The hair is a good deal whiter than it was on St. Patrick’s Day, 1994 — the day I wrote my first sports column for The Gazette.
I was trying to fill the shoes of Michael Farber, whose feet are considerably smaller but whose talent was always larger than that possessed by your aging scribe. Still, I should have accrued a degree of wisdom after writing thousands of columns.
Enough to know better than to overreact to a loss — or a winning streak.
Like pretty much everyone else, however, I overreacted to that 9-2 loss when the Canadiens were scorched on home ice by an aging Pittsburgh Penguins team.
And I should know better than to overreact to a winning streak that includes road victories over three of the last four Stanley Cup champs, with a tilt against the fourth championship team in Colorado Saturday, following a trap game Friday night against the Blackhawks in Chicago.
But doggone, it’s not simply that the Canadiens are winning games. It’s how they’re winning. Martin St. Louis’s team was full value for each victory — against Florida, Tampa Bay and, in impressive comeback fashion, in Vegas against the Knights.
The Canadiens are getting scoring from all four lines.
Jake Evans and Emil Heineman are tearing it up.
Alexandre Carrier looks like the best low-key acquisition since the Dutch bought Manhattan for a handful of beads.
The enormous threat of Patrik Laine, whether he scores or not, has brought both the second line and the power play into focus.
Nick Suzuki is showing again why he’s the most underrated two-way centreman in the game.
That irrepressible water-bug Lane Hutson is a defenceman in the thick of the rookie scoring race and the race for the Calder Trophy.
If the Canadiens keep this up, Martin St. Louis should be a finalist for the Jack Adams.
Samuel Montembeault is showing why he should be Canada’s starting goaltender for that silly 4 Nations tournament, whether it means anything or not.
No one is more aware that all this could melt away quicker than December snow in a climate-change rainstorm, especially with the Canadiens facing an impossible schedule with games in a four-day span in Chicago, Denver and at home against the Canucks Monday.
Even the worst teams usually have modest winning streaks at some point during the season. But the worst teams don’t beat Florida, Tampa and Vegas back-to-back-to-back on the road. The worst teams aren’t rolling four solid lines and three solid defensive pairs.
And the worst teams don’t react to a 9-2 thrashing by winning six of their next eight games. Knock my wooden head, but the Habs are also really healthy for the first time in years and (as both Laine and Carrier pointed out) they’re playing with intensity and playing for each other.
St. Louis has built something here, a team that is more close-knit than any edition of the CH going back to 1993. They possess a chemistry that you toy with at your peril. There is constant pressure to trade certain veterans but those veterans are very much part of this, they have shown (see Josh Anderson) they’re willing to adjust their games to help the team win and they’re part of that solidarity the kindly young coach is selling.
For as long as I can recall, the Canadiens annual Christmas holiday road trip has been the time seasons go to die. It’s when good teams become mediocre, the mediocre become poor and poor teams become awful. By the time they slink back into town, they’re saying all the right things but fans, media and players alike know that any real shot at a playoff spot is gone.
Not this time. This time, the Canadiens have positioned themselves for a very late run at a playoff spot — a race we are going to ignore until March. No point trying to calculate whether it will require 93 or 96 or 91 points to get there. They have to win games, catch the teams in front of them and let the chips fall where they may.
Meanwhile, Canada needs a Czeching line: So for the second year in a row, Czechia dumps Team Canada out of the Canada Invitational Junior Tournament. I have scorched eyeballs from reading the hot takes ripping everyone from head coach Dave Cameron to Justin Trudeau, who gets blamed for everything from hockey failures to long winter nights.
TSN, the network that took a nice little tournament and hyped it out of all proportion, ought to take a portion of the blame. It’s true that Cameron and the coaching staff did a terrible job and that (not for the first time) Canada’s “physical” play backfired. It’s also true that the world is catching up to us, but next time Canada might try selecting players who have actual skills.
Meanwhile, the real zeros are not at Hockey Canada, or on the ice, or behind the bench, or even among the suits at TSN. The real zeros are the ordinary Canadian fans who chose to hurl jerseys and litter onto the ice as the young Czechs celebrated their victory.
No class at all.