Pierre McGuire believes Canadiens rookie goaltender has a problem with his game

Jakub Dobes played in just three games since the Montreal Canadiens returned from the 4 Nations Face-Off. It's a concerning stat for Habs fans, as they believe Martin St. Louis is riding Sam Montembeault too hard in the lead-up to he playoffs. It'd be nice if the Canadiens could trust their backup goaltender to start in more games, but it seems like the trust has been lost. No one had much of an idea why that was the case, until Pierre McGuire shed some light on the situation in his recent The Sick Podcast - The Eye Test episode.

Dobes won his first game back from the break, but dropped the last two. His first was disappointing, as he allowed one goal on 24 shots in a 1-0 loss. However, he allowed five goals on 35 shots in a 5-4 loss to the Seattle Kraken on March 13th. Montembeault started all four games since that loss, and will also get the net in Tuesday night's game against the St. Louis Blues.

Montembeault hasn't been lighting the league on fire recently either, allowing three or more goals in his past three starts. He earned the loser point in his last two losses, but the Canadiens need to start compiling two-point games if they want to make the postseason. With 13 games remaining in the season, it's difficult to see Dobes starting more than two or three of those matchups.

""There's a problem with Dobes' game... around the league people know that if you elevate the puck on this guy you're going to score a lot of goals""

Pierre McGuire

Has the rest of the league found a weakness in Dobes' game, or is McGuire speaking out of turn? Dobes hasn't been performing as well as he did at the start of the season, but it still hasn't been terrible. If the Canadiens had scored a goal for him against the Flames, his three games since the break would look much different.

Time for a Cayden Primeau second chance?

Cayden Primeau was sent to the Laval Rocket after a rough start to the season. He has been the AHL's top goalie since the demotion, owning a 16-2-1 record with a .916 save percentage and a 2.13 goals-against average. Dobes isn't necessarily worthy of a demotion, but if the Canadiens are afraid to start him for this alleged tell then it might be worth giving Primeau another look.

It's difficult to expect Montembeault to start ten of the remaining games with a condensed time frame to play them. It'd be unfortunate to see the Canadiens fall out of a playoff race because their goaltender is overworked. The coaching staff will either have to get Dobes out of his funk or make a difficult decision.