Montreal Canadiens: 3 Biggest Reasons Habs are Stanley Cup Contenders
Montreal Canadiens seasons have gotten off to good starts in the past and it didn’t lead to a long playoff run.
Last season, the Habs started 11-5-3, but they were 24th in the NHL standings by the time the pandemic wiped out the last month of the regular season. They started the previous season 11-6-3 but missed the playoffs. The 2016-17 season started with the Canadiens going 16-4-2 in the first quarter of the season, only to lose in six games in the first round of the playoffs. They were 13-2-1 to begin the 2015-16 season but somehow missed the playoffs by a wide margin.
The Habs are off to another great start this season, but it feels a lot different than their previous quick starts.
After 12 games, the Canadiens once again have an impressive record to begin a season. Their 8-2-2 record has them battling the Toronto Maple Leafs for first place in the Canadian Division and had them on top of the NHL standings before the Leafs defeated the Vancouver Canucks Saturday night.
Now, it’s been a bit of a weird year and there’s a reasonable chance that the Tampa Bay Lightning and Vegas Golden Knights would be way ahead of everyone if they didn’t have games cancelled, but to see the Canadiens battling for top spot clearly shows they are off to a great start.
Can they keep it going? Can they avoid struggling later in the season like we have seen from them in previous years? There are many reasons to believe they can, and here are the three biggest reasons the Canadiens will maintain their pace and be Stanley Cup contenders when the playoffs begin this season.
Young Players Take on Huge Roles
The Canadiens made a lot of changes in the offseason, but when they moved Max Domi it sent a clear message that they were going to rely on their young centres to play big roles for the team this season.
21 year old Nick Suzuki, 20 year old Jesperi Kotkaniemi and rookie Jake Evans were basically handed roles down the middle this season. Phillip Danault, at 27, is the leader of the bunch, and the only other natural centre with the team is 21 year old Ryan Poehling who is on the taxi squad.
It hasn’t hurt, in fact, having the trio of young centres, as well as Alexander Romanov on defence, has been a huge reason for the team’s success this season.
Suzuki is leading the team in ice time among forwards and has 12 points in 12 games while playing on the first line with Jonathan Drouin and Josh Anderson. He is playing a terrific two-way game and the Habs top line applies tons of pressure to the opposing defence every single night.
Kotkaniemi is playing third line centre with Tyler Toffoli and Corey Perry, though Joel Armia was on the line before he was injured. The Finnish centre has seven points in 12 games, giving the Canadiens tremendous depth down the middle of the ice.
Evans is playing fourth line centre as a rookie, but he is also second among forwards in average time on ice while shorthanded. He is also averaging close to ten minutes per night at even strength, which shows the Habs have a trusted fourth forward line and a dangerous penalty kill that has already scored seven shorthanded goals.
On defence, rookie Alexander Romanov has looked like a 30 year old and not a 20 year old since day one. He plays a great two-way game, quarterbacking the second unit of the power play, and dropping the shoulder for the odd thunderous body check.
In year’s past when the Habs got off to a great start, it was basically the same team we had seen in the past, but Carey Price was putting up a 1.50 GAA for a few weeks to start the year.
It was the same old roster, but we were expecting different results. Now, with so many young players taking on huge roles it’s not the same old roster anymore. It’s a roster that has turned over quite a bit and the young players look terrific.
New Additions Find Roles and Chemistry Immediately
The Canadiens made significant changes to their lineup in the offseason. General Manager Marc Bergevin added Jake Allen in goal, Joel Edmundson and Alexander Romanov on defence, and Josh Anderson, Tyler Toffoli, Corey Perry and Michael Frolik up front.
A lot of times, it takes new players some time to adjust to a new team. When the Habs brought in Brett Kulak he looked like a depth piece who might become an NHL regular or might not. Eventually he earned the coaches trust and formed some chemistry with teammates and he looked terrific in a top four role in the postseason last summer.
Ben Chiarot took some time to adjust before forming a great partnership with Shea Weber.
Joel Edmundson took one game to figure things out and most of the other newcomers took less time.
Josh Anderson scored twice on opening night and already has eight goals. Tyler Toffoli is leading the team, and was leading the league for a short time, with nine goals in 12 games. Edmundson has played heavy minutes at even strength with Jeff Petry and looks quite comfortable in a top four role. Corey Perry stepped in and helped out when Joel Armia was injured.
Most importantly, Jake Allen has been sensational in goal.
The former St. Louis Blues netminder has played five of the team’s 12 games so far this season and has won four of them. His 1.81 goals against average and .940 save percentage are light years better than we are used to seeing from Carey Price’s backups. Allen was brought in because Price’s backups struggled so much in recent years, and he has been better than advertised.
A busy, truncated schedule makes it even more important to have a quality second goaltender. Many years in the past Price has carried the team to the postseason only to run out of gas down the stretch and look a little sluggish in the playoffs.
Last year, after months off due to Covid-19, Price was phenomenal in the postseason, leading all goaltenders with a 1.78 GAA and coming in second with a .936 SV%. The hope was, with Allen in town, that a rested Carey Price would start Game 1 of the 2021 Playoffs. Allen is more than holding up his end of that bargain.
Depth everywhere
The Canadiens young players like Suzuki, Kotkaniemi and Romanov stepping up to take on big roles, combined with newcomers like Toffoli, Anderson, Edmundson and Allen playing so well gives the Canadiens one thing that no other team in the Canadian Division can claim: tremendous depth at every position.
Up front, the Habs relied heavily on the Danault, Tatar and Gallagher line for everything in the past two seasons. They had to shut down the opposition’s best players but also lead the Habs offensively. Now, they might be the Canadiens third best forward line.
The line of Anderson, Suzuki and Drouin has combined for 32 points in 12 games this season and the “third line” of Kotkaniemi, Toffoli and Armia (now Perry) has combined for 28. Meanwhile, the Habs former best line of Danault, Tatar and Gallagher has 19 points.
That trio is still excellent defensively, but the depth means they don’t have to be terrific offensively to win games. It also means they don’t have to play against the other team’s best line on every single shift as head coach Claude Julien has the luxury of just rolling all four lines throughout games.
The Habs fourth line of Artturi Lehkonen, Paul Byron and Jake Evans are all averaging at least 12:34 per game of ice time.
No other team can trust their bottom six forwards as much as the Canadiens. Toffoli is a third line winger on the Habs and he is second in the league in goals. Lehkonen has played every game on the fourth line and he averages 13:26 per night.
Meanwhile, the Toronto Maple Leafs, who are battling the Habs for first place, are trying to make Jimmy Vesey work as a top six winger because they really only have five forwards they can trust every night.
Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner and William Nylander are amazing players, but their huge salaries make it difficult to add depth at every position like the Canadiens own.
In a season with a condensed scheduled, that could become even tighter if there are cancellations, depth is more important than ever. Suzuki leads the Habs forwards in ice time with 18:19 per game, while Mitch Marner is a few seconds short of 23 minutes per night.
Next. Is Petry the early Norris favourite?. dark
Who is going to run out of gas first when both teams play 16 games in 30 days in April? Fairly certain it will be the team that relies on a handful of forwards, and not the one that relies on a handful of forward lines.