(Boston) It was a dapper Martin St-Louis who presented himself to the media on Saturday noon in the concentric hall of a luxury hotel in the city center.
His eyes lit up when he talked about the possibility of “doing something that no one has done yet this year”: beating the Bruins at TD Garden in 60 minutes.
He became animated again by coming to the defense of Brendan Gallagher, whom he had criticized after Thursday’s defeat. “As a coach, you have to be careful not to hold guys back too much, otherwise, are you going to have enough competition? »
Ten hours later, his team responded with possibly their worst commitment effort this season. Forget the thermostat or thermometer; It looked more like an air conditioner. In terms of numbers, it settled with a score of 5-2 for Boston. And in words?
“We were slow on the puck all night,” according to captain Nick Suzuki.
But again, Mike Matheson? “Their lives were way too easy. They had a lot more time than us when they had the puck. »
And St-Louis has put the last “nail in the sundae”, to quote a rogue from the Sports section of La Presse. “I thought we were soft,” said the head coach.
St. Louis will sometimes analyze – publicly, we hear – certain results with rose-colored glasses, but Saturday was not one of those nights. A coach can criticize his team in many ways, but calling it “soft” – soft in English – is one of those words that is almost taboo in hockey, because it calls into question the involvement of the players. Watching CH play on this Saturday evening which must have been full of emotion, we quickly agree with the coach’s observation.
From Gustav Lindström with his soft passes, almost into his own goal, at the start of the match, to the passive defense of Juraj Slafkovsky after he committed a turnover, on the Bruins’ fourth goal, the examples abounded.
“There’s a fine line between being too careful and getting burned,” Johnathan Kovacevic said. When I was punished and it gave them a three against five, it was because I was too aggressive at the blue line. Sometimes you have to learn to retreat if you’re not there. But the statistics say a lot about the success you can experience if you successfully enter territory in puck control. »
“We gave them way too much respect, in the one-on-one battles, the bodychecks, the battles for the puck. We were soft tonight,” St-Louis repeated.
Casually, the Canadian concludes the week with four defeats in four games, including his two worst performances of the young season, Thursday and Saturday, according to Natural Stat Trick indicators.
In possession of the puck, the Canadian only controlled 35 and 32% of shot attempts at five-on-five in these two games. In other words, the opponent spent twice as much time in the CH zone as in his own zone, which is quite similar to the observation we made at first sight. In terms of scoring chances, it was 22% on Thursday, 37% on Saturday. In the last two games, Montreal had 13 scoring chances and allowed 33.
We recall that this week began the day after a resounding victory against these same Bruins the previous Saturday. “We don’t expect to be perfect, but I expect us to have standards,” Jake Allen testified. We know where our standard is, we have to go back there. »
It appears that the last two losses of the week were recorded against the two best teams in the NHL. “That’s the level we want to reach,” Matheson admitted of the Golden Knights and Bruins. Sometimes it doesn’t feel good, but you need, as they say in English, a good smack in the face and you respond. »
A good slap in the face. Wasn’t that the feeling that came from the loss earlier this month in Arizona, which followed the game in Vegas? How many slaps in the face will they need to at least be tougher to deal with?
His trio is the only one that was the least bit competitive in this match.
Martin St-Louis’ new combinations did not please him. With the young Juraj Slafkovsky and Jesse Ylönen, he spent the evening besieged in his territory. His failure to face off (4 in 12) probably didn’t help.
The Vegas Golden Knights moved up a target player on Thursday; the Bruins succeeded. Each of the 18 players in uniform put at least one shot on target on Jake Allen.
