The Montreal Canadiens have had some terrific battles this season, but there are no moral victories as they face elimination against the Washington Capitals.
The Canadiens had a 2-1 lead in Game 4 Sunday night, thanks to Juraj Slafkovsky and Cole Caufield, before the Capitals scored four unanswered goals in the third period and won 5-2. This game showed the Habs’ issue with their offense arising more often than not in this series.
This game was there for the taking, but the Canadiens ultimately failed on offense. They managed only 18 shots on net, half of which came in the first two periods combined. It was a far cry from the 35 shots they had in Game 1, the 26 in Game 2 and 40 in Game 3, so their lack of just getting pucks on net killed much of the momentum from Friday’s 6-3 win.
That said, no matter how many shots on net they’ve had, their goal-scoring is a bigger problem. Outside of that Game 3 win, the Canadiens have only scored five goals in the other three contests combined. Even when looking at expected goals on naturalstattrick.com, which evaluates the quality of the chances they’re creating, they’re below average during the playoffs, and that includes their Game 3 win.
The Canadiens have only been shorthanded 10 times in the first round, which is tied for the second-fewest in the NHL, but five of them came in Game 4. Even though they killed all of them, it’s much tougher to produce any sort of offense when they’re playing short, and it came at a brutal time when Montreal could have tied this series.
All these issues leave a lot of pressure on goaltending to hold the fort. Sam Montembeault is effective at that when he’s at the top of his game, helping the Canadiens force overtime in Game 1 and stay close in a 3-1 loss in Game 2. He’s not a top-tier goalie like Jake Oettinger or Connor Hellebuyck, and consistency is part of that reason, but he has shown his value when he’s hot.
That value became clearer when he couldn’t play Game 4, and Jakub Dobes had a .875 save percentage and minus-0.9 goals saved above expected, according to moneypuck.com.
It is encouraging to see the Canadiens battle hard in this series, just like they did in the regular season to clinch a playoff spot when many expected them to miss again as part of the rebuild. But Montreal doesn’t have the experience to make a comeback all that likely, and Game 3 is starting to look like an outlier in a series where nothing can make up for their lack of goal-scoring.
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