Last Year....
 

We had two offensive lines and two grinding lines. And we finished first in the East. [Good] Yet we were not combative enough to go far in the playoffs. [Bad] This year we have three offensive lines and one grinding line. The truth is we have three soft lines and two guys that grind on the last line since George doesn't grind that well. That is the picture.

Last year The Red Wings won the cup with two skilled players in Zetterberg and Datsuyk and the rest of the offensive squad was filled with grinders(since I consider Holmstrom and Frenzen grinders with skills).

Hockey is about working hard first and the way our team has been refashioned this year has been a big reason for the lack of effort since the beginning of the season in my opinion.

My 2 Cents.

people seem to forget this team didn't have one significant injury all year, until i think the tail end of the year, where Saku and Komo were out for a slight period, but beyond that, i've never remembered a year when they were so healthy...

I can see your point, we lack a shutdown line. Lang/Lats arent exactly shutdown type guys. I wouldn't mind having a gritty/hard-working/point producing third line. Especially in the playoffs, these are the type of lines that win you games. But, we dont have that, so we'll have to do with our 3 offensive lines. Its not necessarily a bad thing.

It is true, Montreal were lucky not to have players injured for more than 2 weeks last year.They finished first, yes. Things could have ben different if Boston would have been with Bergeron, the Flyers with Gagne, the Hurricanes with Brind'Amour, Walker, Cullen, Williams not being injured for more than a month.

Yes Montreal finished first with a team that was small but skilled, young and fast.
It worked last year but that does'nt mean it is going to work this year. Everyone notice how the Habs needed more size and grit in the playoofs last year.
Anaheim won the cup with a team that was tough, big ,mean. But Anaheim got eliminated in the playoffs pretty fast the following year.
Bob has to e able to adjust the team and fill the holes when needed.
The team desperately need a top 4 dmen with size, grit and some nastyness.
montreal also need a top 9 forward that has some skills, that is physical, hits , that can drop them and is a winner. Carcillo, Clarckson, McLeod.
kostopoulos and Begin... give me a break!

Yeah! who doesnt remember awesome grinders such as Smokes, Ryder and Streit...

It's just the way it was mixed up it worked better than this year. Smoke was a good finisher for Begin and Kosto for instance. They could do this with Lang as finisher. Then you had Lapierre on the third line tiring it up with whatever was available at the time. Sometime you had a kid line with Lappy and Lats wich didn't so badly(and Dandy helping out), sometime Begin and Kosto would join him. Carbo kept mixing it up all the time and it worked.

I'm not gonna say anything because the season is early...but you know I wasn't thrilled with the Lang acquisition.

I would use the Koivu line as a shutdown line. It's not grinders, but it's 3 players with a heightened sense of defensive awareness who also happen to be fast and slick.

They got him because they couldn't get Sundin-who maybe would have made the three offensive line concept work. But the truth is we needed grit and size on our first two lines and that's not what we got by getting Lang.

The only soft regular forwards on the team are Pleks, Tanguay and A.Kost. I would say the rest of the forwards battle through the tough checking pretty well. MTL needs to get back to making the puck do all the work. We are missing our crisp passing game and trying to do too much individual dangling to create opportunities. If they work harder off the puck they will be much more successful.

DET plays a puck possession passing game which makes grinding much less important. MTL can and has played that way as well. Active sticks, good shot blocking and good positioning is how you play defense in the new NHL. MTL can do that, and they have at times. When they get away from it, they don't fare so well.

I don't think sacrificing talent for pluggers is a good strategy.

I think having more grinders make us work harder as a whole. I think it has an effect on the whole team. And while the Koivu line works hard they lack size. While Andrei and Kovy have size they something are not stellar on body-to-body. Datsuyk for instance is super-strong and you can hardly move him. He's skilled but works like a beast.

Well, Gainey got half the equation by getting size. In reality, the personnel changes have not made the team softer by any measurable amount, either. Streit is no grittier than Tanguay. Smolinski is no grittier than Lang. Laraque is far grittier than Ryder. Just because the players are more talented doesn't mean that they can't play a checking role, either. That's up to Carbo to find line combinations that work and have chemistry. It's up to him to decide who should be checking the other team's lines. The personnel he has to work with is better at both ends of the ice for the most part. Also, you might not remember but Smolinski was utterly useless almost the entire season. Same thing with Ryder. Streit was better, but he also had some bad moments.

Detroit with Zettererg, Datsyuk Hossa, Holmstrom and Frazen at forward are faster, more skilled and grittier then montreal. Detroit also have a top 3 dmen in the league and a top 10 dmen in the league in Lidstrom and Rafalski.
I think we cant compare Montreal to Detroit.Montreal has to find their own identity.

Laraque did not replace Ryder since most the time Ryder did not work on the first two lines, he was a healthy scratch. No Laraque took Begin's post and he's been less effective than him. Offensive lines can play a grinding style and the Koivu line sort of do that. But do not have the size sometime to make a difference. But again getting guys with skills and grit should have been the first goal. And the third line could be skilled yet be though. And I can't see Lang, Lats and Sergei doing that.

I think we need a real shutdown third line and more size/grit/skills on the first two lines.

And yet, last game we played we were out-skated and out-played... out hit ? meh! the team that beat us last game did it simply because Julien and Co realized (took a year to understand - but still) hits and fight can be nice, but to win a game you have to score goals, play hockey... be serious for a second here, Bergeron, Kessel, Savard, Yelle (use to, not anymore), Ryder (never had gritt, we saw enough of him to know), Krejci, Sturm may very well have been working hard, but looking at theses names, I have yet to see gritty players... hell, even Thornton looked like Pavel Bure against us that game...

Tic-tac-toes, side to side pass, you know - the things we used to do... well THEY were doing it the whole game...



Carcillo, Clarkson and McLeod = winner ? really... winner of what exactly ?

Want more gritt ? lets start by letting the ones who have some play with it... yes Begin will take the dumb penalty once in a while, but he plays balls out every single shift... just like the other names you've mentionned - it comes with the style of play... Kostopoulos may never win a fight, but I have yet to see him refuse one, ALWAYS willing to take one for the team, and never complain about it... Lapierre may look like a wuss to other teams/fans with all his yapping, but he plays with an edge, just gotta learn the when and how's...

all theses guys - including the non-Habs you mentionned, if ALLOWED to play their style will give you exactly what you want... but they'll also go too far sometimes, take a dumb penalty, get suspended, etc. it comes with their style of play...

Yep I said that early in the season.

Carbo has gone on record as saying that the era of having 2 scoring lines, a shutdown checking line and a grind/energy line is over, and that it's all about 3 scoring lines and an energy line that can score.

He also said that he would rely on his defensemen to take more of the responsibility to play defense, meaning the forwards would get the green light a lot more and so not spend as much time working in their own zone.

So far the lack of specialized players, who can seriously check and shutdown teams, isn't so glaring. It's more the fact that the forward aren't willing to pay the price at either end of the rink, game in and game out, shift by shift. They seem to have received a green light to make soft passes in the offensive zone, wait around the neutral zone and their own blueline for pucks, and make the fancy pass instead of cutting to the net.

Someone needs to tell Carbo his team isn't full of Lafleurs to wheel around every night like heroes, teams like the Leafs seem ready to work hard and skate over top of us, and in the Bruins case, it only takes one Lucic to shutdown an entire team.... this is a major problem.

As far as having a shutdown line, maybe it would help change the attitude the team right now. Someone does need to make the game harder for the opposing forwards, and our Ice Capades crew is no where near ready to do that, Kosto and Begin aside.

This looks like the same team from last year's playoffs, despite our record there's a lot of work to do to turn us into serious contenders. The good news is that there's still lots of skill and speed here, and plenty of time to learn the lessons. It takes 4 playoff rounds whether you finish 1st or 8th in the conference, I'm confident by that time there will be a more work-first mindset.

Last year, our 3rd and 4th line consisted of a mix or Ryder/Lats/S.Kost/Streit/Begin/Kosto/Dandy/Smokes/Laps.

Our third line is Laps/Lang/S.Kost this year. Our 4th is Lapierre, with surely Kosto when he comes back if he continues to play like he did all season.
Then there will be Laraque/Dandy/Begin for the last spot.

Like you said, but not just for hockey, for any type of career you have, it all comes with hard work. If you don't work hard, it'll bring you nowhere.

You've seen what our team is capable of when we work hard, now it's to keep it consistent. I don't think having 1-2 extra grinders on 3rd line would change a thing.
We have a young team, the youngsters will push when the leaders do it.
If they see Markov-Koivu-Kovalev-Hamrlik work really hard, then you can be sure Higgins/Plek/Tangs/Komi will follow. When those 8 players work hard, the others will have no choice but to do the same. What Im referring too I guess is the famous ''Domino effect''.

A third line grinder can maybe change the momentum after a big check in a few games. But if the leaders don't work, that big check will go unnoticed.

Hard work comes first, add that to a team that has such raw talent as ours, and we'd be very much Dangerous.

Last year, we did finish 1st, we also finished 10pts ahead of the 8th seed(Boston), that just so happened to have missed their best player/leader all season. It's not like we dominated the East last season, it's quite far from that.
Lets also not forget the only 2 reasons we finished first last year was because we were healthy all season and we had the #1 PP in the league. This has nothing to do with Grit.

First of all, saying the red Wings were filled with "grinders" is completely false. Franzen has now scored 37 in his last 43 games... How can you call him a grinder?

Holmstrom is arguably the best in what he does, so once again, I don't think he's much of a "grinder"... What made the Red Wings what they were last year is the fact that all of them were playing inspired hockey, and all of their player was responsible defensively... One thing though: you've got to pay the price to have that kind of success in both the offensive zone and the defensive zone. We've got all necessary tools to succeed, players have got to understand it and somehow find a way ot give it all game in game out.

Right. But it's like the first line doesn't work hard. Their size is a disadvantage, thought.

My ideal third line would be guys with size that works hard yet have skills. We have none of that but having Kosto with Sergei and Lang somehow made the whole line more dangerous and more what i'm looking for.

We finished first in my opinion because we had a great mix. Yet not gritty enough, not hard-working enough to go far in the playoffs.

I was concerned going into the season about the lack of grit/toughness/"physicality" (whatever you want to call it) in our projected top 6...

nothing about the start of the season, including the 8 wins, has led me to feel otherwise.

As skilled as our top 9 is, winning in the playoffs requires more, and as the roster stands right now I don't think we have the make-up of a team that can handle a 6-7 game series against a hard fore-checking physical team.


It's a tough situation, because looking at the top 9, who do you move?

Lang? big bodied RH centre we "needed" so desperately (playing ok, but his 46% faceoffs make me wonder...)

Higgins? Imo even if last years offensive output is his limit (which I doubt), he brings more than that to the table and plays the kind of game that should keep him in a habs jersey for the long-haul.

Koivu? heart and soul captain... not going anywhere

Kovalev? streaky for sure, but most talented guy on the roster, and most feared by the opposition... plus he's great in the playoffs

Tanguay? been the best point producer on the team thus far, hard to fault him for doing what he does best, can't really expect him to do much more

Kost? Too much untapped potential to risk watch blossom elsewhere

Kost Jr? Ditto, plus plays with a great aggressive edge despite smaller stature

Pleks? trade the turtleneck??? Crazy... guy is solid in all parts of the game, showed last year he can put up the points

Lats? See kost comments...


Just looking at that abundance of skill, it feels crazy to suggest that any move should be made.
but unfortunately building a team isn't just about having the most "skilled" players.
and even more unfortunately, the one drawback every single one of those guys has (except MAYBE higgins) is that none of them can really be called "physical" players.

I argued in the past (until i was blue in the face) that you didn't NEED size at centre, but you do need grit, and this group lacks it sorely.

If it were my call, I'd be looking to trade lang+ for a solid, physical Dman who can play top 4 minutes, and then call up Chipchura and see if his style of play is enough to balance our top 3 lines.

Tanguay- Koivu- Lats
Kost- Pleks- Kovalev
Higgins- Chipcura- Kost jr
Kosto- Lapierre- Begin/Laraque

if the team is still looking soft come february, look at targeting a physical winger that can play in the top 9, but as young as Chipchura is, i think his style of play/attitude is exactly what our forwards are missing right now.

I am wondering if it is in Kovalev, Plekanec, Lang?
Kostitsyn after the hits/concussion he got is not the same.
If our players dont play with more determination and show more passion, i say bring some changes.

Character is built trough adversity, and when it comes to the Bruins they beat them easily last year, eleminated them in the PO, win the first match-up, after all that every single human being would think "Bah! should be an easy game"... same goes for the last season as a whole, what kind of adversity did they had to go trough last year ? injuries - nope, losing streaks - nope, controversy - nope...

so, yeah, lessons to be learned, agree completely... chances are it will take a few lessons though ;)

determination and gritt... two different things...

The problem with our skilled guys is one of lack of size + skills in my opinion(players that have both). Change Plekanec and put Jokinen in there and it changes our team from top to bottom. That really is what we need.