Game #56Dominance In TO; Habs Win Big 4-Pointer

Details

Date: 11/02/2012
Opponent: Maple Leafs
Location: Toronto

Win: 5-0

Habs Goalie: Price (W)
Opposition Goalie: Reimer (L), Gustavsson

Habs goalscorers: Cole, Bourque, Pacioretty, Eller, Darche
Opposition goalscorers: None

Play of the game

Eller has some serious moves and they never look better than when they are made to embarrass the Leafs defensively-challenged captain. After a good play in the neutral zone, Lars came in and mocked not only Phneuf, but Reimer too. It was a great goal, but, boy, did those three players help to make it look really easy.

Dome hockey team

The 6 players we're playing in a no changes, do or die contest in the dome

Forwards

Tomas Plekanec
Pleks had another great game as he is certainly in that playoff-mode (no, not the girlie type) that we need him to be in. He picked up 2 points again and now has 5 in the 4 wins. This was a good night to have Moen miss as Pleks' unit had little to do, but I do hope he'll be back beside Darche and Tom soon.

Mathieu Darche
The coach likes Darche, that much is obvious. But, what does he bring to the Habs? If anything, he brings passion and a love for the CH more than anyone on the team. This guy plays with all his heart and it makes up for any lack of skill. When you play with that much heart and you get that much ice-time generally things can happen for you and they did tonight with a goal and an assist.

Erik Cole
More of the same from the Habs' top forward. With the Habs playing as well as they did and Toronto playing as bad as they did Cole wasn't needed to be outstanding tonight. He didn't mind though as he still went about his business and notched his 20th of the season (17th in last 40 games). Could it be that Cole's leadership is finally paying off? Have enough of the Habs followed his lead such that we are once again a good team? As of now it looks that way, but let's check back in couple of weeks.

Defencemen

Josh Gorges
The Leafs had two PP's before we scored our first goal. Without good penalty-killing this could have been a much different game, but once again we were excellent. Other than Price, no one was better than Gorges. In all he logged 7 minutes short-handed and frustrated the Leafs on numerous occasions.

Hal Gill
This was Mats Sundin night and no Leaf, current or former, was better than soon to be 37 year-old Hal Gill. I am thrilled about that, but one would think that there should be 20 pretty ashamed Leaf players in the dressing room right now. The best part is that Gill wasn't even that good. He was great on the PK and was our second best D-man, but there just wasn't a lot to do for any of the seven tonight.

Goaltender

Carey Price - Game Puck
Price may have got lucky, thanks to the posts, to get the shutout, but he wasn't lucky that we won. He was so good early on and until it was 2-0 that he made the other players' jobs so much easier. A hot Carey makes this team better and that is exactly what we have on our hands right now.

Comments

Montreal dominated a game that we needed to win tonight. We played a tight first period and relied on some good D and PK'ing to get us there. After that, when the game started to open up, we picked apart their defence and that led to a plethora of goals. They out-shot us, but there was no doubt as to which team outplayed who. Winning, especially in regulation, was huge for us and to win 5-0 makes it that much sweeter. This was a total team-effort which has been the theme of our 4 wins in 7 days week.

2 weeks ago we thought that there was a chance. Last week, there was no way we could even continue to think about the playoffs. This week, what is it? Well, we are 7 points back of 8th and we have 26 games to go. Of course, mathematically, we are still very much alive. But, is this a team that can get another 35 points in those games? Even then, would that be enough? All along I have believed that we may as well go for it and now, of course, there is no change to that. I do think that it is possible, but not because I think that we are a spectacular team or because we were unlucky earlier in the year. No, I think it because, first and foremost, we have a pretty easy schedule till the end of the year (have a look yourself) and the other reason is that we are getting better as a team and, like it or not Ontario, other teams are getting worse.

I have 26 more games to watch this year, and I know what I'll be cheering for. Go Habs.