The Montreal Canadiens are heading back on the road to take on the Florida Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning, but they’ll have to do it without Carey Price.
The holiday break is over, and the Montreal Canadiens got back to practicing in Brossard Thursday morning. Brendan Gallagher and Andrew Shaw weren’t there but Karl Alzner, recently recalled from the Laval Rocket, and Joel Armia were. That was a positive bit news to have Armia practicing with the Habs again, but it was followed with some news on Carey Price.
Montreal will be without their starting goaltender for the Florida road trip. Something was coming after Price left practice early and Claude Julien let reporters know afterwards while the team’s Twitter account made it official, it’s a lower-body injury that is keeping Price back in Montreal.
The 31-year-old missed time from the team last season as well. Price was out for a lower-body injury, unrelated to the knee issue that shut him down in 2016, and a concussion in the new year. There hasn’t been any detail on the extent of this ailment, but all we know is the Montreal Canadiens are going to be without Price for some time.
Antti Niemi should be plunged into the pseudo-starter role again while management likely calls up Michael McNiven. Charlie Lindgren would be the likely candidate, but he is still recovering from an injury of his own.
There shouldn’t be much cause for concern. Niemi has provided the Montreal Canadiens with steady goaltending ever since he was claimed off the waiver wire last season. He played 18 games for the team back then and is already sitting on 8. However, the games haven’t looked as pretty as Niemi has a .876 save percentage and 4.14 goals against average.
By no means is this the end for the Habs. They need to continue to build off the positives from the last week and keep the wins going.
Montreal is still in the second wild-card spot with a 19-13-5 record (43 points). They can survive without Price for a bit. That said, the sense of concern should turn up if it’s longer than the team expected.