3/17/2004
Canadiens 4, Avalanche 2
The power play was flying, Jose Theodore was his usual brilliant self, Alexei Kovalev got his first Montreal points, and yet another elite team comes away from the Bell Center with absolutely nothing to show for their efforts. I love this season.
Seriously...can anyone remember the last time the Canadiens beat supposedly-better teams with this much frequency, especially towards the end of the season? However, the true test is coming up towards the weekend...a home-and-home with the still-tough New Jersey Devils, with the caveat that we'll have Sheldon Motherfucking Souray back for at least one, and maybe both of those games. The mini-series comes at a very intriguing time...we're tied with the Devils on points, but conceding two games in hand to them. Two points is the bare minimum if we plan on holding 6th place (and making an assault on 5th), but three would be much better. Four would be too much to hope for, but if we could take both games, then I think we're safe from 7th place almost for certain.
But, then again, there are no easy games anymore. We beat Toronto and Colorado, but lost to Florida previous to that. As a reminder, the rest of the schedule after the Jersey games goes: at Buffalo, vs. Ottawa, at Boston, at NY Islanders, then home to Philadelphia and Buffalo to close out the season.
That said, I think we should take heart. The way it stands now (as crazy as it would have sounded in the beginning of the season), 4th place and home ice isn't completely out of the realm of possibility, especially with the Laffs and Sens faltering.
Seriously...can anyone remember the last time the Canadiens beat supposedly-better teams with this much frequency, especially towards the end of the season? However, the true test is coming up towards the weekend...a home-and-home with the still-tough New Jersey Devils, with the caveat that we'll have Sheldon Motherfucking Souray back for at least one, and maybe both of those games. The mini-series comes at a very intriguing time...we're tied with the Devils on points, but conceding two games in hand to them. Two points is the bare minimum if we plan on holding 6th place (and making an assault on 5th), but three would be much better. Four would be too much to hope for, but if we could take both games, then I think we're safe from 7th place almost for certain.
But, then again, there are no easy games anymore. We beat Toronto and Colorado, but lost to Florida previous to that. As a reminder, the rest of the schedule after the Jersey games goes: at Buffalo, vs. Ottawa, at Boston, at NY Islanders, then home to Philadelphia and Buffalo to close out the season.
That said, I think we should take heart. The way it stands now (as crazy as it would have sounded in the beginning of the season), 4th place and home ice isn't completely out of the realm of possibility, especially with the Laffs and Sens faltering.
