GDT Jan 23, Habs vs Canucks, 7 PM

[DON]

Romanov 20:46

Petry 19:45

[Sir_Boagalott]

26 minutes ago, Helmethead said:

Guys, I know it's early...

 

But this team is LEGIT

 

Exactly like you said, its still early but they look legit.  They are doing really well but I'd like to see more consistency in player scoring.  The team is averaging 5 goals a game and that has worked out, so far anyway.   However, players seem to go on scoring streaks.  ex: Toffolli 5 g in 2 games.  It seems like the Habs could have scored those 30 goals in 3 games and have a 3-3 record.  That streakiness could end up being problematic in the long term. 

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

Just now, Sir_Boagalott said:

 

Exactly like you said, its still early but they look legit.  They are doing really well but I'd like to see more consistency in player scoring.  So far the team is averaging 5 goals a game and that has worked out, so far anyway.   However, players seem to go on scoring streaks.  ex: Toffolli 5 g in 2 games.  It seems like the Habs could have scored those 30 goals in 3 games and have a 3-3 record.  That streakiness could end up being problematic in the long term. 

 

It’s a fair point, but the word which keeps coming up is depth. Julien just rolls four lines with minimal thought to matchups, which is really saying something. How this relates to streaks is that when one player goes cold, we have a lot of other guys who have the capacity to step up. This isn’t like crossing our fingers that Patches gets hot and that Drouin scores his annual goal on a particular night. We can score up and down the lineup.

[Habs Fan in Edmonton]

1 hour ago, Habsfan89 said:

The more I watch Evans the more impressive I am with him. He's going to be a very good checking center in this league.

 

Absolutely!!  I have been so impressed by Evans. Not bad for a guy taken 207th in the draft (only 210 guys were drafted). Obviously a guy who had to work for everything he's got.  Goes to show that a little time in the minors is a good thing. 

[Sir_Boagalott]

9 minutes ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

 

It’s a fair point, but the word which keeps coming up is depth. Julien just rolls four lines with minimal thought to matchups, which is really saying something. How this relates to streaks is that when one player goes cold, we have a lot of other guys who have the capacity to step up. This isn’t like crossing our fingers that Patches gets hot and that Drouin scores his annual goal on a particular night. We can score up and down the lineup.

 

They definitely have the depth that 1 player has stepped up every game and been the hero.  Having the depth to score up and down in the lineup is irrelevant if they all get hot in the same game.  The current scoring trend doesn't prevent numerous players having multiple goal games in the same game.  We might just be lucky that scenario hasn't happened yet. 

[tomh009]

9 minutes ago, Sir_Boagalott said:

 

They definitely have the depth that 1 player has stepped up every game and been the hero.  Having the depth to score up and down in the lineup is irrelevant if they all get hot in the same game.  The current scoring trend doesn't prevent numerous players having multiple goal games in the same game.  We might just be lucky that scenario hasn't happened yet. 

Yes. But. The likelihood of everyone going hot (or cold) at the same time is minuscule.

[DON]

Danault has just 2 shots in 6 gms, no wonder he hasnt scored yet.

Fewest on the team, even Perry has 4.

[Habsfan]

God damn!!  I'm lovin' what i'm seeing from this team! I'm well aware that Vancouver and Edmonton aren't powerhouses, but the way we dominated them was impressive! 

 

1 hour ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

I wonder if the Dollar Bill division will really split into two: Leafs, Habs, Flames...then the rest. It’s possible.

Agreed, I think it'll be MTL, TOR and CAL at the top of the divison once the season ends!

[Neech]

23 minutes ago, DON said:

Danault has just 2 shots in 6 gms, no wonder he hasnt scored yet.

Fewest on the team, even Perry has 4.

 

Pretty amazing that only Danault and Byron haven't scored out of all the skaters who have dressed through six games.

[dlbalr]

1 hour ago, GHT120 said:

Evans to the dressing room ... hope its equipment not injury

 

Neither - he got a misconduct penalty (so did Pearson).

 

My first 3 Stars/Recap column of the season: https://www.habsworld.net/2021/01/habs-take-two-of-three-in-vancouver/

[Commandant]

5 hours ago, Trizzak said:

Not sure why Perry is 3rd line LW. Just bring Lehkonen up there, and move Toffoli to the right side. Play Byron on the left with Evans and Perry with sheltered minutes since Byron is injured and Perry is rusty.

 

We have scored 29 goals in 6 games (24 in 5 coming into the game)..... With averaging nearly 5 goals a game, maybe we can trust Julien's combos for a bit?

[Commandant]

3 hours ago, Sir_Boagalott said:

 

I was sort of joking Danault is really good defensively but my issue with him is that he isnt offensive enough.  Plex was great defensively but was also a scoring threat.  The Habs need somebody that can shut down other teams top lines and average 25g/year.  Danault will never score that amount.   Like I said it looks like Suzuki will be beyond that this year.  Its like he fills a hole from the 80's & 70's. 

 

I sure hope Danault doesnt get by a Weber slapper and miss a bunch of games.  I'm sure nobody wants to see Tatar-Evans-Gally line and really get to see what that line could do.  Imagine if Evans could be in the top 11? 

 

1) You just wished injury on one of our players

 

2) You ignored the fact that Danault was top 15 in the NHL amongst centres for 5v5 points and 5v5 points/60, and xGf% and think that Evans is going to be an improvement on that. Silliness

 

But Most Importantly you wished injury on a player.... Which i'm sorry, but that's ####ing stupid.  

 

 

 

 

[hab29RETIRED]

3 hours ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

 

It’s a fair point, but the word which keeps coming up is depth. Julien just rolls four lines with minimal thought to matchups, which is really saying something. How this relates to streaks is that when one player goes cold, we have a lot of other guys who have the capacity to step up. This isn’t like crossing our fingers that Patches gets hot and that Drouin scores his annual goal on a particular night. We can score up and down the lineup.

Yep, we have the type of depth we haven’t seen since 93. While 5 goals a game isn’t sustainable - unless there’s a systematic return to 80’s firewagon hockey across the league, and we don’t have 3 90 point a game rate guys, we do have 4 lines that can contribute. Byron is no longer on the 2nd, or even the 3rd line.  We aren’t making deals for Jeff Scott and Steve Ott, or signing Prust (which for some reason as seen as a big coup).  We also have temper expectations of being able to score at the same rate against teams that don’t have a big chunk of their D depleted.

Having said that, one of the reasons for even more optimism, is that as great as Suzuki has been I don’t think we’ve even come close to his full offensive potential yet. He’s been a solid and complete player, but until I read about it today, I didn’t realize his points steak. Unlike Armia or Taffoli, he hasn’t any game where he put up huge numbers, but just keeps chipping in every night. We also haven’t seen KK step up yet. If those two really break out, our offence will be even better.
 

what does have me worried is the defence and the propensity for dumb penalties and building a rep as a team that takes a lot of penalties.  Refs will just call penalties based on rep.

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

9 hours ago, hab29RETIRED said:

Yep, we have the type of depth we haven’t seen since 93. While 5 goals a game isn’t sustainable - unless there’s a systematic return to 80’s firewagon hockey across the league, and we don’t have 3 90 point a game rate guys, we do have 4 lines that can contribute. Byron is no longer on the 2nd, or even the 3rd line.  We aren’t making deals for Jeff Scott and Steve Ott, or signing Prust (which for some reason as seen as a big coup).  We also have temper expectations of being able to score at the same rate against teams that don’t have a big chunk of their D depleted.

Having said that, one of the reasons for even more optimism, is that as great as Suzuki has been I don’t think we’ve even come close to his full offensive potential yet. He’s been a solid and complete player, but until I read about it today, I didn’t realize his points steak. Unlike Armia or Taffoli, he hasn’t any game where he put up huge numbers, but just keeps chipping in every night. We also haven’t seen KK step up yet. If those two really break out, our offence will be even better.
 

what does have me worried is the defence and the propensity for dumb penalties and building a rep as a team that takes a lot of penalties.  Refs will just call penalties based on rep.

 

I agree - although if Suzuki and KK “really break out,” as you say, it’s possible that other guys will regress. That is, it’s not as though Armia or Toffoli are going to be multi-point players every night and are just waiting for those two to step it up another level. So it’s wrong to imagine an explosion by KK or Slick Nick *adding* to what we’re already doing. Rather that explosion would be part of the “turn taking” dynamic of a really balanced offensive squad. That gets to what I was saying about depth. On any given night, any one of our lines can do the damage.

 

I actually think this team might have better FW depth than the ‘93 team. It feels like tempting fate to say that, but objectively, it might be true.

 

You are 100% right about the traps that lie in wait. The dumb penalty thing is obvious. But what I did not see convincingly on this trip was a team that can look the game down defensively, with consistency. We did it in the second game against EDM, but apart from that, it was more about our offence getting us out of jams than our D clamping down and sucking the life out of the opponent. A truly strong team - a contender, like the 1993 team - will have that capacity to impose its will defensively.

 

I believe this group has the capacity to do that. We saw it in The Bubble last year. It’s something we have 50 games to work on and, barring catastrophic injury, I’m fairly confident we’ll get there. It may take some tough losses to top teams, though, to really impress upon this group how imperative it is.

[tomh009]

Yes, I think we have the talent for effective, disciplined defence. That part is really up to Julien. With a short camp and no pre-season, I can understand why the D is not clicking yet. But I do believe it will improve yet.

[Trizzak]

11 hours ago, Commandant said:

We have scored 29 goals in 6 games (24 in 5 coming into the game)..... With averaging nearly 5 goals a game, maybe we can trust Julien's combos for a bit?

Perry has played RW exclusively his entire time in the NHL. Forgive me for questioning the choice of playing a career RW and LW on their off sides instead of sheltering someone who is rusty and a guy who took a Weber slapshot to the ankle with limited minutes.

 

Moving forward I'll try to get Claude to approve my posts on this forum before I submit them. 

[alfredoh2009]

I was really happy to see Gallagher scored the winner. The Danault line has been good against the other team's best lines but they are not the team's scoring threat I expected:

Tatar 3g 3a

Gallagher 2g 2a

Danault 0g 3a

 

Maybe 5g in 6 games is what should be expected, an indication of the team's evenly distributed scoring punch

[GHT120]

11 hours ago, Commandant said:

1) You just wished injury on one of our players

 

2) You ignored the fact that Danault was top 15 in the NHL amongst centres for 5v5 points and 5v5 points/60, and xGf% and think that Evans is going to be an improvement on that. Silliness

 

But Most Importantly you wished injury on a player.... Which i'm sorry, but that's ####ing stupid.  

 

Didn't read anything as wishing an injury ... but people can interpret things differently

 

While stats are stats, the question in my mind has long been whether Danault could have generated similar numbers with different wingers ... until this season Gallagher and Tartar were by far the Habs best wingers ... since 18/19 Danault is 6th in assists per 60 minutes, and 106th in goals per 60 minutes ... IMO the wingers made the centre ... but I accept that you disagree

[xXx..CK..xXx]

1 hour ago, Trizzak said:

Perry has played RW exclusively his entire time in the NHL. Forgive me for questioning the choice of playing a career RW and LW on their off sides instead of sheltering someone who is rusty and a guy who took a Weber slapshot to the ankle with limited minutes.

 

Moving forward I'll try to get Claude to approve my posts on this forum before I submit them. 

Where did you see that Perry played left wing? Any instance that I can remember seeing him in the offensive zone, it was on the right side of the ice, and anything I read stated that he was “replacing Armia to the right of Toffoli and Kotkaniemi”.

 

Toffoli has also been doing great coming in on the rush on his off wing, so no need to give that a change. 
 

I don’t think that it was a mistake playing Perry on the 3rd line rather than Lehkonen. He has more offensive upside, and we kept everything else intact.

[alfredoh2009]

26 minutes ago, GHT120 said:

 

Didn't read anything as wishing an injury ... but people can interpret things differently

 

While stats are stats, the question in my mind has long been whether Danault could have generated similar numbers with different wingers ... until this season Gallagher and Tartar were by far the Habs best wingers ... since 18/19 Danault is 6th in assists per 60 minutes, and 106th in goals per 60 minutes ... IMO the wingers made the centre ... but I accept that you disagree

 

I think that starting with the puck 6 times out of 10 would help the wingers produce more than if they were playing with KK who is below at 45%, sometimes worse than that.

 

The Tatar line has been producing at a steady pace, at 0.83 goals per game. That is really good, a 68 goal pace on an 82  game season. That is better than last season ( 57 goals for the line, 0.69 goals-per-game)

 

[xXx..CK..xXx]

I’ve seen one website show that Perry played on the left wing, and another that he played on the right wing. I don’t specifically remember seeing where Perry lined up during a faceoff, but remember plenty of action of his in the offensive zone on the right wing.

 

I have also come across an article stating that he was going to line up to the right of Kotkaniemi and Toffoli in Armia’s spot.

 

Even though I watched the match, is there any confirmation as to where he was playing? Because I would have assumed he was playing right wing. 

[Habsfan]

10 minutes ago, alfredoh2009 said:

I think that starting with the puck 6 times out of 10 would help the wingers produce more than if they were playing with KK who is below at 45%

Actually, I just checked the numbers and KK is at 47.5%.

Suzuki and Evans are at 44% and Danault is at 52%.

Unfortunately, winning face offs is a skill that takes time to master. We might have to wait a few more years before Suze and KK can regularly win 50%+ of their face offs!

[alfredoh2009]

4 minutes ago, Habsfan said:

Actually, I just checked the numbers and KK is at 47.5%.

Suzuki and Evans are at 44% and Danault is at 52%.

Unfortunately, winning face offs is a skill that takes time to master. We might have to wait a few more years before Suze and KK can regularly win 50%+ of their face offs!

Last year KK finished at 42.8% in the regular season and had only 33.8% in the post-season. This season,  game-to-game he has had:

(1/9) 11.1%, (6/13) 46.2%, (6/9) 66.7%, (8/10) 80.0%, (5/8) 62.5%, (2/10) 20%

 

So, yes he is at 47% now, but he is usually well below 50%

[Commandant]

3 hours ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

 

I agree - although if Suzuki and KK “really break out,” as you say, it’s possible that other guys will regress. That is, it’s not as though Armia or Toffoli are going to be multi-point players every night and are just waiting for those two to step it up another level. So it’s wrong to imagine an explosion by KK or Slick Nick *adding* to what we’re already doing. Rather that explosion would be part of the “turn taking” dynamic of a really balanced offensive squad. That gets to what I was saying about depth. On any given night, any one of our lines can do the damage.

 

I actually think this team might have better FW depth than the ‘93 team. It feels like tempting fate to say that, but objectively, it might be true.

 

You are 100% right about the traps that lie in wait. The dumb penalty thing is obvious. But what I did not see convincingly on this trip was a team that can look the game down defensively, with consistency. We did it in the second game against EDM, but apart from that, it was more about our offence getting us out of jams than our D clamping down and sucking the life out of the opponent. A truly strong team - a contender, like the 1993 team - will have that capacity to impose its will defensively.

 

I believe this group has the capacity to do that. We saw it in The Bubble last year. It’s something we have 50 games to work on and, barring catastrophic injury, I’m fairly confident we’ll get there. It may take some tough losses to top teams, though, to really impress upon this group how imperative it is.

 

We have 29 goals in 6 games... almost 5 a game.  We aren't the 80s oilers, and the game isn't played the way it was in the 80s. 

 

To say this level of offense is unsustainable for a full season isn't rocket science.  Its just natural. 

[Commandant]

1 hour ago, GHT120 said:

 

Didn't read anything as wishing an injury ... but people can interpret things differently

 

While stats are stats, the question in my mind has long been whether Danault could have generated similar numbers with different wingers ... until this season Gallagher and Tartar were by far the Habs best wingers ... since 18/19 Danault is 6th in assists per 60 minutes, and 106th in goals per 60 minutes ... IMO the wingers made the centre ... but I accept that you disagree

 

There were two posts where he wished Danault got hit with a Weber slapshot and missed time so Evans could have more opportunity. 

 

And I've always looked at assists as being just as valuable as goals.  The guy has the same Pts/60 at ES as a number of other first line centres,  guys who also play with the best wingers on their team, so playing with good wingers is not the reason he's putting up the same points as those guys. 

His ability to drive the play at both ends of the ice shows up in both the advanced stats, and also shows up when a guy like Nathan MacKinnon is asked the toughest player to play against in the NHL and he says Phil Danault.  His peers certainly respect his ability at both ends, more than fans do.