10 Thoughts: Senators down Habs 3-1 in preseason finale

With the Habs and Senators having combined for over 150 minutes of penalties in their tussle on Tuesday, the consternation among the Habs fans was palpable, with many of them having been conditioned by the numerous injuries to top Montreal players in the last five years. This shouldn’t be the goal of the preseason games, and yet both last year and this year the Habs-Senators games resulted in ugly play and violence.

As it was, though, the only ugliness was in the ineffectiveness of the Montreal offence. While the weaker lineup had scored five goals on Ottawa on Tuesday, the top lines had a great deal of trouble getting pucks to and past Linus Ullmark in the Ottawa net. Cole Caufield did manage to pot one, but the final result was a 3-1 Ottawa win, with an empty-netter sealing the win for the visitors. In spite of that, the Canadiens managed to finish the preseason with a 4-2 record, the first time they have completed a preseason with a winning record for the first time since 2019.

Habs Lineup

Caufield – Suzuki -Slafkovsky
Veleno – Dach – Gallagher
Anderson – Evans – Laine
F. Xhekaj – Beck – Blais

Guhle – Hutson
Struble – Dobson
A. Xhekaj – Engstrom

Montembeault
Dobes

10 Thoughts

1) After Tuesday’s slugfest in Quebec City, most people were expecting the gloves to drop soon after (if not before) the opening faceoff, but cooler heads appear to have prevailed. The players on the bubble wanted to show the coaches that they are capable of playing, not just fighting, and the coaches wanted to see the same. So, sixteen minutes passed before the first penalty was called. Who can say they saw this coming?

2) On the other hand, neither was the Habs’ control of the play at the same level as on Tuesday night: the Senators controlled play early, and by the midpoint of the period, the shot clock told the grim tale, with 10 shots for the visitors against only three for the bleu, blanc, et rouge.

3) Samuel Montembeault was doing his best Dominik Hasek impressions in the first period, scrambling to stop shots and corral loose pucks, but it fell apart just before the midway point. With Lane Hutson pinching in to support the attack of the first line of Cole Caufield, Nick Suzuki, and Juraj Slafkovsky, Jake Sanderson and Shane Pinto were able to create a two-on-one rush from a turnover. Kaiden Guhle did what he could, but Sanderson was able to flip the puck to Pinto, and the Ottawa Centre tapped it into the wide-open net as Montembeault had no chance of covering the shot.

4) That first penalty? Caufield was called for boarding–yes, boarding!–Claude Giroux. It looked rather like the two were battling for the puck and Giroux rotated to have his back to Caufield and his stick, surely one of the most gentle boarding incidents I have ever seen. Nevertheless, Caufield now has a boarding penalty on his record. Oh, yes, there was some subsequent pushing and shoving, and Slafkovsky and Artem Zub were sent off with coincidental roughing minors.

5) After killing that penalty, the Habs finally put together some sustained pressure, and Patrik Laine made a nice move around Hayden Hodgson in front of the net, but could not find an opening in Linus Ullmark’s armour. And a few minutes later, it was Caufield on a two-on-one, with Slafkovsky on his left. Caufield completed a nice pass to the big Slovak, but Slafkovsky was unable to translate it into a good shot. Maybe if it had been Slafkovsky passing to Caufield …

6) The Canadiens showed much more vim and vigour early in the second, and applied more pressure than they had in all of the first, but most of the shot attempts were well to the outside, and many of those were blocked before they even reached Ullmark. Clearly, the team will need to find a better path to the net in the regular season, whether it’s Brendan Gallagher occupying his usual office, or Ivan Demidov deking his way around the defenders to get closer to the net.

7) On the other hand, the Senators managed to make just such a shot count, as Nick Jensen took a high shot from the Montreal blue line. Montembeault saw it coming through traffic and was ready with his trapper, but David Perron got his stick on the puck just in front of the Montreal goaltender and tipped it into the opposing corner of the net to extend the Ottawa lead to two goals.

8) The Habs were granted three power-play opportunities in the second half of the period, as Jensen and Stephen Halliday both were called for interference, and Laine drew a holding call on a rush along the boards. However, this roster’s power play was disappointingly ineffective, only managing three shots across three power play opportunities. Compared to what we saw earlier in the preseason from what was likely close to the Habs’ second power play unit, the top unit had trouble gaining control, and when they did, they were significantly less mobile and significantly more predictable. One hopes that some additional reps in the regular season – and the addition of Demidov – will polish them into the potent unit we are expecting to see this season.

9) The home team continued applying the pressure in the third, and arguably more effectively at five-on-five than they had done on the second-period power plays. However, the combination of effective Ottawa shot-blocking and a very solid night’s work from Ullmark kept the Habs off the board until Caufield finally pushed the puck over the goal line at 15:36 of the final period. Certainly not one of the prettier goals of Caufield’s career, but he did what was necessary and got the Habs back within one.

10) That was all she wrote, though. Martin St-Louis pulled Montembeault with 90 seconds left in what seemed like a half-hearted attempt to get a tying goal, but it was all for nought as the Habs did not manage a single goal with the extra attacker on the ice–and then Lars Eller, the longtime Canadien, hammered the final nail in the coffin with an empty-netter.

HW Habs Three Stars

First Star: Adam Engstrom (0g, 0a, 3 shots, +0, 18:00 TOI) played likely his best game of the preseason, highlighted by a pretty break through the Ottawa defence on one of the Montreal power plays. He couldn’t score on that one, but his play was solid, and he–together with Arber Xhekaj–kept the Senators to a single scoring chance on the night. And, no, they were not particularly sheltered, either. Engstrom will surely not be in the lineup for the first game of the regular season but he is showing that he is well capable of playing in the NHL.

Second Star: Cole Caufield (1g, 0a, -1, 2 shots, -1, 17:46 TOI) scored that singular goal, so he will be the representative of the top line. He could have easily had an assist as well on that two-on-one break with Slafkovsky, and he played with intensity consistent with his personality.

Third Star: Joe Veleno (0g, 0a, 2 shots, +0, 14:26 TOI) looked the best of tonight’s contenders for the final forward position on the roster. He showed speed, he showed intensity, he showed moves. And he likely saved a goal, blocking an Ottawa shot in front of an open Montreal net, and then clearing the puck. He will surely be playing NHL games this year yet, and he looks to be a big upgrade from last year’s Michael Pezzetta in the 13th forward role.