LAS VEGAS — This one went as expected for the Montreal Canadiens.
A 3:00 p.m. local start against the Vegas Golden Knights, after more than 24 hours off in Sin City, at the end of a long road trip on west-coast time. Two regular defencemen nursed upper-body injuries and were replaced in the lineup by one (Frederic Allard) who was playing in just his second NHL game — his first in nearly two full years — and another (Joel Edmundson) who’s just two games into a return from a nagging back injury. All of those were factors that were going to make this a very difficult game to win, and it proved to be exactly that.
Halfway through, with the Canadiens trailing the Golden Knights 3-0 and making goaltender Jonathan Quick’s desert debut a walk in the park, the odds against the visitors shown on the T-Mobile Arena scoreboard dropped from unfavourable to impossible.
It was right about then that the Canadiens drew a power play and began leaning into the identity they had built over the past two months.
They picked up the effort level, pushed the pace, got everyone pulling in the same direction and captured momentum to score three third-period goals thereafter.
In the end, the Canadiens lost 4-3. But they didn’t lose face.
As coach Martin St. Louis said after a loss to the Anaheim Ducks on Friday, that’s vital.
“To me, it’s finish the year, don’t coast to the finish line,” he said about the objective for his team over the final 20 games of the season. “We’re not just going to count the days to the end of the season; we’re going to go to work.”
There were plenty of reasons, without making excuses for the Canadiens, as to why that didn’t happen through the first half of Sunday’s game, including the way the Golden Knights performed to suffocate them.
“They dominated us,” said Canadiens defenceman David Savard, “but I like that we came back to what our game is.”
This was one of the main goals of this season — building an identity and a style of play, a foundation of sorts to allow the team to quickly attack the root issue when it veers off course.
Without it, you try to troubleshoot symptoms and end up causing other problems that sink you further into the abyss.
But the Canadiens have built that foundation and didn’t have to go searching for answers when a tough half a game in Vegas appeared to be trending towards an embarrassing loss.
“Being aggressive and playing with the puck,” said Savard, “we know we can do it now. We bring the puck back if we have to, and we make sure everyone’s on the same page, but we’re able to attack together with it. I think we’ve been creating more chances lately, and this is part of our brand. We gotta be hard to play against and be on top of people and I think we’re seeing our brand coming out even after a tough period or half a game.”
The Golden Knights knew it wasn’t over and that the Canadiens would push back because it’s something the Canadiens are beginning to become known for.
“No surprise,” said Vegas star Jack Eichel. “You know the situation they’re in this season, but they still compete hard and are going to be competitive. They want to win every hockey game they go out there for, and no matter how many guys are out for them, they have good players, they play together, and they can score. We had a high-scoring game when we visited Montreal earlier this season.
“For a minute, we dropped our game, and they took advantage of it. All of a sudden, a three-goal lead turns into just fighting to get a win in regulation.”
St. Louis would’ve liked to have seen that type of push from the Canadiens at the start of the game, but seeing it come and generate results despite them starting by doing the opposite of what he wanted them to do only helps reinforce to his players how important it is to stay on brand.
“It’s very encouraging,” St. Louis said. “I always say the coaches, you have to convince your player why we’re doing things a certain way, why we’re playing a certain way, and when you see that type of third it really helps our staff to sell what we’re doing.”
Clearly, it’s already been bought.
The evidence was in the way the Canadiens went about getting back into Sunday’s game — by doing thing the same way they’ve been doing since the beginning of January.
“I feel like we’re able to generate plenty without doing anything at the cost of something else,” said St. Louis. “I don’t think we have to cheat to generate chances, and you’re seeing that. I never feel like we’re out of it.”
That he could feel that way even after it appeared as though the Canadiens were going to be blown out of the rink and straight into the Bellagio Hotel fountain tells you how far this team has come in a short time.
It still has a long way to go to turn into a team expected to play consistently to its brand from wire-to-wire and game-to-game and be favoured to win more often, but it starts with this.
