The good, the bad, and the ugly of Ivan Demidov

Ivan Demidov proved how much potential he has when he had a goal and an assist over the first four shifts of his NHL career. It was a stunning performance for the Russian superstar, as he somehow outperformed the massive expectations that Montreal Canadiens fans placed on his shoulders. Demidov failed to record another point during the game, and his teammates never helped him much, either. Demidov helped the team grab a 2-0 lead, but apart from a late powerplay goal by Juraj Slafkovsky, the Canadiens choked away the lead given to them by their newest forward.

It isn't that Demidov had no part in the loss on Monday night. Some flaws in his game don't lend well to holding a lead. Demidov's defensive deficiencies have always been a talking point, as we saw plenty of times this year when Canadiens fans were upset by his usage in the KHL. It was easy to look at his SKA St. Petersburg stat lines and struggle to figure out why his ice time was dipping. However, when looking at some of his defensive plays on Monday, it's possible that Roman Rotenberg wasn't as bad a coach as Habs fans would have you believe.

Demidov cheats in the defensive zone to try and get offensive opportunities. It isn't a trait we haven't seen before, as plenty of offensive superstars in the league share that same defensive work ethic. We call some of them the best in the world so we won't send Demidov back to Russia because of a few missed assignments. The issue is that a young player has to find his footing in the league, and he might have to eat some defensive responsibility before he can get the longer leash that players like Alex Ovechkin, David Pastrnak, and Nikita Kucherov earned.

Then, we get to the ugly. It was a 2-2 game when Demidov took a shift with under 15 minutes remaining. Kaiden Guhle pinched in the offensive zone, and Demidov was coming into the zone as the last forward back. Instead of covering for Guhle, he received the puck and tried to force a play to the middle of the ice. The Blackhawks turned it over and went the other way, leading to a Lukas Reichel goal. However, Demidov's backcheck, where he let Reichel drive to the net for a pass while gliding through the neutral zone, raised some eyebrows.

The issue was that Demidov had just come onto the ice, so fatigue wasn't a concern. He was the one who turned over the puck, so he should've been the hardest worker to stop the Blackhawks' attack. Guhle was caught low in the offensive zone, and he got a stick on Reichel as he was shooting after a straight-line sprint back to his defensive zone, passing off the gliding Demidov in the process. It was a poor cap on a good debut for Demidov, and a play that made me wonder if Roman Rotenberg was right all along.