The Montreal Canadiens were the toast of the hockey world coming into this season. Expectations of both the fans and the organization were sky high. Mats Sundin was coming, Carey Price was entering superstardom, and Alex Kovalev was hitting the peak of his renaissance. The plan was to have it all culminate in a Stanley Cup championship to cap off their 100th anniversary celebration, which to this point, has provided us with nothing cheer about except additional midweek national coverage of NHL games on CBC.
Sundin never showed up, and his replacement, Robert Lang, is out for the season. Carey price has been - dare I say it - absolutely awful for more of the season, and despite being more effective recently, we all know the deal with Kovalev. Since the team can't give everyone two days off to "find themselves" Montreal is stuck in a world of hurt. The way they're going, it is legitimate to assume they may actually miss the playoffs. However, if they do make it, I am almost certain they won't last very long.
Everyone jumped on Bob Gainey's back for not making a splash on deadline day... but hold on a minute... wasn't this team supposed to challenge for the Stanley Cup anyway? What happened to all that early season hype?! The guys playing for Montreal now are the same guys all the analysts envisioned would be playing for them when they dropped the puck in October. What seems to have befallen Montreal is the same problem that has cursed Ottawa: collective over-achievement. In 2007 when the Senators made it to the finals, they got career years out of people like Mike Fisher, Antoine Vermette, Chris Kelly, Andrej Meszaros, and Chris Neil. I know some of them have moved on, but what's clear is that you'll never see any of the aforementioned players produce or compete the way they did two years ago. Which is really frightening considering some of their salaries...
Is it possible that the likes of Tomas Plekanec, Chris Higgins, and the Kostitsyn brothers have already peaked and rescinded back into mediocrity? The Habs better hope not. There's no hope for them this year, or next: have you seen the list of pending UFA's? I guess it was just hype.
1 comment:
Was just reported that Carbo is fired. Press conference tonite at 7pm.
Craziness...I don't know what to think.
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