A Winning Habit
Fansided

Reasons for Optimism Abundant for Habs Despite Playoff Exit

By Sebastian High

MONTREAL, QC - NOVEMBER 01: Jesperi Kotkaniemi #15 of the Montreal Canadiens celebrates a victory with goaltender Carey Price #31 against the Washington Capitals during the NHL game at the Bell Centre on November 1, 2018 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Montreal Canadiens defeated the Washington Capitals 6-4. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
MONTREAL, QC - NOVEMBER 01: Jesperi Kotkaniemi #15 of the Montreal Canadiens celebrates a victory with goaltender Carey Price #31 against the Washington Capitals during the NHL game at the Bell Centre on November 1, 2018 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Montreal Canadiens defeated the Washington Capitals 6-4. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images) /
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Montreal Canadiens
MONTREAL, QC – OCTOBER 10: Montreal Canadiens  (Photo by David Kirouac/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) /

Despite the heartbreak that accompanies a playoff series loss, the Montreal Canadiens have left their fanbase with many reasons for optimism and excitement.

The 12th seed Montreal Canadiens gave the 1st seed Philadelphia Flyers a true run for their money. The argument could even be made that Montreal outplayed Philadelphia in the series as a whole, but the bounces and the calls simply did not go their way, but alas, that is a topic for another article entirely, and deserved or not, Philadelphia is the team that progresses to the Final 8, not Montreal.

Not only did Montreal surprise analysts and fans alike with their playoff performance, but their play-in performance was even more unexpected. One thing that stood out during this postseason was that the Canadiens played as a team, especially defensively, something that cannot be said of the Habs performances ever since November.

The Montreal Canadiens successfully shut down Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin in the play-in round and did the same to Philadelphia’s big guns (with the exception of Jakub Voracek) in the round of 16. Claude Giroux, Travis Konecny, Kevin Hayes, James van Riemsdyk and Sean Couturier all had a minimal offensive impact in the six games of the series, a far cry from their regular-season performances.

This is mainly due to the combination of sound defensive play, a good defensive system and excellent goaltending. We’ll get to Carey Price in a moment, but let us focus on the defending first.

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