GDT: Last Preseason Game - Habs B squad vs Sens Goons - 7pm EST

Tuggy

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Really crappy preseason by a lot of the team and just overall with the Laine injury.

I had a lot of cautious optimism coming into the season, but that's all pretty much gone. The Laine play definitely set me back.

Hopefully come Game 1 the boys will be ready to go, but I'm finding it hard to shake the bottom 5-10 feeling when I look at this team and their preseason performance.
 

morhilane

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Feb 28, 2021
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Didn't they lose every game a few pre seasons ago? I agree though that for many reasons this camp has been bad.

Marty 1st pre-season. It was shit like this year, except the multiple injuries were not to "fan favorite" or prospect (yet) except Suzuki who managed to start the season and looked like shit for a while clearly playing injured. Also, they had like 80 people at camp and managament basically wanted to see everyone get a pre-season game to evaluate them. The end result was that the main line-up never played together. And then they started the season with 5 rookies at D and Guhle with 0 NHL games was the defacto #1D until mid-November. They had a relatively good season start thought, things when to shit after Matheson came back...but then everyone else got injured.

But Habs only "won" their pre-season 3 times since 2010 (I don't have the data before that).
2024: 2-4
2023: 3-3
2022: 0-5
2021: 2-3
2020: --
2019: 4-2
2018: 3-3
2017: 2-3
2016: 3-1
2015: 1-3
2014: 3-2
2013: 2-3
2012: --
2011: 1-5
2010: 3-3
 
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Weltschmerz

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Apr 22, 2007
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No coach in the NHL has the ability to do that.. Anderson and Gallagher aren't going on waivers, the contracts themselves dictate that.

Blame Bergevin, not Marty.
Not sure, if they can send down Armia they could send down Anderson, problem is there is noone really pushing for that spot either.
 
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Lshap

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I missed the last two games and only checked the injury thread to see if anyone new is hurt. No tears, breaks, or concussions? I'm good. Don't care about wins. Trying to extract meaning from preseason is mostly useless, other than a few individual performances.

Moving into the real season, what matters is health and some semblance of special teams. Even without Laine, I'm expecting more goals and a few more wins.
 

morhilane

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I'm expecting more goals and a few more wins.
You might be expecting a bit too much there. Dvorak/Gallagher/Anderson looks like players regressing and Newhook transplanted his brain during the off-season (just terrible decisions making since the start of pre-season).

This team will be even more of a one-line team + D, I doubt Dach will be able to do much with whomever end-up his wingers. Forget about the bottom 6, it's just Evans down there and he's not very good offensively.
 

L4br3cqu3

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You might be expecting a bit too much there. Dvorak/Gallagher/Anderson looks like players regressing and Newhook transplanted his brain during the off-season (just terrible decisions making since the start of pre-season).

This team will be even more of a one-line team + D, I doubt Dach will be able to do much with whomever end-up his wingers. Forget about the bottom 6, it's just Evans down there and he's not very good offensively.

I disagree on Dvorak, if he stays healthy, we could see him produce a bit, he obviously isn't the flashiest, he's the absolute vanilla player, but he's smart, has tools and is pretty much always in the right spot.

And about Gallagher, well, yesterday, he was akin to the Gallagher of old, annoying pest around the net, he was the reason Dvorak got the puck and scored.

But yeah, otherwise, I know my expectations dropped like a rock since Laine got injured, I just hope the team can keep their hard working habits from last season and that the kids keep getting better. I'm not sure we'll be able to get out of the bottom-10 this season yet again.
 

morhilane

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I disagree on Dvorak, if he stays healthy, we could see him produce a bit, he obviously isn't the flashiest, he's the absolute vanilla player, but he's smart, has tools and is pretty much always in the right spot.

And about Gallagher, well, yesterday, he was akin to the Gallagher of old, annoying pest around the net, he was the reason Dvorak got the puck and scored.

But yeah, otherwise, I know my expectations dropped like a rock since Laine got injured, I just hope the team can keep their hard working habits from last season and that the kids keep getting better. I'm not sure we'll be able to get out of the bottom-10 this season yet again.
Dvorak has no foot speed anymore. Every time he got the puck last night, a Sens caught up to him and took it away from him. It's going to be even more visible once the season start.

Gallagher will have run out of juice by November like the two previous seasons.
 

BLONG7

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Does MSL n his balls make that decision?
Coach plays who tbe higher ups give him.
Gally can't be sent to the A according to his contract, but Andy could.
MSL doesn't make that decision as per se, it would be Hughes.
I am sure, Hughes is trying to be creative to try and get out of the situation Bergevin has created for him.............................attaching a pick might get it done, or hold back some $$$ in a trade etc

I still think Andy could bounce back this season, but Gally looks beyond well done. We can hope for LTIR in his case.....
 

BLONG7

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I missed the last two games and only checked the injury thread to see if anyone new is hurt. No tears, breaks, or concussions? I'm good. Don't care about wins. Trying to extract meaning from preseason is mostly useless, other than a few individual performances.

Moving into the real season, what matters is health and some semblance of special teams. Even without Laine, I'm expecting more goals and a few more wins.
We have to get those special teams fixed asap....................man the PK and PP suck.
Not sure, maybe a full squad that we haven't seen yet, will get it done, but the coaches should be looking over their shoulders.

I do think we can still be a better team, adding Dach, Hutson, one of Heineman, Kap, Roy to the team, along with Laine in December some time.....in the mix is the goal at this point.
 

morhilane

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I still think Andy could bounce back this season, but Gally looks beyond well done. We can hope for LTIR in his case.....
Andy looked like last year Andy in the last pre-season game. Lost, confused, couldn't grab a puck to save his life. I don't think he's well mentally on the ice if I can explain it like that.

It feels a bit like the Tremblant trip didn't go too well this year actually.
 
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WeThreeKings

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Sep 19, 2006
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Not sure, if they can send down Armia they could send down Anderson, problem is there is noone really pushing for that spot either.

Armia is paid 3 million and only had 2 years left at the time.. a lot easier to do that with a guy getting paid to be a bottom 6er. A lot harder with a guy who gets paid like a top 6 forward and if he plays well, could have value to the team or in a trade.

Gallagher is the harder one to do anything with because of all the protections Bergevin gave him and the fact half the fan base worships him.
 
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ChesterNimitz

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Jul 4, 2002
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Dvorak has no foot speed anymore. Every time he got the puck last night, a Sens caught up to him and took it away from him. It's going to be even more visible once the season start.

Gallagher will have run out of juice by November like the two previous seasons.
What was really troubling last night was that a quickly decaying Gallagher was one of the more noticeable players on the team that was dressed last night. It showed that the team’s depth is still not good enough and that again this year, this team will only go as far as its top line, mobile defence and above average goaltending take it. Last night, only one of those elements was present as the top line didn’t dress and the mobility of the team’s defense lessened with the absence of Matheson and Struble and it bing Guhle’s first game back from surgery.

Once those three elements are ‘in play’, coupled with the return of Dach and the soon return of Laine , this team will be better than last year and the optimism that many here felt at the start of camp revived.
 

calder candidate

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This camp has been really underwhelming there didn’t seem to be a lot of structure, player aren’t ready, alert or intense, PP and PK were abysmal the knee on Laine was a depressing, the fact that no one reacted to the knee on Laine was puzzling, even more puzzling that no one pay a visit to Grieg in the next game, we did stuff afterwards which the minimum, NHL player safety was MIA, (hot to the head, blind side hit, knee, dive there were multitude of stuff that could have been penalized) Xhekaj when through the ringer when he was only defending and retaliating reading the headline you think he was a head hunting scum bag…Can’t even get a game with almost full line up we ending camp with only negative answer to our questions 1st didn’t do much, Laine down so the 2nd is not great and we don’t even know who should be playing with Dach, Mailloux and Reinbacher didn’t do better than anyone, worst Reinbacher is fine the the season, so we don’t really have a lock jam on D…No one did great or anything of significance, goalie were ok but nothing more Dobes might of had the best performance…
 
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BLONG7

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This camp has been really underwhelming there didn’t seem to be a lot of structure, player aren’t ready, alert or intense, PP and PK were abysmal the knee on Laine was a depressing, the fact that no one reacted to the knee on Laine was puzzling, even more puzzling that no one pay a visit to Grieg in the next game, we did stuff afterwards which the minimum, NHL player safety was MIA, (hot to the head, blind side hit, knee, dive there were multitude of stuff that could have been penalized) Xhekaj when through the ringer when he was only defending and retaliating reading the headline you think he was a head hunting scum bag…Can’t even get a game with almost full line up we ending camp with only negative answer to our questions 1st didn’t do much, Laine down so the 2nd is not great and we don’t even know who should be playing with Dach, Mailloux and Reinbacher didn’t do better than anyone, worst Reinbacher is fine the the season, so we don’t really have a lock jam on D…No one did great or anything of significance, goalie were ok but nothing more Dobes might of had the best performance…
They did not ice a full squad once, which for me is a bit of an issue.............I am still thinking we will surprise this year with the additions, and the huge number of one goal games last year, many of which went the wrong way for us.

The preseason was a $hitshow for sure................our coaching concerns me.
 
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Tyson

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Mar 1, 2007
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Well one conclusion is becoming evident- we were under the illusion that this team would be in the mix....as long as we have several dead weight contracts, this team will be a bottom 5 team.
Molson should be embarrassed at his tenure as owner.
This so called rebuild is far from over.
Send Kapanen back and allow him to play real hockey and not play for a bottom feeder.
 

zx81

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Aug 2, 2005
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They did not ice a full squad once, which for me is a bit of an issue.............I am still thinking we will surprise this year with the additions, and the huge number of one goal games last year, many of which went the wrong way for us.

The preseason was a $hitshow for sure................our coaching concerns me.

Laine's injury really impacted the pre-season plan. After his injury, our coaching staff was scared of losing another key player.

The PP will be an issue again this year. Burrows is gone but we play the exact same way. It will never work with the current setup and strategy. Never. Hutson may help a bit but our pp problem is deeper than a lack of talent at the point.
 

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