It used to be a staple for cartoonists in publications like the New Yorker. A couple of emaciated fellows in ragged clothes dragging their long beards across the desert, struggling toward an oasis in the distance. Add funny caption and bake.
Terry Mosher could draw that as a couple of guys wearing Habs jerseys, struggling toward the 4 Nations Face-Off break in the distance, past cacti bearing the names of teams along the way: the Jets, Wild, Ducks, Sharks, Kings, Devils and Lightning. (When you lay the monikers out like that, it looks like a diabolical gauntlet.)
Seven more games for this very exhausted team, then the oasis of their choice: South Beach, the Bahamas, Guadeloupe, the Dominican, Mexico. Whatever floats your boat.
Mercifully, only three Canadiens will be playing in this wholly artificial 4 Nations affair: Patrik Laine and Joel Armia for Finland, Samuel Montembeault for Canada. If it were up to me, there would be none. The Canadiens’ push to be “in the mix” for a playoff spot has been monumental. Even Lane Hutson looks tired at times and most nights, I would swear in court that the young man is human Red Bull.
If Hutson is a little weary, it wouldn’t be a surprise. Last season, he played 38 games with Boston University and seven more with the Team USA at the World Juniors — 45 games in all. This season, he’s played all 49 games in a compressed schedule and he’s playing big minutes and driving the offence in most games.
Then there’s Nick Suzuki, 422 games into his NHL career and he has never missed one. Still able to drag the Canadiens into a tie with the New Jersey Devils with a goal and two assists on a night where they had all the fizz of last week’s ginger ale. They say Suzuki isn’t a true No. 1 centre, yet as of this writing, he’s 11th in total points among all centres in the NHL and tied for seventh in even-strength points with one Sidney Crosby — all this while battling the top centremen game after game.
An extra day off now before the game against the Wild, another short break ahead of the West Coast trip. Then the Super Bowl weekend games and it’s a race to the sunshine. When they return, Emil Heineman should be back from the injury suffered in Salt Lake when he was hit by a car.
The stretch run after the break isn’t a short one. The Canadiens will still have 26 games to play in 54 days, almost a third of the schedule and a game every other day until Mikko Rantanen and the Hurricanes visit for the finale on April 16.
Will that be the end of the season, or will the Canadiens find the energy, drive, talent, cohesion and plain old-fashioned luck to make the playoffs? Hey, that’s why they play the games. Stay tuned.
Rantanen and ravin’: I do not get the Rantanen trade. If the Carolina Hurricanes can sign him long-term (and they have the advantage of being able to make him an eight-year offer) then it makes sense for the Canes.
But Colorado? Losing a player of Rantanen’s class and leaving him feeling shocked and surprised? Not the greatest moment for the Avs. Somehow, you feel that Kent Hughes would have found a way to hang on to Rantanen. If not, he would have found a way to avoid upsetting one of the league’s biggest stars. Players tend to notice things like that.
And Chicago? Does Connor Bedard understand that the Blackhawks are now at least three to five seasons away from mediocrity, never mind being in contention? No wonder the kid always looks so miserable.
The other Suzuki: Maybe you have to be a bona fide seam-head to understand, or simply a connoisseur of good stories. But no player in baseball history has deserved his selection to the Hall of Fame more than Ichiro Suzuki.
Suzuki was already 27 years old when he left the Orix Blue Wave to join the Seattle Mariners, meaning that he missed at least five MLB seasons. He still managed 3,089 hits in the majors but the stories about the man and his dry wit are even better than the stats. One for the ages.
Raising Kane: Hutson told my mentor Stu Cowan that he idolizes Patrick Kane. It’s easy to see Kane’s influence in Hutson’s play — but we hope the admiration extends only as far as Kane’s game. Off-ice, Kane has been something less than a role model.
Over to you, Jim-Bob: This beauty is from the Avalanche-Rangers game Sunday. “So that go-ahead goal by Cale Makar was the go-ahead goal…”
Heroes: Nick Suzuki, Juraj Slafkovsky, Cole Caufield, Kaiden Guhle, Alexandre Carrier, Kirby Dach, Jack Crawford, Cam Alexander, Andy Reid, Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, Madison Keys, Jannik Sinner, Cassie Sharpe &&&& last but not least, Ichiro Suzuki.
Zeros: Jeff Bezos, Amazon, Daniel Snyder, the Blackhawks, Alexander Zverev, WADA, Joey Barton, Novak Djokovic, Tom Brady, Harrison Butker, Bud Selig Jr., Claude Brochu, David Samson &&&& last but not least, Jeffrey Loria.
Now and forever.