Achi news desk-
Home and home with the Detroit Red Wings is all that’s left for the Montreal Canadiens in the 2023-2024 season. It’s been a season of improvement, and that’s the simple goal in a rebuild.
This one was very exciting as it was the debut of college sensation Lane Hutson. Perhaps the most exciting game of the year was played by the Canadiens and the Red Wings.
The Wings kept their playoff hopes alive with a 5-4 overtime win.
Wild Horses
If a player moves to a higher level and is unable to play to his strengths, that is the first sign that he could be in for a tough few days. It’s not about weaknesses. That’s what brought the player to the NHL – his strengths. Can he still achieve his best qualities at higher levels?
The most obvious example is when a goal scorer has big totals in a junior hockey league, but can’t score at all at the NHL level. Another example would be a playmaker at the college level who has plenty of time to make plays, but at the NHL level, he can’t hold on to the puck to create success.
This is why the first period of game one in Lane Hutson’s career immediately showed that he would have no difficulty at all with his strengths. On the first shift, he had very little time to make a pass to Juraj Slafkovsky and he did it perfectly.
On the second shift, he already scored his first NHL point. It was a Hutson classic. He was dancing along the blue line. He was chased by a checker who left in his wake. He then feinted to beat two more before shooting it on goal. Brendan Gallagher scored on the rebound.
Two shifts later, Hutson with a beautiful pass after getting the puck off a draw in the offensive zone. He waited and waited until the sniper found his open lane. It was, once again, lovely. Hutson has shown so quickly that he can do exactly what he has always done as a player, offensively.
Defensively, Hutson made a mistake leading to the Red Wings’ first goal. There’s no doubt that it’s important for Hutson to play good defense as well, but defense is about decisions, and decisions get better with experience. Decisions can be improved much more easily than talent can be found.
On that first goal against, Hutson tracked forwards high, and as a result, he was caught. He couldn’t track back down-low to the goal quick enough, so he ended up watching the puck, instead of taking a man. There will be teaching moments defensively, but as long as he can do offensively what made him one of the best college scoring blue liners in history, he will be an excellent NHL player.
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As the game progressed, it was clear that Hutson was not going to have any trouble finding his passes. Sometimes they were stretch tickets that released players. Sometimes they were simple ways to advance on the other wall. A player must feel that he has time to make a good pass. It is a good indicator that there is silence at work. Hutson always looked calm in his first game.
In fact, the most striking note is that Hutson looks exactly as he did as a Boston University Terrier. He moved from college hockey to the NHL and his game didn’t change. He achieved the same profile in his first NHL game which is remarkable.
As the game progressed, Hutson became stronger defensively. Around his goal, his head was on a swivel. He was looking for his check, and good body positioning to block attackers. He also predicted that the play would be beautiful on defense first on loose bucks.
In overtime, 3-on-3, where Hutson will excel, he wheeled and had a chance in the slot. It was lovely. The victory was within reach. However, with Hutson down low, he had no support and the Red Wings came back the other way to win it.
Head coach Martin St. would like to Louis Hutson’s first NHL game. Hutson had 22:04 of ice time.
Wilde goats
There are no goats. There were only excellent performances.
Brendan Gallagher scored twice. He now has 15 goals on the season. That might not sound like Gallagher’s season, but 15 is a respectable number for a player who gets little to no power play time. Gallagher and his contract are not obligations. Indeed, this was a solid season for Gallagher.
It was also a strong night for Rafael Harvey-Pinard, who scored on a great pass from Jake Evans. Evans also had a strong season. He was asked to take on a much bigger role with the injury to Christian Dvorak, and he shone. There is an NHL place for Evans on a stronger Canadiens club. Eventually, when the team is at a higher quality, he would be a fourth line center and a good one at that.
Josh Anderson didn’t impress on the scoreboard, but he had a strong game. Anderson has been looking more comfortable of late. He drives the net like he used to. It is possible that he is finding the courage he needs in his game again after his serious ankle sprain injury. He says here that Anderson improves next year to have a strong season putting this year’s woes behind him.
The club looks quite competitive in game 81. The pieces are coming together.
Wilde cards
The Canadiens’ first 100-goal streak in 31 years may already be amassed. The century mark in goals is difficult to reach. Generally, there are only five to 10 100-goal streaks per season. This year, there are seven.
In Montreal, fans have not been able to count on one this century. Even in the high-scoring days of Alex Kovalev, the last player to have a point-per-game in Montreal in 2008, no line has been even close to 100 goals.
The last line to reach the 100 goal mark was Brian Bellows, Vincent Damphousse and Kirk Muller in 1993. That says a lot about how good that cup winning team was, and even more about how much they scored. Black hole fans lived through in Montreal for a long, long time.
Maybe it’s finally coming to an end. A 100 goal line could be a reality as soon as next season. The sample size of Nick Suzuki, Cole Caufield and Juraj Slafkovsky is getting solid enough to start dreaming. The arrival of Slafkovsky has changed everything.
In the last 41 games for the Canadiens, Slafkovsky has exploded with 15 goals after scoring just four goals in the first half of the season. Nick Suzuki has also had a tremendous second half as the top scorer on the line with 22 goals. Suzuki is playing the best hockey of her career. The laggard by far, although he is considered the best shooter of the three, is Cole Caufield. He has 14 goals in the second half of the season.
Add that up and the Canadiens line has 51 goals in 41 games. There’s your 100 goal line. Can they duplicate that for an entire season? It promises to be exciting to find out. In their favor is that all three players are still improving, especially Slafkkovsky, whose ceiling seems very high. Also in their favor is that they have a chance to get some relief in matches in the coming years, if the second line can also provide some offense and be a threat.
This is the kind of scoring talent not seen in Montreal since 1993. That seems strange to say, but the numbers tell the truth. The top scoring teams under head coach Guy Carbonneau did not have a line that scored at the speed of Caufield-Suzuki-Slafkovsky.
Next season should be exciting.
Brian Wilde, a Montreal sports writer, brings you Call of the Wilde on globalnews.ca after every Canadiens game.
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