VIDEO: Poor Len reviews last night's Canadiens vs Senators game (?)

You know the old Henny Youngman joke: "I went to the fights the other night and a hockey game broke out!" Here's our National Sports (as long as it's hockey) Editor, Poor Len Canayen, with his take on last night's tilt in North America's most beautiful second-tier (state/provincial) capital.

Tank youse, Hed! Hockey fans in Québec (the city) are still pissed at Gary Bitchmann, the non-skating Jew who is czar of the so-called National Hockey League. It is he, and he alone, who stands in the way of the return of NHL hockey to Québec City, former home of the much-missed Québec Nordiques, who fell victims of wee Gary's drive to make "National" mean "American", and American only. Perhaps he's one of those behind President Trump's constant allusions to making Canada "the 51st state"?

But I digest. NHL hockey was played last night in the fine Centre Vidéotron, where the Ottawa Senators, the home team for the night, received the Montréal Canadiens in a thrilling match which delighted the multitude of Habs fans in attendance... Sens fans not so much.

       

Interviewed after the game, Habs D-man Alexandre Carrier said, "Rendu en troisième, on ne jouait plus vraiment au hockey." True enough. Between them, the teams racked up 152 penalty minutes in a fight-filled 5-0 victory for les Glorieux.

At the centre of the mêlée were the Xhekaj brothers, Arber and Florian, with two fights each. Florian fought Jan Jenik in the first period, and Arber and Jenik traded blows in the second. Then, in the third, both brothers fought on the same shift when Arber took on Zack MacEwen and Florian battled with Carter Yakemchuk near the Habs' bench. The brothers combined for 31 penalty minutes and were both ejected from the game, along with MacEwen, after those third-period fights. 

Also in the third period, Senators forward Nick Cousins was penalized for an egregious slash on tiny but terrible Canadiens rookie Ivan Demidov, who, along with Lane Hutson, put on a skating and stick-handling clinic that deserved a standing O.

For the record, the Canadiens' goals were scored by Oliver Kapanen, Patrik Laine, Alexandre Carrier, Lane Hutson and Kirby Dach, three of the goals coming on the power play. Assist went to Dach, Demidov, Hutson and Laine, as well as Alex Newhook, Mike Matheson, and Brendan Gallagher.

The victory was largely due to the fine work of the young players, but the contribution of the old pros should be noted. It was good to see Dach figure in the scoring. We hope doing so will help him regain his self-confidence. And Brendan Gallagher... what can we say except "We love ya!"

Last night was perhaps the last opportunity for players who are "on the bubble" to show that they deserve to stay with the Big Team when final cuts are made after Saturday's last pre-season game at Ottawa. Owen Beck, Joe Veleno, Samuel Blais and Zach Bolduc were present last night but did nothing in particular to help or hurt themselves.   

The best of the prospects, IMHO, was Kapanen, whose goal last night was the icing on the cake of a strong performance. My money's on him to be in the starting line-up for the first regular season game, along with maybe Beck. The season opener is October 8th, at Toronto.

We leave you with a pic from last night's game: Jayden Struble on top of Jan Jenik.

If you like your hockey like a good steak... bloody... this was your kind of game!

Footnote added at 1235 FMT: The blatant attempts of certain Ottawa players to inflict serious physical damage on the smaller and better Canadiens did not go unnoced by the NHL Department of Player Safety. Nick Cousins has been fined $2148.44 -- the maximum permitted under the agreement with the players -- for his vicious slash on the arm of Ivan Demidov. Hayden Hodgson was fined $2148.44 for boarding Alex Newhook. The money goes to the NHL Players Emergency Fund.

Poor Len sets the table for the NHL Stanley Cup finals

Poor Len here here, with a few words before catching up on my sleep after Game 7 of the NHL Eastern Conference finals. I won't pretend it was a great hockey game, and the result seemed to me inevitable. After 85 minutes of play, Pittsburgh Penguins edged the Ottawa Senators 3-2.

A big tip of the toque goes to Sens beleaguered goalie Craig Anderson, who kept his team in there. Finally, though, Ottawa had the same problem that beset the Montréal Canadiens. It takes more than a great goalie and an all-star defenceman to win a championship. You have to have guaranteed goal-scorers up front. Pittsburgh has 3, and Ottawa... not so many.

Time now to review my picks (as adjusted) for the Stanley Cup finals, which begin this coming Monday night. I had the Eastern Conference pretty much figured out, although I thought (hoped?) the conference final would pit les Glorieux against the Penguins. The upside of being slightly wrong on that was that I didn't need my crying towel last night, and didn't lose any money. In fact I made a couple of bucks from Canucks dreaming of a big upset following their team's Game 6 win.

As for the Western Conference, the Nashville Predators continue to astound and confound me. I thought the Anaheim (Formerly Mighty) Ducks had a nicely balanced team and should have been able to get by the Preds. I underestimated Pekka Rinne, who is a contender for MVP in the playoffs and must be rated right up there -- perhaps above -- all-star goalies Carey Price, Hendrik Lundqvist and Braden Holtby, all of whom are now on the golf course or practising for the rodeo (Carey! Carey! Carey!) or whatever they do in the off season.

Nashville too has a nicely balanced team, and play as such, in spite of the efforts of one egotistical player (hello, P.K. Subban!) to glorify himself. (Memo to P.K.: Nothing wrong with blessing yourself before a game, if you're Catholic, but you don't kneel on the ice in front of your bench to do it. Nor do you tear off your sweater to reveal your black body after your team wins. Those showoff stunts are for soccer players.) I watched most of the Preds vs Ducks games, waiting for Mr Ego or someone else to make some horrible gaffe. No-one did. Congratulations to coach Peter Laviolette on great work getting these guys to play as a team.

Will the Predators' (and Rinne's) hot streak continue through the Stanley Cup finals? Will Penguins' Phil Kessel be wrapped in a wet sheet and taken to the funny farm before the series ends? Will P.K. Subban "lose an edge" and cough up the puck for a Pittsburgh goal? Can almost-rookie goalie Matt Murray stand the heat for six or seven games? If not, will Marc-André Fleury be mentally ready to get back between the pipes? Should be an entertaining series. I stand by my earlier prediction: Pittsburgh in 6... or maybe 7. Lifetime pct (still) .973.

VIDEO: Habs defeat Cinderella Senators, advance to second round

Poor Len Canayen here, with a couple of thoughts about the NHL playoff series between the Montréal Canadiens and the Ottawa Senators -- the ones people like, not the ones who infest Parliament Hill.

The hard-working Senators [not the ones who infest, etc. Ed.] did their best, last night, to prolong the series, outshooting La Sainte Flanelle 43-20. Sadly for them, Carey Price -- hereinafter TBGITW (The Best Goalie In The World) -- stopped all 43 of the Sens' shots, whereas Ottawa's Craig Anderson, no slouch himself, allowed one to get by him. Result: Montréal 2 - Ottawa 0. (The Habs second goal was scored into an empty net with 3/10ths of a second left.) Montréal wins the series 4 games to 2, and goes on to the second round against either Tampa Bay or Detroit.

To call Carey Price TBGITW is, IMHO, no understatement. Here's just one example of the several "saves of substance" he made last night.



Naturally, Hockey Night in Canada selected TBGITW for a quick post-game interview, before he left the ice. Mr. Price was his usual modest self, attributing the win to the hard work of his teammates and a couple of lucky bounces. He might have mentioned a quick whistle in the second period which resulted in an Ottawa goal being disallowed, but we won't quibble about that.

What burned my ring last night was the way TPWMNBC -- The Player Who May Not Be Criticized, a.k.a. P.K. Subban -- inserted himself in the interview to make sure viewers knew who the real star was, is, and will always be, as long as the Montreal Gazette's alleged sports writers (Hello, Dave Stubbs!) think the sun, moon and stars shine out of Subban's arse.

Stubbsy will have a hard time singing the praises of TPWMNBC in relation to last night's game though, for Subban contributed nothing to the Habs' win. (That's him, #76, lying on the ice in front of Price in the video clip.) But, by jumping into the interview, he did manage to answer the question posed here just under a year ago. That article has drawn quite a few hits this month. Real hockey fans know who the real heroes are.

Walt's playoff recap: Montréal Canadiens vs Ottawa Senators

Ed. here. Walt's mind and/or heart has been elsewhere this week, hence the dire dearth of new posts on WWW. From wherever he is, he has sent a number of dispatches, of which this is the first.

Walt and Poor Len were MIA for several hours on Wednesday, Friday and Sunday evenings, watching their beloved Montréal Canadiens defeat the Ottawa Senators in the first three games of one the eight NHL playoff series. Scores were 4-3, 3-2 (in overtime) and, last night, 2-1 (also in overtime). The Habs gave up the first goal and trailed 1-0 at the end of the first period in all three games, but came back to win.

Regular readers of WWW will know that Poor Len watches carefully the every move of P.K. Subban, the PC winner of the Norris Trophy a couple of years ago, the one whom the Montreal Gazette's Dave Stubbs thinks -- even now -- is a "transcendant" defenceman. Here's what we saw this week.

In Game 1, Mr. Subban led the team in penalties, the second being a 5-minute major plus a game misconduct for a vicious two-handed lumberjack slash on Ottawa's Mark Stone, causing a hairline fracture of the Stoney wrist. Les Glorieux managed to win the game without Subban, with Jeff Petry filling the gap without doing anything stupid.

In Game 2, P.K. whistled a cannonading slapshot [Hello Danny Gallivan, wherever you are! Ed.] past Andrew Hammond to score the Habs' second goal. The Hamburglar heard the 85-mph rocket coming at actually ducked to avoid being decapitated. Very good. But Montréal fans and coach Michel Thérrien still wish that Subban would pass the puck occasionally, especially on the power play, which continues to struggle.

Last night, Mr. Stubbs's home boy was, as usual, out of position when Ottawa scored its lone goal. P.K. took a high, hard, open-ice check from Ottawa's Patrick Wiercioch. Bent on revenge, he charged over to the boards in an attempt to crunch Sens star Erik Karlsson. That left Subban's buddy Andrei Markov -- who planted a kiss on P.K. after the Friday night goal -- alone against two attackers. Result, Ottawa goal.

Poor Len stands by his recent re-evaluations of P.K. Subban, and adds that if he (Subban) ever learns to play defence, he'll become an asset to the Canadiens, rather than the liability he is now.