Canadiens shouldn’t overreact to blown lead to Jets
The Montreal Canadiens had by far their most disappointing game to this point of the season on Tuesday night when they watched a 4-0 lead crumble at the hands of the Winnipeg Jets in the final three-plus minutes of the game before ultimately falling in overtime.
While the comeback win could spark a season-saving rally for the Jets, it’s important for the Canadiens to not overreact to one bad stretch of play, as disastrous as it was.
Montreal still owns a 9-3-3 record and sits in second place in a brutally competitive Atlantic Division, and Tuesday’s goaltender (rookie Jacob Fowler) still looks like a future franchise goalie despite the meltdown.
On Wednesday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, host Tyler Yaremchuk and co-host and former NHL goaltender Carter Hutton discussed why this single disastrous result shouldn’t cause Montreal to panic and divert from its current course.
Tyler Yaremchuk: For Montreal, I know today on Sports Talk in Montreal and all those things, they’re having Max Lapierre, they’re going to be having reactions to this one. I also don’t think you want to overreact to anything if you’re the Montreal Canadians. Like, was that absolutely insane? Yes. You’re still a really good team. Like, I don’t think this says much, in a negative way, about the Habs They just totally had the wheels fall off for three minutes.
Carter Hutton: Yeah, that’s it. And I think that’s the other side of it, too. You could tell in the post-game interview when they had the mic in Caufield’s face and the camera, just how disgusted they were with the game. And I think Josh Anderson had a great point, being like: ‘My job in those moments is to push the pace and be there and create energy.’ And they needed to score three goals. I think that’s the biggest thing you’re going to hear today in talk radio and media and TV, is about trying to protect Jacob Fowler. Because the last thing you want to do is for him to slow down because he was just voted Rookie of the Month. He’s been unbelievable. He’s on a crazy run. This is a tough game, a tough game to swallow. When you’re feeling great, now you’re going to roll into your next start when you had this great experience, but you just gave up five goals in the last two minutes and overtime of a game. It’s hard to not let that creep into your game. So you’re going to try to protect a youngster as a 21-year-old if he is your future.
You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode below…
