(WGR 550) – With the Stanley Cup Final set to begin on Monday, I, of course, want to recognize how amazing the Montreal Canadiens' run to the Final has been.
On the other side of it, I don’t want to get too carried away.
Montreal only made the playoffs because they played in the North Division, which was, by far, the worst division in the NHL this season. The Canadiens ended up 18th overall in the league standings, and before coming together as a team in these playoffs, they had lost eight of nine games.
Since then, they went on a seven-game winning streak and are 11-2 in their last 13 games. Montreal has a winning percentage of .706 in the playoffs and are 12-5 overall, which is slightly better than their opponent in the Final, the defending champion Tampa Bay Lightning.
If your goalie gets hot in the playoffs, you always have a chance to win. That has happened for both of these teams this postseason.
For Montreal, Carey Price has absolutely stood on his head. It is just like the last time the Habs won the Cup in 1993 when Patrick Roy stole it for a team that had no business being there.
Price is a large reason why Montreal is where it is, but not the only reason. Price is the backbone of a stellar penalty kill that is No. 1 in the league in the playoffs at 93.5%. Montreal presses hard while shorthanded, and often gets more scoring chances on the PK than they give up.
A big part of Montreal’s penalty kill is former Sabres first round pick Joel Armia. He was back on the NHL's COVID-19 Protocols list after already having COVID-19 earlier this season, but he has since cleared the protocols and should be good to go for the series.
When Montreal acquired its captain, Shea Weber from the Nashville Predators, I was widely criticized when I said it was a very good deal for Montreal. The Canadiens gave up P.K. Subban in, what should’ve been, the prime of his career, and the experts said the Canadiens were getting a declining player with a huge contract that still had quite a bit of term left.
As it turned out, Subban is the declining player and is now with the New Jersey Devils, while Weber is still a great defenseman and has played stellar hockey for the Canadiens throughout the playoffs. The “aging, declining star” is averaging 25:38 of playing time per-game.
Corey Perry was in the Stanley Cup Final last year with the Dallas Stars, and he has played his best hockey of the season in these playoffs. Throughout his career, Perry has had the knack of making the big play at the big time, and these playoffs have been no different. He has three goals and six assists for nine points while getting less than 14 minutes per-game.
Former Vegas Golden Knights first round pick Nick Suzuki has been Montreal’s best forward overall. The 21-year-old has made big plays, and always seems to be in the middle of key situations for the Habs. His passing has been eye-opening, and he has a little bit of swag to his game too.
Tyler Toffoli and Paul Byron have two game-winning goals each, giving Montreal balance in these playoffs.
If you told me that Montreal would get this far, I would’ve said Brendan Gallagher would be going crazy, but that’s not the case. Gallagher has just five points in 17 games.
It’s been the kid who, just a few months ago, was playing college hockey with the Wisconsin Badgers. Cole Caufield is just 21 years of age, and was taken by Montreal in the same draft that the Buffalo Sabres selected Dylan Cozens.
Caufield was a healthy scratch for the first two games of the playoffs, because after all, you can’t play 20-year-olds in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, right? Interim head coach Dominique Ducharme was proven wrong, as the kid has four goals and five assists for nine points in 15 games.
Montreal has won an NHL-best 24 Stanley Cups, while Tampa Bay has won two.
Unfortunately, the NHL is a league where you can go on a run with a mediocre team if you get goaltending.
Tampa Bay is loaded with superstar talent from their crease all the way to their forward lines.
Many feel goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy is the best goalie in the world, and I wouldn’t argue that. In the playoffs. his numbers are slightly better than Price’s with a 1.99 goals-against average and a .936 save percentage. In his career, Vasilevskiy has played 76 playoff games and has a 2.28 goals-against average and a .923 save percentage. When the stakes are high, this 26-year-old is at his best.
Both teams are also proving that you don’t build your goaltending through free agency, it’s done through the draft. Vasilevskiy was the 19th overall pick for Tampa Bay in 2012, while Price was the fifth overall pick for Montreal in 2005.
Victor Hedman is considered, by many, to be the best defenseman in the NHL. He, like Weber, gets all the big minutes and he totally controls the game when he’s on the ice.
When you talk about stars, Steven Stamkos is always mentioned with Nikita Kucherov, but for my money, Brayden Point has become a better player than Stamkos. Don’t get me wrong, Stamkos is a star in this league, but the 25-year-old Point just keeps getting better.
Through Game 6 against the New York Islanders, Point had scored a goal in nine-straight games. He came up one short of the NHL record set by former Philadelphia Flyers forward Reggie Leach in the 1970s.
This year, Point has 14 goals and 20 points in 18 playoff games. He also scored 14 goals in 23 games in last year’s playoffs. Point has 70 points in 62 playoff games. He’s amazing around the net, and he’s also good at controlling the puck and helping the Lightning get good entries into the zone.
Kucherov was injured for the regular season, but he leads the league with 27 points in 18 playoff games this season. That’s seven more points than Point, who is second.
Tampa Bay can throw super stars at you, and then they also have, maybe, the best bottom-six forwards in the league too.
Blake Coleman was a huge acquisition from the New Jersey Devils, and getting Barclay Goodrow from the San Jose Sharks and Patrick Maroon from the St. Louis Blues made this team hard to play against. They also gave the stars the protection they need to operate.
If Tampa Bay wins the Stanley Cup, Maroon would be the first player since 1983 to win the Cup in three-consecutive seasons when many of the Islanders did it during their dynasty years.
I’ve talked about all the good Tampa Bay forwards, but I’m missing one.
Who’s third on the Lightning in playoff scoring with eight goals and nine assists for 17 points in 18 games? It’s Alex Killorn. That’s the same amount of points as Stamkos.
We already talked about Montreal’s penalty kill, and it’s going to be tested by the second-best power play in this year’s playoffs. Tampa Bay is scoring at a 37.7% clip with the extra man.
The Lightning’s penalty kill isn’t too shabby either, ranking fourth in the playoffs at 83%. Here’s where the discrepancy is, as Montreal’s power play is only successful 20.9% of the time.
I, obviously, can’t see Tampa Bay losing to Montreal, but I also couldn’t see Montreal beating Vegas or the Winnipeg Jets, and that happened too.
Before I close, I think the real shame of this series is only 3,500 people will be there when Montreal plays at home. The fans in Tampa have been going bonkers throughout the playoffs, and it’s now a full building. The Lightning played all their playoff games last season in the Toronto and Edmonton bubble, so the fans of South Florida have been, and are ready for this.
You can hear the entire Stanley Cup Final on WGR Sports Radio 550. Coverage of Game 1 on Monday gets started at 7:30 p.m. ET.
