Versus the 58 games Harvey played in 1961 Canadians ?
In the 58 games he played in 1961, the Habs were 38W-13L-7T, .715 pts
In the 12 missed games they went, 3W-6L-3T, .375pts
In 1962 mtl was a .700 teams so almost Harvey level montreal despite Beliveau-Moore-Geoffrion-Richard missing games or having down seasons, but Plante played all the games this time instead of just 40 and that seem to have been a goaltender hot season, the next season they were down to .564
You can credit that to Harvey if you want, but here's a more accurate breakdown of the 1960-61 Habs season.
Mini-Era | Timeline | GP | Record | GAA | SV % | Record w/o Harvey | |
Wobbly Plante | First 21 games | 21 | 10-7-4 | 3.29 | 0.885 | / | |
Hot Charlie | Nov 26 - Dec 31 | 16 | 13-2-1 | 1.94 | 0.933 | 1-1-1 | 5 GF, 6 GA |
Medium Charlie | Jan 1 - 18 | 7 | 4-2-1 | 2.29 | 0.917 | 2-1-0 | 12 GF, 5 GA |
Cold Charlie | Jan 21 - Feb 5 | 7 | 1-4-2 | 3.86 | 0.877 | 0-4-2 | 12 GF, 23 GA |
Recovered Plante | Last 19 games | 19 | 13-4-2 | 2.26 | 0.924 | / | |
Recovered Plante | Playoffs | 6 | 2-4 | 2.33 | 0.910 | / | |
Harvey doesn't do much to help Wobbly Plante with his wobbly knee.
Hot Charlie is a solid 2.00 without Harvey, in line with how he played when Harvey was out.
Medium Charlie is still solid, with a 1.67 while Harvey is out.
Cold Charlie is a trainwreck, and is still giving up 5 GA against New York in the single game he plays with Harvey.
Looks like Harvey was just lucky enough to miss the Cold Charlie games. The one game he played was a win - a 7-5 win over the Rangers, where Harvey had 0 points, and was a +1.
The Habs finish strong with Recovered Plante.
In the playoffs, Plante is still okay, but the Habs really suffer when Langlois (0 Pts, -4) and Harvey (1 A, -3) are out there.
Here's a good article about the season, that was written when Hodge was still playing well.
HERO'S HUMILIATION IN MONTREAL
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Was Plante unusually hot in 1962? Or did he just succeed with a lot of people missing? Did Plante regress in 1963? Or was this season a better one to show that Plante missing games affected team GAA.
Here's Harvey's Norris run, plus the seasons you mention.
Season | Other Hab | Plante GAA | Non Hab Leader | Diff |
1954 | 2.34 | | 1.86 | +0.48 |
1955 | | 2.12 | 1.91 | +0.21 |
1956 | | 1.86 | 2.10 | -0.24 |
1957 | | 2.00 | 2.22 | -0.22 |
1958 | | 2.11 | 2.32 | -0.21 |
1959 | | 2.16 | 2.72 | -0.56 |
1960 | | 2.54 | 2.56 | -0.02 |
1961 | 2.40 | 2.80 | 2.50 | -.10 / +0.30 |
1962 | | 2.37 | 2.56 | -0.19 |
1963 | 3.07 | 2.49 | 2.47 | +0.58 / +0.02 |
Hey look! Jacques Plante. Pretty good right? His MVP season seems to be just in line with the majority of Plante seasons in terms of beating the field.
In 1954, Plante was a 1.41 vs McNeil's 2.34, but he doesn't qualify, so he's not in the table.
In 1963 Plante looks to be slowing down, but is still very good. Maniago was less good.
And of course, 1961 is covered above, which to recap:
Plante was bad, independent of Harvey.
Hodge was good, independent of Harvey.
Hodge was bad, independent of Harvey.
Plante was good, independent of Harvey.
Plante was good, in spite of Harvey being bad.
The immediate improvement coming off of winning five straight Cups? Or the immediate improvement where Jacques Plante was awarded a rare goalie MVP for his efforts in Harvey's absence (a wire-to-wire Hart win, at that)?
Or the immediate improvement that nearly won Harvey a Hart for his efforts with the Rangers immediately upon joining the team despite being 37...or the fact that he helped drag the Rangers to the playoffs for the first time in years?
And that's before we actually dig in and watch him play...where he spent way too much time babysitting a minor leaguer in Al Langlois...
Plante played like Plante usually did. He became more valuable, because there were a lot of big names missing in front of him.
Harvey was good. He was better than what he replaced (which in this case is Gadsby, who went to Detroit, which also helped New York sneak past the Wings into the playoffs). But he was easily replaced by fairly competent, but unspectacular defenders in Montreal, Also, more to my general point does this 2nd place Hart finish put his season in the same category as 1990 Ray Bourque?
Watching him play does show that Langlois isn't good, (although that guy on the 2nd pair who can't skate backwards is surprisingly good.) it also shows that he doesn't have the breakout pass of a Potvin/Bourque/Lidstrom. (What's a breakout pass called when it doesn't clear the blue line? Stay-at-home pass?) It also shows that his main job on the PP was making an even shorter pass for Geoffrion.
Going by film, what I've seen also makes it look like maybe Red Kelly should have gotten another Norris or two.