Montreal Canadiens: Eric Staal Puts Poor Regular Season Behind Him With Great Playoff

Montreal Canadiens general manager Marc Bergevin didn’t have a lot of cap space to make big moves at the trade deadline.

After a busy offseason, the team was pushing up against the cap and had to pinch their pennies when it came to deadline deals. With Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Jake Evans having up and down seasons, there was a need for an experienced centre.

Enter Eric Staal.

The 36 year old was acquired from the Buffalo Sabres for third and fifth round draft picks. He was expected to take on a depth role and hopefully add a little bit of offence down the middle of the ice. It started out great when he scored the overtime winning goal against the Edmonton Oilers in his first game in a Habs sweater.

Overall though, Staal’s regular season performance with the Canadiens was not good. Calling it “not good” is being as nice as possible.

Staal’s next seven games saw him score zero points, put up a plus/minus of minus 8, and work his way down from a second line centre role between Tyler Toffoli and Josh Anderson to a fourth line role.

In all, Staal would play 21 games with the Habs, scoring just two goals and one assist and finishing as a minus 10. Plus/minus is a fairly fickle statistic as it can be greatly affected by teammates, but when a player is minus 8 in a seven game stretch, it’s bad.

Worse, scoring three points in 21 games when your initial linemates are Toffoli and Anderson is putrid. It was starting to look like Staal may not even deserve a place in the playoff lineup. With everyone healthy, wouldn’t Nick Suzuki, Phillip Danault, Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Jake Evans give the Habs their best chance at success?

Well, Dom Ducharme didn’t think so, and Staal is certainly rewarding the trust the Montreal Canadiens organization have put in him.

While Staal isn’t the fastest skater on the team, he is having no trouble keeping up with the play in the playoffs. That’s a big leap from his first few games with the Habs where he appeared to be wearing skates that were four sizes too big and not tied properly.

He is still not a shutdown specialist, but he is making simple reads in the defensive zone and moving the puck out of dangerous areas. Again, in his first several games with the team, he constantly turned the puck over just inside his own zone as he looked like he had no idea where his teammates were on the ice. He took far too long to make plays and the opponent regularly made him pay for those mistakes.

Staal has completely cleaned up those mistakes in the playoffs. He has carved out a role as a fourth line centre with veteran wingers Corey Perry and Joel Armia. They aren’t expected to carry the team, but they play about ten minutes per night and have been adding tremendous depth to the Habs in this playoffs.

In fact, after consecutive two point games, Staal is now leading the team in scoring.

He had assists on Brendan Gallagher’s game opening goal and Tyler Toffoli’s empty net marker in Game 7 against the Toronto Maple Leafs. The fact he was on the ice with Toffoli and Danault in the dying minutes shows the coach is trusting his defensive abilities.

In Game 1 against the Winnipeg Jets two nights ago, Staal made some space for himself in front of the net before one-timing home the goal that made it 2-0. He then added an assist on Evans empty net clincher. Again, with a late lead, Ducharme turned to Staal to help kill off the final minutes.

With six points now, Staal is tied with Toffoli for the team’s lead in scoring in the playoffs. He has done it subtly, by improving his play at both ends of the ice and building some chemistry with Perry and Armia. He has also done it after being pretty much written off by the fan base.

But now he is leading the team in scoring and being counted on to play a smart, defensive role when the team is defending a late lead. Bergevin has made many great trades as GM of the Habs, and acquiring Staal is just one more that has had a big impact on this team in the postseason.