Montreal Canadiens: Looking Back at Michel Therrien’s Second Stint With Habs

MONTREAL, QC - MAY 6: Michel Therrien of the Montreal Canadiens. (Photo by Francois Laplante/Freestyle Photography/Getty Images)
MONTREAL, QC - MAY 6: Michel Therrien of the Montreal Canadiens. (Photo by Francois Laplante/Freestyle Photography/Getty Images)
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The Montreal Canadiens are facing familiar foes in this playoff series. Let’s look back at Michel Therrien’s time in Montreal.

The Montreal Canadiens have had a number of exceptional men behind the bench of their team over the years. Toe Blake won eight Stanley Cups in 13 seasons. Scotty Bowman guided them to a 60 win season in an 80 game schedule and four consecutive Stanley Cups in the 1970’s.

Pat Burns won a Jack Adams Award while leading the Canadiens to a Stanley Cup Final appearance in 1989. Surprisingly, Burns in 1989 and Bowman in 1977 were the only two coaches to win the coach of the year award while behind the Habs bench.

Still, there have been many great people calling the shots for the Habs. There have also been some not so successful attempts to be the team’s bench boss. Mario Tremblay quickly comes to mind. His team’s won 71 of 159 games with him at the helm and though he was only in town for two seasons, he chased Patrick Roy from town. The legendary Habs goaltender demanded a trade after mistreatment from Tremblay.

Somewhere in between Toe Blake and Mario Tremblay is where current head coach Claude Julien rests. This is his second tour of duty behind the Habs bench, though he is currently home after being hospitalized with chest tightness. In his absence, Kirk Muller has taken over against a couple of familiar foes who are on the Philadelphia Flyers bench.

The Flyers head coach is Alain Vigneault who was just a young fella when he coached the Habs from 1997-2001. He had some decent seasons but the roster was a mess thanks to Tremblay and general manager Rejean Houle shipping every quality veteran out of town for little return.

GLENDALE, AZ – FEBRUARY 09: Michel Therrien of the Montreal Canadiens. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
GLENDALE, AZ – FEBRUARY 09: Michel Therrien of the Montreal Canadiens. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images) /

Therrien took over after disastrous season

An even more compelling character in Habs history is the Flyers current assistant coach, Michel Therrien. He, like Julien, had two stints as Habs coach, and there were no shortage of naysayers and hecklers during his more recent stretch with the Canadiens that ended in 2017.

When Therrien was finally let go, it almost seemed inevitable with all the vitriol fired his way on social media. Watching Therrien on the Philadelphia Flyers bench in this playoff series with the Habs makes one think back to his time in Montreal. It isn’t remembered very fondly thanks to twitter, but was he really that bad?

Therrien took over the Canadiens bench (for the second time) after they suffered through a difficult 2011-12 season. The Habs dealt with a few key injuries that season, but had one line capable of producing offence with David Desharnais, Erik Cole and Max Pacioretty all scoring over 60 points.

The team finished with a 31-35-14 record and cost two men – Jacques Martin and Randy Cunneyworth- their position as head coach. In stepped Therrien for a second time, to try and build a contender out of the 28th placed team in the league.

MONTREAL, QC – JANUARY 14: Head coach of the Montreal Canadiens Michel Therrien. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
MONTREAL, QC – JANUARY 14: Head coach of the Montreal Canadiens Michel Therrien. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images) /

Quick turnaround in Therrien’s first season

Therrien didn’t turn the team into a contender immediately, but they were much improved under his watch. The team went from allowing 2.76 goals against per game to 2.63 in Therrien’s first season. They went from winning 31 of 82 games to being on the right side of 29 in just 48 games during that lockout shortened year.

David Desharnais took a bit of a step back offensively, but Brendan Gallagher and Alex Galchenyuk had great rookie seasons, P.K. Subban immediately turned into a terrific top pairing defender, Max Pacioretty’s two-way game reached a whole new level and veterans like Andrei Markov, Brian Gionta and Tomas Plekanec were pegged perfectly into roles that fit their game.

All of the Habs success at that time was often attributed to Carey Price, but the team went from the worst team in the Eastern Conference to the second best in one season. Price was on both of those teams, but the one with Therrien calling the shots looked a lot better defensively and more organized as a group.

If it was all a fluke, things would have collapsed in 2013-14, but the team was just as good. It was Therrien’s first 82 game season back behind the bench and the team looked sluggish late in the shortened season. Could they keep it up for six months?

Yes. Yes, they could. There was not a lot of flash and star power on this lineup, and it looked pretty similar to the one’s that came before it, but they finished with 100 points in the regular season. Pacioretty led the way with 39 goals, but his supporting cast of Desharnais, Gionta, Gallagher, Plekanec, Daniel Briere, Rene Bourque, Lars Eller and Galchenyuk didn’t provide a ton of firepower.

Again, their defence carried them as only two teams in the Eastern Conference allowed less than the Habs 204 goals against. The biggest “problem” with Therrien among fans at this time was he didn’t play Nathan Beaulieu and Jarred Tinordi enough, instead electing to use veterans like Francis Bouillon and Doug Murray.

It is six years later and the Winnipeg Jets and Nashville Predators are still waiting for Beaulieu and Tinordi to break out.

The Canadiens looked great in the postseason, dispatching the Tampa Bay Lightning in four straight games before outlasting the heavily favoured Boston Bruins in a thrilling Game 7 victory in the second round.

This set up a semi-final matchup with the New York Rangers who were a deep team, but not as strong as the Bruins. The Habs were thrashed in Game 1, but more importantly, lost Price for the rest of the series when Chris Kreider crashed the net. The team that solely relied on Price should have been finished, especially being down 1-0 in the series.

They did lose, but they showed some resolve after losing 3-1 in Game 2 with Dustin Tokarski in goal. The Habs won the next game 3-2 in overtime, before losing Game 4 by the same score on a Martin St. Louis OT winner. Montreal won a wild Game 5 by a 7-4 score before bowing out in Game 6 with a 1-0 heartbreaking loss.

The team that “only” had Carey Price stayed close in a tight series without their main man in goal. They won two of the five games played without Price in net and lost one in overtime and lost the last one 1-0. With a lack of star power and deadline pickup Thomas Vanek not being impactful, you would have to give some credit for that run to the coach.

MONTREAL, QC – JANUARY 19: Head coach of the Montreal Canadiens Michel Therrien. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
MONTREAL, QC – JANUARY 19: Head coach of the Montreal Canadiens Michel Therrien. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images) /

Could they have another great year in 2014-15?

The following year Price was back and the team still looked pretty similar. Pacioretty, Desharnais, Gallagher, Galchenyuk and Plekanec were still in the top six and Markov and Subban were carrying a heavy burden on defence. PA Parenteau and Jiri Sekac showed up but didn’t fit in well with their new team.

Still, without any improvements and a complete lack of star power, the team finished first in their division and second in the league with 110 points. The Montreal Canadiens won 50 games for the first time since 1989 when players like Patrick Roy, Larry Robinson and Bob Gainey were on the team.

Yes, Price was fantastic but fans biggest complaints in this season were Sekac, Eller and Parenteau were not playing enough top line minutes and youngsters like Sven Andrighetto and Charles Hudon should have been given longer looks. I think time has proven that none of those players deserved first line minutes at that time in their careers, or ever, unless you were the Toronto Maple Leafs trying to tank for Auston Matthews and you put Parenteau on the top line.

The Habs ousted the Ottawa Senators in the first round, but lost to a tough Tampa Bay Lightning opponent in six games in the second round. The Lightning won the first game 2-1 in overtime and won Game 3 by the same score with a goal in the final seconds of regulation.

The 2015-16 season was Therrien’s first bad year behind the bench in his second term. They had to play 70 games without Price in goal and ended up with a 38-38-6 record which gave them 82 points in the standings. Considering Mike Condon was the team’s best answer in goal and he started 55 games, having as many wins as regulation losses wasn’t a terrible fate.

It was enough however, to turn the heat up extremely high on Therrien.

TORONTO, CANADA – APRIL 27: Michel Therrien of the Montreal Canadiens. (Photo by Claus Andersen/Getty Images)
TORONTO, CANADA – APRIL 27: Michel Therrien of the Montreal Canadiens. (Photo by Claus Andersen/Getty Images) /

Tough season without Price puts Therrien on thin ice

He went into the 2016-17 season with high expectations and had a solid team on the ice. Big changes were occurring to the lineup for the first time since he arrived as Alex Radulov came to town as a free agent. Subban was traded for Shea Weber in the offseason and Eller left while Andrew Shaw was acquired. Paul Byron and Phillip Danault were acquired during the previous season but would be playing their first full years in Montreal.

The Habs record stood at 31-19-8 in February and they were leading their division. Therrien was then fired as the team hit its first skid of the season. Claude Julien came in to replace him.

All told, in his four and a half season stint, the Canadiens had a record of 194 – 121 – 37. To put it into context, that is 99 points in the standings for every 82 games played. So, on average, even with Price missing a full season while he was there the Habs were a 99 point team with Therrien behind the bench.

Not sure if you noticed, but they have not been a 99 point team since he left. Their best season since saw them secure 96 points.

Under the guidance of Therrien, Pacioretty, Gallagher, Byron, Subban, and Eller developed into terrific two-way players. We expected more from Tinordi, Beaulieu and Galchenyuk, but is that the coaches fault, or the fault of those who had a more direct impact on development? Or, were those players just not as good as their draft slot would have suggested?

It is hard to say. What isn’t difficult to see is the results on the ice were far better under Therrien than they were under the coaches who came directly before him or directly after. Michel Therrien’s second stint with the Habs isn’t remembered fondly by many Habs fans, but looking back, it seems we were spoiled into thinking we had a Stanley Cup contender that failed to materialize.

Next. Why Muller had nothing to apologize for after win. dark

The more likely scenario here is, we had a mediocre team that routinely overachieved when Therrien was behind the bench, but didn’t reach the same heights when Jacques Martin or Claude Julien were calling the shots.

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