A Winning Habit
Fansided

Montreal Canadiens: Taking a Page From the Rangers’ Book

By Omar L

MONTREAL, QC - OCTOBER 28: Members of the Montreal Canadiens acknowledge the fans after defeating the New York Rangers 5-4 during the NHL game at the Bell Centre on October 28, 2017 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
MONTREAL, QC - OCTOBER 28: Members of the Montreal Canadiens acknowledge the fans after defeating the New York Rangers 5-4 during the NHL game at the Bell Centre on October 28, 2017 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images) /
facebooktwitterreddit

The Montreal Canadiens can learn from what the New York Rangers have been able to put together as of late because it’s turned their season around completely.

The 2017-18 NHL regular season is nearly a quarter of the way done. However, there has yet to be a team that has legitimately run away with the league. The Tampa Bay Lightning and the St. Louis Blues are close to that point with the start they’ve had, whereas the Arizona Coyotes may be on the verge of one-upping Colorado’s record from last season. Additionally, teams like our very own Montreal Canadiens are on their way to change how their year’s gone.

Montreal has seven of their last ten games which have raised them from last in the Eastern Conference to the middle of the pack with 17 points. The beauty of it still being November is that a lot of the teams are still relatively bundled up. A solid winning streak can do leaps and bounds for you right now. Take the New York Rangers for example.

The Rangers had a similar start to the Habs where they only had a single win in their first eight games. Everything was going wrong for them. It even got to the point where Alain Vigneault was keeping the head coach hot seat warm for everyone else. It’s been a complete 180 for them as of late considering they’re tied for the second wild-card spot in the east with 20 points.

More from Editorials

How did the heck they do that? Well, a six-game winning streak helps. The Rangers haven’t lost a game since Halloween when they defeated Vegas 6-4. They’ll be looking to make it seven on Wednesday against Chicago.

Although the Montreal Canadiens have been able to put a couple wins together here and there, they haven’t been able to get an actual streak going. The longest stretch they’ve spent in the W column was three games.

Other teams are going to continue to win games as well. If the Habs want to clear some distance, it would be ideal to have a similar streak as the Rangers. Save for Arizona and maybe Buffalo, the upcoming games for Montreal will be challenging. However, it would be huge to strap together some wins against these teams, especially Toronto and Dallas.

At the very least, getting points in any faction would work as well. The Habs are still in that ‘sweet’ spot where another lousy stretch can bring them down to where they were.

They have all the tools to go on a run with Charlie Lindgren and a possible soon to return Carey Price. Additionally, that top line of Jonathan Drouin, Alex Galchenyuk and Artturi Lehkonen is looking better each game.

The Montreal Canadiens already look like they’ve gotten their confidence back from the early season slump, but there’s nothing like a winning streak to get it to reach a new level. They’re already on the right track after beating the Sabres 2-1 in overtime on Saturday. How about strapping on three or four more.

Next: Listening to Habs Twitter

Can the Habs go on a run in these next few games? Let us know your thoughts down below.

Home/Editorials