Carey Price
It has been an up and down season for Carey Price. Well, I guess it has been a down and up season. Price was not at his best to start the year and saw his goaltending coach fired when he has a save percentage of .889 a few weeks ago.
He has started to turn a corner lately and has looked more like his normal, dominant self once again.
Last night, he was a busy man in the first period as he faced 13 shots in the first 20 minutes. He stopped every puck fired his way and gave the Canadiens a chance to work out some kinks early on. They did, and by the second period they looked for more comfortable and were creating far more offence than they did in period one.
Still, the Jets had ten shots on goal and Price turned aside nine of them. He continues to play far more relaxed in his net than he was earlier in the season. Most of his saves look routine because he is covering so much of the net and moving so calmly to get into the right position to make the save.
Connor would beat Price again in the third period but this one couldn’t be blamed on the goaltender. It was an absolute bomb of a one-timer from the Faceoff dot on the power play that was placed perfectly under the crossbar and just inside the post.
He wasn’t perfect, as the Kyle Connor goal in the second period found a way through him, but he was solid. It wasn’t the best performance of his 700 career NHL games, but Price was really solid on this milestone night.
Price shut the door late in the third period as the Jets were seemingly shooting from everywhere. Winnipeg had 13 shots on goal in the third, and would finish with 36 shots on net. Price stopped all 30 he saw at even strength but was beat twice by Connor when the Habs were shorthanded.
He did more than enough to keep the team in the game and was a big reason they were able to build a 3-1 lead after two and a big reason they won in regulation.