Martin St. Louis expresses optimism in interview with Eric Engels

Martin St. Louis expresses a funny contrast from the panic of Montreal Canadiens fans after a tumultuous preseason. The powerplay went scoreless and looked lifeless in the debut of St. Louis as the leader. Alex Burrows ran the powerplay since Marty took the head coach position, but his departure this offseason put St. Louis in charge. The Canadiens also lost their newest offensive weapon Patrik Laine to an injury, which takes away another option for his revamped powerplay. No one would blame St. Louis if he was discouraged, but if he was, he shows no signs of letting the public know.

St. Louis' biggest flaw is that he cares too much. The Rebuild show on CraveTV talked about that in an early episode, about how St. Louis' whole life revolves around returning the Canadiens to prominence. He spends countless hours in his office in the Bell Centre searching for a way to do it, and he also mentioned that in the interview on Sportsnet with Eric Engels.

"The whole movie [The Big Short], his wheel is always turning, and I’m like that. Sometimes I feel like I can't shut it off. But I have to be careful about how I let these thoughts out. When I Iet them all out, I’m only taking care of one person — me. I have to be careful about just taking care of me."

St. Louis believes in his culture, which preaches guiding his players to the answers instead of telling them directly. He wants to build a culture built on creativity, which makes sense considering the way he played. St. Louis may not have built the career he did if he fell into the same mold as everyone else. The coaches could've turned him into a robot in the era where he debuted, which would've never worked at his size. However, Marty carved his own path and forced the coaches to adjust to him.

“I never liked to be overcoached, so I give my players on the power play the principles that we want to play within and then I’ll let them feel it out before we talk about it. I feel like I create more discussions with them than actually telling them what to do. I’m trying to steer them towards the answers versus giving it to them all the time.”

St. Louis believes that his team is well on their way to being successful. The bantam coach turned NHL head man is proving that you don't need to go on a long journey to get a full-time role. Undoubtedly, St. Louis' playing pedigree is why he got the job, but he wouldn't have kept the role if he hadn't done a good job so far. St. Louis has bought the respect of the locker room and his way of seeing the game is right fit for this group. The only thing left for the Canadiens is to put it all together and make St. Louis a winning head coach.