I know it’s a longshot — and not something they even thought about doing — but with the goaltending being what it is right now is there a chance Jacob Fowler gets a recall at some point this season from the AHL’s Laval Rocket? Three shutouts with the Rocket, a save percentage over .900 and that bulldog fight in him. Yes, I know, he’s got a lot to learn, still …
T-Fish on Bluesky — @t-fish.bsky.social
I believe Canadiens management would like Fowler to get at least one full season under his belt in the AHL as a No. 1 goalie at the pro level before bringing him up. But if Samuel Montembeault and Jakub Dobes continue to struggle like they have recently they might not have a choice to at least give Fowler a chance.
Montembeault was horrible in Thursday night’s 8-4 loss to the Washington Capitals — especially on the third goal he allowed on 10 shots before being replaced by Dobes. The Capitals beat Dobes four times on 25 shots with one goal an empty-netter.
Montembeault has a 4-5-1 record with a 3.71 goals-against average and an .852 save percentage — ugly numbers. Dobes is 6-2-2 with a 2.96 GAA and a .892 save percentage. In his last four games — all losses — Dobes has an .820 save percentage. Another ugly number.
“Can the goalies be better?” head coach Martin St. Louis said after Thursday’s game. “For sure, they can be better. But we have to do a better job in front of them also.”
The Canadiens allowed 13 high-danger scoring chances against the Capitals, according to Natural Stat Trick.
The fact is it’s hard to win when you have two goalies with save percentages below .900. The Canadiens need their goalies to make more saves, including big ones.
As for Fowler, being a good goalie at the NCAA level and in the AHL doesn’t guarantee success in the NHL. Cayden Primeau is a perfect example of that.
Like Fowler, Primeau won the Mike Richter Award as the top goalie in U.S. college hockey and was outstanding last season in Laval, posting a 21-2-2 record with a 1.96 GAA and a .927 save percentage. But he was 2-3-1 with the Canadiens last season, along with a 4.70 GAA and a .836 save percentage. In 58 games with the Canadiens over seven seasons, Primeau had a 15-25-7 record with a 3.73 GAA and a .882 save percentage. He played three games with the Toronto Maple Leafs this season, posting a 2-1-0 record with a 4.70 GAA and a .836 save percentage and is now playing for the AHL’s Chicago Wolves after being reclaimed on waivers by the Carolina Hurricanes.
Having said all that, Fowler seems to have a better mental makeup and that “bulldog fight” to handle the pressure of playing for the Canadiens. He was also a third-round pick (69th overall) by the Canadiens at the 2023 NHL Draft, while Primeau was taken in the seventh round (199th overall) of the 2017 draft.
Heading into Friday’s home game against the Belleville Senators, Fowler had a 6-4-0 record with three shutouts, a 2.11 GAA and a .921 save percentage as an AHL rookie.
If Canadiens management doesn’t think the 20-year-old is ready yet for the NHL spotlight, another option would be Kaapo Kahkonen, who has a 4-2-0 record, a 2.35 GAA and a .919 save percentage with the Rocket. The Canadiens signed the 29-year-old as a free agent on July 1 and he has 140 games of NHL experience with a 49-68-15 record, a 3.34 GAA and a .898 save percentage.
The Canadiens (10-7-3) have lost five straight games (0-4-1) while being outscored 27-10 and dropped to sixth place in the Atlantic Division and out of a playoff spot after Thursday’s loss.
They can’t wait much longer for Montembeault to try and find his game or for Dobes to start playing better.
I think it’s worth taking a shot with Fowler and see what he can do. If he doesn’t look ready, he can always go back to Laval.
Is Martin St Louis the best coaching option for this team?
Hoek on Bluesky — @graezilla.bsky.social
The biggest challenge for a coach is to get players to buy into what they’re selling. The Canadiens have bought into St. Louis since he took over the job almost four years ago and that hasn’t changed.
Jeff Gorton, the president of hockey operations, and general manager Kent Hughes knew this rebuild wouldn’t happen overnight and believed St. Louis was the right coach to teach young players how to play the game the right way and eventually start to win. All three of them have been patient since the start of the rebuild and they will continue to be that way.
Despite making the playoffs last season in Year 3 of the rebuild and the strong start to this season, all three know that as the youngest team in the NHL the Canadiens aren’t ready yet to be Stanley Cup contenders. The last five games against some bigger, more experienced teams have highlighted that.
Firing a coach in Year 4 of a rebuild — especially one that has gone very well so far — is taking a step backward since a new coach will bring in his new ideas and it’s sort of like starting over again. With a 10-7-3 record the Canadiens are actually seven points ahead of where they were at this point last season when they had a 7-11-2 record.
The Buffalo Sabres, sitting in last place in the Atlantic Division with a 7-9-4 record, look like they are going to miss the playoffs for a 15th straight season. One big reason for that is they have had seven different coaches since last making the playoffs in 2011. Lindy Ruff, the last coach to lead Buffalo to the playoffs, is now back behind the Sabres bench.
Bad goaltending and long-term injuries to Kirby Dach, Patrik Laine, Alex Newhook and Kaiden Guhle have played a big role in the Canadiens’ recent slump, although St. Louis refused to use that as an excuse after practice Friday in Brossard.
As the late, great Red Fisher of The Gazette used to say when things were going badly for the Canadiens: “Show me the players.”
The Habs got physically owned by Tom Wilson and the Capitals again Thursday night and outplayed overall, which is exactly what happened during the playoffs last season. My question is: Where is the sandpaper and the harder-to-play-against factor that Kent Hughes said the team needed to play with?
Deke Rivers on X — @OLearyO
The Canadiens actually outhit the Capitals 20-19 — but none of those hits was against Tom Wilson.
The biggest hit was the one the 6-foot-4, 225 pound Wilson delivered on the Canadiens’ Jake Evans, who is 6-foot and 190 pounds. The hit knocked Evans out of the game and led directly to a goal with less than six minutes left in the second period, putting Washington up 4-2.
The turning point in the Canadiens-Capitals playoff series last season was the hit Wilson delivered on Alexandre Carrier, who is 5-foot-11 and 174 pounds, in the third period of Game 4. It led directly to a goal that put the Capitals up 3-1 and they ended up winning the series in five games.
Wilson’s hit on Evans was borderline legal — at best. No penalty was called and Renaud Lavoie of TVA Sports reported Friday that the NHL Department of Player Safety will not have a hearing with Wilson and there will be no discipline for the hit.
“I just thought it was high,” St. Louis said after the game. “I thought he came from a long distance and high.”
There was no retaliation from the Canadiens for Wilson’s hit.
Wilson seems to know he can run wild against the Canadiens and intimidate them. That’s a problem.
The Canadiens definitely need more sandpaper and have to be harder to play against. That’s a reason why they called up Jared Davidson from the Rocket after Newhook was injured. But they need more sandpaper from some of their bigger players.
Zachary Bolduc led the Canadiens with five hits against the Capitals, followed by Josh Anderson with four. Juraj Slafkovsky only had two hits, while defencemen Arber Xhekaj and Jayden Struble had zero hits.
Bolduc leads the Canadiens in hits this season with 39, followed by Slafkovsky (38), Anderson (33), Struble (31), Joe Veleno (30) and Xhekaj (27). Heading into Friday’s games, the Vancouver Canucks’ Kiefer Sherwood led the NHL with 96 hits, while former Canadien Emil Heineman, now with the New York Islanders, ranked 13th with 68.
Could Arber Xhekaj’s shoulder be injured again or is it confidence/desire to leave Montreal. Because he isn’t even throwing any hits anymore. Something is up.
Simon Says No on X — @PSimon1025
I don’t believe Xhekaj wants to leave Montreal, but there is definitely something up with how tentatively he has been playing.
It’s a topic I talked about on this week’s Hockey Inside/Out Show with former Canadiens teammates and 1986 Stanley Cup champions Chris Nilan and Rick Green.
Nobody knows more about the role of being a tough guy in the NHL than Nilan, who played 13 seasons and remains the Canadiens’ all-time penalty-minutes leader with 2,248. Lyle Odelein ranks second with 1,367.
“I know Arber has struggled a little bit here,” Nilan said. “But I think a lot of that has to do with hesitancy. Should I fight, should I not fight? Has he lost his swagger a little bit? A little bit — and how do you get that back? That’s a really difficult job. People don’t realize how difficult it is because you have that inner battle that: S—, I’m not doing as good as I should. I should be better, blah, blah, blah. And then sometimes you have these influences that are saying don’t fight — like the coach, maybe. ‘I don’t want you fighting here.’ So you’re like in between.
“I’m not making excuses for him, but you got to settle that s— in your own head to be an effective fighter at that level,” Nilan added.·
Enjoying your Habs Mailbag columns. They help expand the range of hockey questions, enhancing appreciation for our beloved (mostly) game. But one of the current elephants in the room pertains to the Canadiens’ avalanche of key injuries. While we all know hockey and injuries are close bedfellows, I wonder how much more the NHL could be doing to stem this awful tide. I mean, when a Dallas Stars player gets just two minutes for hooking prior to Alex Newhook’s board-crashing and season-changing injury it seems seems insufficient. What say you?
Jay Allain, Orleans, Ma.
The NHL’s Department of Player Safety — with former enforcer George Parros in charge — does not do a good enough job of protecting players. They usually rule in favour of the attacker instead of the player who was injured or could have been injured on a dangerous play with intent to injure. Parros too often looks at the result of the play instead of the intent to injure.
An example was during the pre-season when the Ottawa Senators’ Nick Cousins was only fined $2,148.44 — the maximum allowable under the collective bargaining agreement, which is another problem — for a vicious two-handed slash from behind to the hand of Canadiens rookie Ivan Demidov after he had lost the puck. It was an obvious attempt to injure, even though Demidov wasn’t hurt badly.
In my opinion, any obvious attempt to injure a player in an illegal manner should be an automatic one-game suspension — at minimum.
But in the case of what happened with Newhook, I don’t believe there was any intent by Stars defenceman Ilya Lyubushkin to injure him. Lyubushkin gave Newhook a little hook and he unfortunately fell awkwardly into the boards after that, fracturing his ankle. It was indeed a hooking penalty, but there was no need for additional punishment, in my opinion.
If you have a question you’d like to ask for the weekly Habs Mailbag, you can email it to montrealcanadiens@postmedia.com
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