote this post because it is basically exactly what I was going to say. Although I was going to add I think Semin will find himself in the doghouse soon if he doesn't get the puck deep from the neutral zone.

You and Le Genius will not give him much leash I am sure. That is not an insult just a comment.

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Well, it was the P-3 show again tonight - Price, Patches and PK (and damn - not one, but two spectacular long passes from PK straight to Pacioretty for a goal. Impressive). A bit too much like last season for comfort, in terms of the impotence of the supporting cast. Like so many times before, I found myself wishing that we had 'just one more dangerous forward.' The one bright spot was Galy's GWG. Psychologically, I think that was important for the kid and for the team. If Galy gets rolling, all bets are off.

Props to Flynn at the end for the masterful face-off win that created the opportunity for the EN goal. But I'd still try Lord Byron next game to see if he can add spark and speed.

I quite liked the Desharnais line in the O-zone - especially Flash and DD, who are obviously smart, savvy players; but their effectiveness was marred by the total ineptitue of their defencemen everytime the puck crossed the Habs' blueline. Gilbert-Beaulieu were absolutely putrid. Execrable. I'm willing to be that if you break it down, over half of those Leafs shifts where they had the Habs hemmed in occured when those two were on the ice. That duo can't keep playing like that. If it does, then yeah, bring on Pateryn. (That said, I notice that everyone is crapping on Glibert - rightly - and no one is saying boo about Beaulieu's complete suckage. They BOTH sucked IMHO).

Petry had good moments but also looked spotty to me too, at times. It was odd to see the D having problems when that is supposed to be our area of strength.

My feeling with Semin is that he needs to find his groove, his confidence. He looks like a guy who's searching. It could go either way with him.

Anyone notice that MT kept his lines together all night? Interesting.

Nonetheless, the Leafs did carry the bulk of the play and deployed the kind of quick-transition, puck-supporting, fast-skating game that I wish we'd see from our guys nightly. We won the game on superior talent, but it's hard not to look at the play of both teams and conclude that the Leafs have the better coach. Big surprise.

Final thought: the Habs' relatively flat play reinforces what I said about this so-called 'rivalry.' For the canadiens, it's just another day at the office. No different than playing the Florida Panthers.

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Price was himself. Accurately picked as first star of the game. Stopped everything put at him except the double deflection.

Eller was good , he will have better games coming up. Big year for him.

Chuck looked good at center winning 70% of draws. Great shot.

D was average although PK picked up three assists. Nate has it tough playing with Gilbert.

Loafs are and AHL team with some cast off vets added from around the NHL.

Gallagher and Pleks don't seem like a fit on same line. Max will score no matter who he plays with.

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We won, that's the bottom line, we never play well on the first game of the season vs Leafs, never, and this team tends to play down to the opposition, I'm happy today regardless of how sluggish and disorganized we were.

Semin took some undeserved abuse from the commentators, but I thought he made some really good plays(couple bad clears tho) and his skill is undeniable, that line is going to bring us Hab fans some joy this winter...

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Semin took some undeserved abuse from the commentators, but I thought he made some really good plays(couple bad clears tho) and his skill is undeniable, that line is going to bring us Hab fans some joy this winter...

Get used to it. Semin is the Euro whipping boy of the league.

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Guest Stogey24

We won, that's the bottom line, we never play well on the first game of the season vs Leafs, never, and this team tends to play down to the opposition, I'm happy today regardless of how sluggish and disorganized we were.Semin took some undeserved abuse from the commentators, but I thought he made some really good plays(couple bad clears tho) and his skill is undeniable, that line is going to bring us Hab fans some joy this winter...

Semin might have the best release in the game, Therrien needs to be on him to shoot. If he become a threat out there, it opens up alot of space for other players.
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I definitely don't share the common opinion in here about the Habs being outplayed badly.

Hell, I don't even think we were outplayed at all.

We hit what, 2-3 posts + scored a goal that could have been a good goal last season.

Could have ended up 5-1 for the Habs.

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Price was himself. Accurately picked as first star of the game. Stopped everything put at him except the double deflection.

Eller was good , he will have better games coming up. Big year for him.

Chuck looked good at center winning 70% of draws. Great shot.

D was average although PK picked up three assists. Nate has it tough playing with Gilbert.

Loafs are and AHL team with some cast off vets added from around the NHL.

Gallagher and Pleks don't seem like a fit on same line. Max will score no matter who he plays with.

2nd request - Please check your PM's. Clearly you saw the first one since you've posted after the first request was made.

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Guest Stogey24

I definitely don't share the common opinion in here about the Habs being outplayed badly.

Hell, I don't even think we were outplayed at all.

We hit what, 2-3 posts + scored a goal that could have been a good goal last season.

Could have ended up 5-1 for the Habs.

Because a team hits a couple posts, doesn't mean they weren't out played( which they were).
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Because a team hits a couple posts, doesn't mean they weren't out played( which they were).

This is splitting hairs, but did anyone else actually feel like Toronto had "scoring chances" or did they just feel Toronto held possession?

Every time we got into their zone it felt like a scoring chance. Every time they got in our zone, none of the shots were threatening. Price made what looked like some great saves but watching the replay he just had to keep his pads on the ice. They only lifted shots near the blue line and every in scoring position was on the ice.

We can't play like this against every team in the NHL but I just feel wrong saying they outplayed us because they had the puck way more than we did when nothing they did with the puck was a threat. JVR is a talented guy but his goal was a pinball against skates or else Price would have tracked it. I never felt for a second we were going to lose. Merely we weren't dominating.

In the end, yes we were "outplayed", but I don't blame Joe for feeling like the Habs could have ended the game at any time while Toronto was fighting for their lives.

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This is splitting hairs, but did anyone else actually feel like Toronto had "scoring chances" or did they just feel Toronto held possession?

I thought they had quite a few chances, especially when they were swarming the net (an area the Habs did not do well protecting). Any time there's a bunch of people in the slot with the puck in the vicinity, I consider those at least 'decent' chances when the Leafs put the puck towards the net as there are more screens to fight through and more chances for redirections.

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I thought they had quite a few chances, especially when they were swarming the net (an area the Habs did not do well protecting). Any time there's a bunch of people in the slot with the puck in the vicinity, I consider those at least 'decent' chances when the Leafs put the puck towards the net as there are more screens to fight through and more chances for redirections.

Habs need to certainly minimize traffic in the crease and the slot. Letting a leaf sit in front of Price during the PK was awful. But I never felt worried. Leafs just don't have the firepower aside from Kadri and JVR.

As for possession vs. posts, it's all important. You need scoring chances with possession for the best chance to win the game.

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I think people are forgetting that Price made some real Grade-A stops on golden opportunities by the Leafs. Puck possession isn't the whole story and the Habs were certainly more opportunistic than TO, but I'm pretty sure that overall quality scoring chances favoured the bad guys. We need to play better - especially when it comes to moving the puck out of our zone. Beaulieu and Gilbert, I'm looking at YOU.

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In terms of zone time and possession the leafs dominated but the Habs had the more and better scoring chances. Take from that what you will. Result is the important thing.

On another note, it didn't take long for Lucic to start gooning it up in L.A. Poor baby got checked, legally mind you, and he threw a tantrum and tried to decapitate the guy and got thrown out of the game. It was a hit to the head and may get him a suspension. I'm going to miss him on the booins, he was so easy to goad into taking stupid penalties

Edited by Habs owned the 70's
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