Patrick Roy was 30 and 58 days when he gave up 9 to Detroit on 26 shots in his last game for the Habs. Holtby is 30 and 146 days, 7 on 25 shots. It’s just the one example I can think of of a guy of Holtby’s juice, where they left him out after he gave up 6. I’ve talked about moving on from Holtby literally the game after The Save at the game to a guy about to buy a Holtby jersey, and leaving him in was cold.
The Patrick Roy situation was quite different - Mario Tremblay had been hired as the Habs coach and (to quote wikipedia):
"Roy and Tremblay, who had roomed together while teammates, had a notably strained relationship, with Tremblay regularly mocking Roy's
English-speaking abilities. Roy was a frequent target of Tremblay during the latter's sports radio career.
[18] The two had almost come to blows in two incidents in 1995, one at a
Long Island coffee shop before Tremblay was announced as a coach and after Tremblay allegedly fired a shot at Roy's throat during practice".
Roy (almost certainly correct) believed that Tremblay left him in goal to humiliate him. That was his last game before being traded to Colorado. He won a Cup with them and was in fact still a very good goalie (Vezina runner up to Jim Carey).
That aside, I agree with you: leaving Holtby in tonight was a baffling decision by Rierden. At 2:58 in the third he allowed his 5th goal and (imo) he should have been pulled then.
I just watched the post game interview with Reirden and he actually said the bad performance tonight "wasn't Holtby's fault". That kind of comment concerns me because yes, his teammates played badly and hung him out to dry
for a number of those goals, but not ALL of those goals and to leave him in, after the 5th one?!? Why the hell would you do that IF you are trying to help a guy play his way back into form and gain confidence? The ONLY logical explanation is that Rierden
was worried that Samsonov would also get shelled and then he'd have TWO goalies losing confidence.
This team certainly has the talent across the entire roster to challenge for another Cup, but I think there are some downright bizarre goings on with the coaching staff. They need to figure out how to motivate the players, they need to get them playing better
defensively, and they need to get that power play scoring goals. Oh, and the goaltending. Figure that out as well, cos Holtby has now reached "inconsistent backup" status. He had a good game against the Kings but the one before that was crap and this one tonight was a shocker.
/rant