Post-Game Talk: Habs win 3-1! Going into the break with a big W!

[VirginiaMtlExpat]

Missed the first, but by the sounds of it we were soundly trounced. I thought we had the better of things in the second. And in the third we played a safe game, like you say, keeping shots to the outside, making Price's job easy.

Remember when we couldn't hold a lead to save our lives? We've certainly improved in this department. Combine that with our ability to come from behind and things are looking pretty bright.

Yeah, corsi doesn't tell the whole story here. But, again, it's really only a statistic that tells a story in the long run. Still, this isn't true for all teams: the Ducks have done well and the Devils not so well in the past despite what their possession numbers would predict, and Minny this year has some fantastic possession numbers but they aren't translating into wins.

Great post. It's useful to re-examine these stats in this context. What that in mind, some success comes down to goaltending... and luck.

 

[JAVO16]

It kept making me think of N8 teh Gr8 as Indy's asian sidekick or something. Boy Low. It was definitely the worst but not the first butchering of his name I've heard... took me a bit to get the hang of it myself though honestly back in the day.

Oh boy, I just started laughing at the worst possible moment after reading your post.

 

[Pricef*]

Cuts both ways though... we haven't played nearly as well as our record indicates either. We won another game we shouldn't have tonight.

I'm surprised too because I thought we'd come out strong.

That's funny because the same can be said about the Laffs. Their Corsi numbers are horrible and worse than ours.

 

[Natey]

Sekac has played 2 bad shifts the whole season and you say he deserved it?

What about giving him a chance to redeem his mistakes by not sitting him instead of trashing him.

DD defender, sekac hater. You're the anti-me.

DD is getting it now though. He shoots more.

This is way I hate about this forum. Say one bad thing, and you're labeled. I ****ing love Sekac. But it was a whole night of bad. If he's on the 4th line next game that'll be frustrating though.

 

[Pricef*]

I'm seriously amazed that you guys don't understand that MT made those changes to salvage the damn game. As much as I like Sekac, he was playing like **** and deserved to be demoted. He'll go back on his line after Christmas as Weise and Prust can't play on a second line permanently. That said, they stepped up to the plate and gave good puck possesion shifts with Pleky and were there for the first goal.

MT made an adjustment and it paid off. Find something else to complain about the man.

"Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated"

 

[Habsawce]

That's funny because the same can be said about the Laffs. Their Corsi numbers are horrible and worse than ours.

At least Montreal doesn't have a history of collapsing down the stretch. While the possession stats are showing that this is a mirage and they're going to struggle, they are trending better with last game being more of an anomaly.

We'll see though. Wouldn't surprise me to see a collapse and finish in the wild card.

 

[Smokey Thompson]

This is way I hate about this forum. Say one bad thing, and you're labeled. I ****ing love Sekac. But it was a whole night of bad. If he's on the 4th line next game that'll be frustrating though.

He had a bad night, especially in the turn over department. Therrien made the switch to give his team a better chance at winning and it paid off.

Sekac will be back in the top 6 next game. Although personally I prefer him with Eller rather than Plek.

 

[Cole Caulifield]

Top 5 is Quick, Lundqvist, Rinne, Price and Rask. Interchange them to personal preference but that's the top 5 and its not debatable IMO.

Rinne is the best goalie in the league this season though. His numbers in both regular and advanced goalie statistics are insane.

Definitely agree with this.

Has faced more shots than anyone since 2011
Top five in save percentage over that time on some bad teams
Number one in save percentage of all goalies since last season with min. 55 games played.
Number one in GPS of all goalies since last season with min. 55 games played.
Gold medal winner 2014

Not sure how this guy "lacks any achievement" to warrant being called the best goalie in the league.

Stats aren't really achievements. The only achievement you listed on there is the gold medal. I am not going to diminish the value of that medal, but Canada was head and shoulder above the rest of the competition and was expected to win. Price was still flawless on the few shots he faced and deserves credit for that. But it doesn't mean anything about being the best in the NHL.

Also, number of shots faced is not an indication of the quality of the goaltender, just that he might have a tougher job. Number of shots per game average would be more meaningful, because this mostly means Price has played a lot of games and not been injured much in the regular season.

I should've said if not the best then a top 3 goalie, although in my opinion he is the best.

If you truly believed in Vezina winners / nominations, than you would've mentioned Bob or Varlamov or Bishop. Tuuka won it last year and is an elite goaltender, but he's not quite on Carey's level and if Price were a Bruin he would've easily won it.

I don't believe Quick is an elite goaltender, but more of a really good athletic goaltender who steps it up in the playoffs. Although he is a top 5 goaltender.

Henrik is obviously an elite goaltender, but in my opinion has taken a step back and would be a #2 or 3 behind Carey / Rinne.

You say he has no Cups to show for his greatness, but name me 1 recent Stanley Cup winner who is better than Carey or who you'd rather have than Carey.

I mostly just took issue with the way you said it I guess. But I don't really have a problem with what you said in the above quote.

BTW, the Vezina and Cup thing is a way to measure the players. Rinne, Lundqvist, Quick and Rask are considered to be amongst the top 5 like WTK said. I'd agree with this. They all have either a vezina win, or a cup win, or nomination for the vezina on top of better career numbers than Price. It's not that you're automatically great if you win a cup, or win a vezina. But if you're the best, it tends to eventually translates into tangible achievements. If you look back in the past, no goalie will ever be called best goalie of his era without a vezina or cup win.

And I think the best way to rank goalies would probably be to tally the vezina votes and award 3 pts for 1st, 2 pts for 2nd, and 1 pt for 3rd. Go back 5 years, and make an average per year (only count season of more than 41 games) in order to eliminate injuries and other weird cases. I'd be interested to see this result but too lazy at the moment to do it. I'd imagine Lundqvist would win easily.

 

[Tyson]

i hope the Montreal nightlife does not do Sekac in.....he looked bad last night, really bad.

 

[Tyson]

Definitely agree with this.



Stats aren't really achievements. The only achievement you listed on there is the gold medal. I am not going to diminish the value of that medal, but Canada was head and shoulder above the rest of the competition and was expected to win. Price was still flawless on the few shots he faced and deserves credit for that. But it doesn't mean anything about being the best in the NHL.

Also, number of shots faced is not an indication of the quality of the goaltender, just that he might have a tougher job. Number of shots per game average would be more meaningful, because this mostly means Price has played a lot of games and not been injured much in the regular season.



I mostly just took issue with the way you said it I guess. But I don't really have a problem with what you said in the above quote.

BTW, the Vezina and Cup thing is a way to measure the players. Rinne, Lundqvist, Quick and Rask are considered to be amongst the top 5 like WTK said. I'd agree with this. They all have either a vezina win, or a cup win, or nomination for the vezina on top of better career numbers than Price. It's not that you're automatically great if you win a cup, or win a vezina. But if you're the best, it tends to eventually translates into tangible achievements. If you look back in the past, no goalie will ever be called best goalie of his era without a vezina or cup win.

And I think the best way to rank goalies would probably be to tally the vezina votes and award 3 pts for 1st, 2 pts for 2nd, and 1 pt for 3rd. Go back 5 years, and make an average per year (only count season of more than 41 games) in order to eliminate injuries and other weird cases. I'd be interested to see this result but too lazy at the moment to do it. I'd imagine Lundqvist would win easily.

I think Rask is by far the most overrated goalie in the NHL.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

Stats aren't really achievements. The only achievement you listed on there is the gold medal. I am not going to diminish the value of that medal, but Canada was head and shoulder above the rest of the competition and was expected to win. Price was still flawless on the few shots he faced and deserves credit for that. But it doesn't mean anything about being the best in the NHL.

Also, number of shots faced is not an indication of the quality of the goaltender, just that he might have a tougher job. Number of shots per game average would be more meaningful, because this mostly means Price has played a lot of games and not been injured much in the regular season.

So having the highest save percentage of any goalie over the last two seasons isn't an achievement?

?????

Dude, I'll happily take a guy who's consistently good and wins zero Vezinas over a one hit wonder who's great one year and disappears the next. As for shots against not being worth anything... that would be true on it's own. But when you factor in the number of shots and his save percentage, it's damn impressive. Its not just that the guy has great numbers, its that he has great numbers on some very bad teams over that time and has faced more shots than anyone.

Price won gold last year, led a team who shouldn't have been in the playoffs to a 100 point season, won two playoff series (one against a heavily favoured opponent where we should've lost early on) and has the best save percentage and GPI of any goalie over the last two years. Other than not getting knocked out in the playoffs I'm not sure what more you can ask of this guy. He absolutely has a case for being the best goalie in the game.

 

[Habs Icing]

How is that possible when he has never even been nominated for a Vezina, or any other trophies or won a cup ?

Price is good no doubt, but that's an exaggeration. Rinne is doing better this year than Price, has been nominated for the vezina twice and has better career stats than Price.

Not to mention Quick, Lundqvist, etc.

I wouldn't bat an eye if someone said : Price might be the best goalie. But "We have the best goalie in the league"... that's too definitive for someone who lacks any achievement to prove it.

I was gung ho about price at the beginning, lukewarm a few years back but as of last year I'm back on the bandwagon. He has played as one of the top 3 goalies in the world. Right now, there are only two goalies that COULD be considered better than Price: Quick & Rinnie. That's it and an argument could be made that they're not better than Price right now.

 

[Habs Icing]

Price....led a team who shouldn't have been in the playoffs to a 100 point season....

You're being inconsistent. In a discussion where you were dissing Therrien you claimed that this Habs team was the best team in the East and one of the best in the league.

So tell me what changed from last year's team to this one? The addition of Allen? Weaver? Gonchar? Sekac? Gilbert?

Or do you just ignore facts & exaggerate to make your point?

 

[vokiel]

Switch Eller and Desharnais. That would be a terrific second line.

And FFS move Eller to the right wing and tell him to attack/shoot instead of trying to be a play maker all the time.

 

[JAVO16]

I watched the game on pvr...knew the Habs won 3-1..and also "knew" by the post game thread that apparently DD played great. I watched him dog it on the Habs only goal against. I watched him play mediocre for 2 1/2 periods, climaxed by his icing of the puck with the score 2-1 that caused MT to take his timeout. But..lo and behold..he redirects a pass from Eller to make the score 3-1 late...and he was great.

Not sure why he was even brought up tonight. As noted, just one of many mediocre players for the Habs tonight.

You watched him dog it ? He was coming back covering his man (the opposing left defenseman) and Gonchar seemed to be in control of the situation as with regards to his coverage of Okposo until Emelin decided to go for a boneheaded pinch at our blueline which ended up with him colliding with Andrighetto and leaving Tavares in a 2-vs-1 situation. Are you confusing DD with Andrighetto on the play ? Because DD was doing his job which is to take out the trailing defenseman. Also, icing the puck ? Mostly everyone did that. It seems like the modus operandi for the game was to ice it when you can. Subban and the rest of the defense group did it countless times, Eller too, etc. Would expect better game analysis from you, Grant.

Our defensive zone coverage was worse than mediocre tonight though. Everyone was getting mixed up and we were constantly loosing advantageous body positioning (I'm looking at Emelin in particular here). Not sure if this is on Therrien or the players just executing the defensive scheme really badly. Probably the later with Therrien not preparing them well enough for the Islander's particular style of offense.

Also, man is JT good. The guy is just so great at drawing his coverage tight to help free up a teammate and dish it to him in the O zone. Love seeing a great hockey mind like that at work. He's just one step ahead of everyone in a way we rarely see anymore in this age of faster=better style of hockey.

 

[Cole Caulifield]

I was gung ho about price at the beginning, lukewarm a few years back but as of last year I'm back on the bandwagon. He has played as one of the top 3-4 goalies in the world. Right now, there are only two goalies that COULD be considered better than Price: Quick & Rinnie. That's it and an argument could be made that they're not better than Price right now.

See, I don't have a problem with what you said there. It has a bit more flexibility than the initial post I responded to. You can say that Price is probably top 5, probably 3, might be the best, etc. But he simply doesn't have the achievements to categorically call him the best. At least, in my book, you need to do more than that to be unequivocally the best.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

You're being inconsistent. In a discussion where you were dissing Therrien you claimed that this Habs team was the best team in the East and one of the best in the league.

So tell me what changed from last year's team to this one? The addition of Allen? Weaver? Gonchar? Sekac? Gilbert?

Or do you just ignore facts & exaggerate to make your point?

I'm not being inconsistent at all.

We have a great roster and we've underperformed. We did not play well last year and we haven't played well this year. I blame the coach for this. What is it that you don't understand?

 

[Cole Caulifield]

I think Rask is by far the most overrated goalie in the NHL.

Against us he's certainly not very impressive.

 

[JAVO16]

I'm not being inconsistent at all.

We have a great roster and we've underperformed. We did not play well last year and we haven't played well this year. I blame the coach for this. What is it that you don't understand?

To me, you're only managing to look like someone with unrealistic expectations, but keep on fighting, you dreamer, you.

 

[Jigger77]

But but but, we didn't play well in one road game against a hot team... Be right back cutting myself.

Who cares about beating one of the hottest teams right now at home. We dropped a few percentiles in the bid to win the Corsi trophy!

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

To me, you're only managing to look like someone with unrealistic expectations, but keep on fighting, you dreamer, you.

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no puck possession
I wonder if you can
No need for statistics or analytics
Just like Southernhabfan
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

 

[Ohashi_Jouzu*]

I think Rask is by far the most overrated goalie in the NHL.

More than, say, Anderson or Miller?

 

[JAVO16]

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no puck possession
I wonder if you can
No need for statistics or analytics
Just like Southernhabfan
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

Well done

Dreamer, you know you are a dreamer
Well can you put your shots in their net, oh no!
I said dreamer, you're nothing but a dreamer
Well can you keep their shots off your net, oh no!
I said "Far out, what a game, a season, a team it is!"
You know, well you know your Corsi% had it comin' to you,
Now there's not a lot Price can do

Edit: I'm trying at least

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

Well done

Dreamer, you know you are a dreamer
Well can you put your shots in their net, oh no!
I said dreamer, you're nothing but a dreamer
Well can you keep their shots off your net, oh no!
I said "Far out, what a game, a season, a team it is!"
You know, well you know you Corsi% had it comin' to you,
Now there's not a lot Price can do

Edit: I'm trying at least

You did well.

Merry Christmas!

 

[JAVO16]

You did well.

Merry Christmas!

Thanks. And a Merry Christmas to you too.