A Winning Habit
Fansided

Four April Fools-ish aspects of the Montreal Canadiens season

By Omar L

OTTAWA, ON - DECEMBER 15: Brendan Gallagher #11 and Artturi Lehkonen #62 of the Montreal Canadiens share a laugh during practice at Lansdowne Park on December 15, 2017 in Ottawa, Canada. (Photo by Jana Chytilova/Getty Images/Freestyle Photo)
OTTAWA, ON - DECEMBER 15: Brendan Gallagher #11 and Artturi Lehkonen #62 of the Montreal Canadiens share a laugh during practice at Lansdowne Park on December 15, 2017 in Ottawa, Canada. (Photo by Jana Chytilova/Getty Images/Freestyle Photo) /
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Montreal Canadiens
MONTREAL, QC – NOVEMBER 26: Montreal Canadiens (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images) /

It Didn’t Work Out

The Montreal Canadiens were in desperate need of a reliable backup ahead of the 2019-20 season. Antti Niemi worked out to be a solid option after the Habs picked him up off of waivers from the Florida Panthers two years previously as he was able to hold down the fort in favour of an injured and struggling Carey Price. Statistically, Niemi was the better of the two (later three) goaltenders.

That ended the year after as the Montreal Canadiens couldn’t get a win out of Niemi. It got to the point where Claude Julien ran Price heavily down the stretch, even playing him in back-to-back situations to get the team into the playoffs.

Heading into the summer of 2019, the Habs needed a backup goaltender they could rely on. Not just someone to play on the second-half of back-to-backs, but a goalie they could go to at any time so Price’s workload wouldn’t be too overwhelming. Enter Keith Kinkaid.

The Habs signed Kinkaid to a one-year $1.75 million deal. The 30-year-old had a lot of success with the New Jersey Devils the year they made the playoffs, but it didn’t go too well the next year falling from a .913 Sv% with 26 wins to .891 Sv% with 15 wins in the same amount of games.

Kinkaid was a supportive teammate, especially on Twitter, but the results just weren’t there.

https://twitter.com/Blockaid1/status/1191935036678909953

The backup had only a single win in six games with only one of them resulting in save percentage over .900 (.907). However, he was able to get the Montreal Canadiens points as three of those five losses came in overtime.

At the same time, it wasn’t as if Kinkaid was horrendous. He did make some quality saves for the team bailing them out when the defence looked like swiss cheese. The problem was that the coaching staff lost confidence in him, and he was sent down to the minors in favour of Cayden Primeau.

Things didn’t turn around too much in the AHL for Kinkaid as he went 3-7-3 with a .879 Sv%. Charlie Lindgren was performing better while Primeau stole the show.

Many were hoping Kinkaid could be the best backup the Montreal Canadiens have had in years. April Fools.

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