Take him off our team and McDavid confirmed. But it would be the same with most teams in the league if you took away their best player .. .
Elite teams have great depth, enough to cover for a loss of a star player for a while.
IMO, that is why many of us don't consider the Habs an elite team when you take Price out.
Example, the year Crosby was out, Pitts had the depth with Malkin, Neal and Letang to dominate the league that year in the regular season at least.
Look at Nashville, Rinne was out and they still managed to win a lot of games. Why? Because of their insane defensive depth.
If you were take out Nash from the NYR, they still have Lundqvist, McDonaugh, Stall, St Louis, Kreider, Stepan, Brassard, Hagelin. They have amazing depth all around. Even right now with Lundqvist injured (correct me if I'm wrong), their back up (Talbot or something?) is playing sufficiently well enough for them to compete.
Sure the Habs have good depth, as in a lot of 2nd liners. But they don't
elite depth that
elite teams have.