Archive for July, 2009

The first victory Jan 5th 1910

The Montreal Canadiens won their first ever game on January 5th 1910.

The team skated with 7 players.
Jack Laviolette who captained, managed and coached the team.
Didier Pitre, Jos Cattarinich, Newsy Lalonde, Ed Décarie, Arthur Bernier and George Poulin.

The game was won against the Cobalt Silver Kings by a score of 7-6 in front of 3000 fans in the Jubilee Arena.

Although that was the first Montreal Canadiens victory it was not the team’s first official victory as the league had to restart their season.

Remembering Le petit Viking – Mats Naslund

Mats Naslund.

That name brings back childhood memories of watching Canadiens games.

Mats Naslund was a very gifted offensive player. Standing at only 5 foot 7 inches he certainly was not the big power forward like say a Bobby Smith. But what Mats Naslund brought to the table was spectacular.

We were blessed to have him in Montreal for several years. Back in 1985-1986 Mats exploded for 43 goals and 67 assists for a total of 110 points. That was also the year that the Montreal Canadiens won their 23rd Stanley Cup.

Naslund was picked 37th overall in the second round of the 1979 NHL draft by the Montreal Canadiens.

In 1988 Naslund bet out Wayne Gretzky for the Lady Bing trophy and during the all-star game of that same year recorded 5 assists.

Naslund finished his career in Montreal with 612 points in 617 games. A point per game player over 8 years.

Watch him come out of nowhere to score a goal back in the 1980 winter olympics playing for Sweden vs West Germany. He had not yet played in Montreal.

Or who can resist seeing a video of Don Cherry… blasting Mats Naslund and 8 year old kids at the same time.

Without making a direct comparison to Mats Naslund but in the theme of small offensively gifted players we have Brian Gionta. He’s also 5′7. Let’s hope Jacques Martin makes sure he’s got room to play.

Mats Naslund was an awesome player.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mats_Naslund

Anyone have any memories or comments about Mats Naslund? Please feel free to leave your thoughts. I love reading them.

New faces in their montreal canadiens jerseys today

First off I’d like to say thank you to the Montreal Canadiens for putting this stuff online because I’m seriously experiencing withdrawl.

I swear I was smiling while watching this video. They were all standing in line in their dressing room at the practice facility… Travis Moen, Brian Gionta, Scott Gomez, Mike Cammalleri and Paul Mara.

Then with pictures flashing they put on their new uniforms. Awesome. In fact, I’ve been dying to see some habs hockey and just seeing them put the jerseys on with their names and numbers, it somehow helped satisfy the desire for a game.

They looked good in those uniforms.

Travis Moen to me looked like he could have thrown everyone around without difficulty. Is it just me or does he look big?

Then Mike Cammalleri, Scott Gomez and Brian Gionta jumped on the ice to practice with some kids. It’s awesome. They seemed to have fun. I think both Gomez and Cammalleri are gonna be great with the media, well at least when “some” media isn’t trying to make some kind of fuss about something new… now that they can’t blame Koivu for everything under the sun.

Boys look good in their uniforms.

And for anyone who hasn’t watched the video, here it is:

What do you think??

Andrei Markov was last season’s Iron man

Did you know that Andrei Markov is a pretty durable player?

Andrei Markov lead the Montreal Canadiens in minutes played and average time on ice last season.

In 2008-2009 Andrei Markov finished the season ranked 20th in the league in total minutes on ice with 1920 minutes and 51 seconds.

If you take it to the average Markov played 24 minutes and 37 seconds each game and finished 18th in average ice time played.

An average of 28.2 shifts per game.

Oddly enough, the player with the highest “time on ice” rating last year was Bryan Allen for the Florida Panthers. Even though he only played 2 games.

Think he’ll log as many minutes this season?

I think he’ll average about the same.

New players vs Old players – Numbers game

I thought I’d take a look at a some numbers and try to have fun. That probably really makes me sound lame…. but anything to do with the Montreal Canadiens will interest me in general.

Trust me.

So to start, what I wanted to do was simply look at last years roster and this year’s roster (2008-2009 vs 2009-2010) and compare some numbers.

So we have 7 players coming in and something like 11 players going out. Here’s a breakdown of the numbers each player game the habs last year:

Looking at last year vs this year and taking out Mathieu Schneider’s numbers because he only finished the season in Montreal, we see something like this:
New Habs – 539 out of 574 possible games played. 35 missed games or 6.1% missed.
Old Habs – 601 out of 820 possible games played. 219 missed or 26.7% missed.

With these numbers, some things don’t really look too different if you do crunch numbers but other things kind of jumped out at me.

Did you know Scott Gomez finished 16th in the league in shots on goal last year?
Did you know Mike Cammalleri finished 25th and Brian Gionta finished 31st?

Last year’s leader (in Montreal) was Alex Kovalev who finished with 209 in 68th position overall. Tomas Plekanec was right behind him with 202 shots on goal.

Did you know that Mike Cammalleri finished 3rd in Power Play goals last year?

Alex Kovalev had 11 power play goals last season.

All those numbers are just that, they are numbers from a season gone by. All these players find themselves in new places (well, most of ‘em) and they’ll be surrouned with new teammates. So their numbers this year could vary, for better or worse.. depending on chemistry, the team’s system (or strategy), injuries…. a whole host of varialbes.

A few things jumped out at me.

1. Scott Gomez will likely shoot the puck quite a bit. Putting the puck on the net is a good thing although he’s never been scorer so much as a playmaker.
2. Mike Cammalleri will likely be shooting alot. He had 299 shots on goal in 2006-2007.
3. Robert Lang was a great pickup last year… so efficient. As was Alex Tanguay. Tanguay’s number weren’t too bad at all really. Just too bad he was hurt and seemed a bit soft in the playoffs.
4. The players coming in (7 of them) actually have a higher total of shots on goal as the ones going out (that’s 11 going out).
5. Although I was a fan of Chris Higgins and do wish him the best, I can’t seem to be disappointed in the numbers he put up last year.

I do believe this year we’ll see a more organized and tighter defensive system that will protect Carey Price. Players like Gionta and Gomez thrived in New Jersey with a similar system and if the defense is tighter it will be so much more fun for Price.

The team has a new look, the dressing room will have a new feel and the team’s culture is different. Who knows which way it will go. I’m waiting to hear more from the analysts.

Whatever they say, just remember. 2 years ago most of ‘em said the Montreal Canadiens wouldn’t make the playoffs while they finished 1st in the east. And 1 year ago most analysts picked them to go deep in the playoffs, some even to contend for the stanley cup, while they barely crawled in at 8th.

So many variables. It can’t be calculated. But the sum of the team’s efforts night after night will tell the story.

Go Habs!

A fine cook – Scott Gomez

In the spirit of finding out new things about our new lineup for the Montreal Canadiens, I thought I’d post this short video.

I’m becoming a fan of Scott Gomez.

In fact if you reading this Scott, you can come over and cook anytime!

Montreal Canadiens Hall of Fame submissions

Over at canadiens.com they have a new website, devoted to help retracing the 100 year history of the great Montreal Canadiens organization.

If you visit the website, you’ll be greeted by video of Guy Lafleur welcoming you.

They’re looking for people to submit their memorabilia for display.

I have to visit!

http://hall.canadiens.com/

Hal Gill in the new uniform

Over on Canadiens 1-on-1 I saw a video of one of the newest Montreal Canadiens players. Hal Gill.

The big defensemen had a tour of the workout facilities, posed for some pictures and suited up in his new uniform (number 75). He then skated with some kids.

I don’t know much about Hal Gill. Really, I just spent time disliking him because he played for the Toronto Maple Leafs and for the Boston Bruins. But from what I’ve read and the few videos I’ve seen he seems to have a good attitude.

Hal, if you happen to read this (hey, you never know!), like I said I was never a fan… .just because you wore those other jerseys… but now, I gotta say that I can’t wait to see you clear people away from the front of the net. And seeing you wear the Habs “bleu, blanc et rouge” is really making it hard for me to wait until the season starts!!
(All is forgiven for that other jersey thing)

Hal Gill, welcome to the Montreal Canadiens!

Here’s the video.

Canadiens History : 1986 finals brawl

Some people want to take fighting out of hockey still today. But I gotta say that we don’t see this kind of thing very often anymore.

Lot’s of fights VS the Calgary Flames in 1986 on the way to their 23rd Stanley Cup.

If you watch the whole thing a former Habs player almost gets it going again… anyone remember John Kordic??

The Hockey News interview with Mike Cammalleri and some thoughts on the new team

I just watched the video of The Hockey News interview with Mike Cammalleri. The interview is 6 minutes and 57 seconds long.

When I first loaded the page up, I thought that Cammalleri looked good in the vintage Montreal Canadiens uniform.

I thought Cammalleri was a good move for sure…. but the more I watch youtube clips, saw him on OTR on TSN…. and with this interview I gotta say I like the Mike Cammalleri signing more and more.

Cammalleri seems to be well spoken and from what I heard he said some pretty interesting things about the new lineup. When asked about the identity of the new Montreal Canadiens lineup he, as well as Ken Campbell, weren’t too shure on what the identity was but as their conversation went Campbell talked about Bob Gainey acquiring guys who are hard workers and who have experience winning… and some playing together.

Then Cammalleri said they may have touched on what the identity of the team is actually going to be. I thought something similar as I learned a little more about these guys. They’re starting to look more like a team who shows up every night and plays hard.

Not to take anything away from last year’s lineup (and some prior years) but that wasn’t quite their reputation. Alex Kovalev certainly hasn’t been known as a player who would bring it every night and the team in general last year had such a major meltdown that they would just stop competing.

I think Cammalleri is just the kind of guy who we should have in Montreal. He wants to compete… he wants to win… he knows how hard the city can be…. he really seems to appreciate and respect the hockey tradition…. and he understands the pressure of playing amidst a rabid hockey fan base and the “occasional” love-hate relationships that some fans have with their players.

Here’s the link to the video:
One-on-One with Habs sniper Mike Cammalleri