What a great surprise today! Habs GM Marc Bergevin sure is not fooling around when it comes to building a team, and he has shown us that again today by trading veteran forward Travis Moen to the Dallas Stars in return of veteran defenseman Sergei Gonchar. Not too long ago, I wrote a post where I analyzed Moen's game with the Canadiens where I was saying he needed to go. (for reference, visit: http://www.habsaddict.com/2014/10/why-travis-moen-needs-to-go.html)
For those of you who haven't read my article, I was mostly saying how Moen's intensity dropped down dramatically in the past few years and how he was stealing a spot for a young rookie on a 3rd or 4th line. With Rene Bourque out and Moen traded, now's a great time for Therrien to have rookie Jiri Sekac be part of his main roster as well as trying out players like Drayson Bowman (who just got called back yesterday) for example.
But enough of that, let's analyze Gonchar's play. The veteran defenseman has been out due to an injury since the beginning of the season. He got back in Dallas' line-up on November 4th. In three games this year, he managed to get one assist, a -1 rating, one shot on goal and three hits. Surely it is a pretty slow start, but let's not forget he just started skating about a week or so ago. Let's give him some time.
In his career, Sergei Gonchar managed to notch 219 goals and 579 assists for a total of 798 points in 1,256 games (including 102 powerplay goals and 321 powerplay assists, for a total of 423 powerplay points). At 40 years of age, we aren't expecting him to stay with Montreal for a lot of years. In fact, he will be an unrestricted free agent at the end of this year. The reason why Bergevin traded for him is mostly to have another defenseman to help Subban and Markov on the powerplay. At first, we got told Tom Gilbert could do the job, but Marc Bergevin is known for acting quickly when things are not working out, and it's not a secret to anyone that Montreal's powerplay was really terrible.
Financially speaking, Gonchar will earn $5 million this year, while the Dallas Stars will retain 8% of his salary ($400,000, which brings the cap hit down to $4.6 million. Moen is earning $1.85 million for the next two seasons. Technically, Gonchar will cost $2.75 million more than Moen, but considering how Moen played this year (0 point in 9 games), I highly doubt Gonchar could do worst, especially with his background. It is also worth noting Bergevin tried to acquire him last summer.
We will have to wait and see if Gonchar's ankle injury, which kept him out of the line-up at the beginning of the season, will truly affect him in the long term. But as a personal opinion, I am really impressed with this trade and I honestly believe Montreal's powerplay will get back in business, especially right on time for the game against Boston Bruins this upcoming Thursday.
Do you like this trade?
Do you think Marc Bergevin will trade a defenseman for a forward now?
We're baaaaaack! Fresh off a nice warm week in Mexico, Habs To The Top is back in action and ready to roll for the second half of the season. Hope you all had a great holiday season and a fab new years. Ok, on with it then...
Game Summary:
After four long days off the Habs finally got back into action last night and defeated the Dallas Stars 5 - 3 in regulation. While they won the game by two goals, they made it much harder on themselves than it needed to be. From the start of the game, the Habs looked like a team playing with the rust of four days of rest. Up and down the lineup - except for maybe the Gomez, Gionta, Pouliot line - the Habs were shaky and disorganized in the defensive zone. This was evidenced by the 11 giveaways that the Habs had on the night - two of which resulted in goals by the Stars. But, despite coming out and playing a shaky first 40(ish) minutes, the Habs settled down and closed the game out in the third for a much needed two points in the standings.
It was also nice to see Laraque score his first goal in a Habs uniform - on only his second shot of the season - a goal which he dedicated to the people of Haiti who are in deep crisis.
Game Notes: 1 - Price looked shaky most of the night but made some great saves including a "TSN turning point" save with about 15 minutes left in the third. With the score tied 3-3, Price stoned Neal with his glove from the low slot. Two minutes later the Habs scored - Gionta's second powerplay goal of the night - to go ahead 4-3 and that was all she wrote. While Price was unstable through the first two periods, he too settled down to close out the game in the third period. And for a rare occasion the team in front of him filled the opposing nets. He has been cursed this season with great play but little to no offense in front of him. Nice to see the change and nice to see his team score more than 2 goals in front of him.
2 - Pouliot continues to impress. When he came to Montreal in the Latendresse trade, I don't think anyone really expected very much from Pouliot. While he was a 4th overall pick in 2005 - one spot ahead of Carey Price - he has been floundering in Minnesota and generally seemed like a bust. Like Latendresse, the knock against Pouliot was that he was not willing to go to the net and pay the price on a consistent basis. Fast forward a month or so, and Pouliot has 6 points (5G, 1A) and is a +1 over 10 games since joining the Habs. Like Latendresse, Pouliot seems like a player that was in a need of a change of scenery and, so far, he is thriving in Montreal. Not only that, but he filled the second line left wing void that he been there since the beginning of the season. It is unfortunate that AK46 is out for 6 weeks, because for a moment there the Habs had TWO good scoring lines.
Pouliot, to his credit, is using his size and skill to get shots away, to grind it out in the corners and to crash the net. If you don't know where to find Pouliot, look to the opposing net...he is always headed towards it or hovering around it. This is skill that has been sorely lacking on the Habs for years. It seems like the change of scenery is working for Pouliot and as such, he might end up being a steal for the Habs. Remember that he was drafted 4th overall and has the potential to be an elite winger. Time will tell.
3 - The 2nd line is firing on all cylinders. With the return of Gionta and the addition of Pouliot, Scott Gomez has got two wingers the perfectly compliment his style and it is showing for all three on the scoreboard. That line finished with 5 points on the evening (Gionta 2 PP goals - in the 500th game of his career - Pouliot had 1G, 1A, and Gomez finished with 1A). Its nice to have secondary scoring on this team, for a change. Now all they need is to find a suitable replacement for AK46 on the top line. Damn the injuries!
4 - Speaking of Gionta's powerplay goals, the Habs finally scored with the advantage at home last night. While the Habs have the #1 pp in the league - clicking at 24.6% - their home PP percentage has been much less effective at 18.6% (including last night 2 goals).
5 - George Laraque, understandably, played his most inspired hockey game of the season and scored his first goal in a Habs uniform. And man was he happy! In case you don't know, George Laraque is Haitian and in case you have been living under a rock you know that Haiti is in the grips of destruction after a massive earthquake decimated the country. That being said, you could see how happy Big Georgie was to score as he mouthed "Finally! F-ck!" on TV. After the game, he told the media scrum that he dedicates his goal to the people of Haiti. Right on man, they need all the positive vibes they can get! Here's the goal in case you missed it:
This goal seemed to give the Habs the emotional lift they needed to get over the hump and win the game.
Standings:
The Habs looked sloppy in the defensive zone last night leading to turnovers, too many rebounds and allowing the Stars to stay in the game when they could have put it out of reach in the 2nd period. While Montreal struggled to get the rust off after 4 days rest, they ultimately pulled it out in the third and earn a well needed two points in the standings to leave them tied for 8th overall in the East with 50 points.
Next Game:
The Habs have the day off before taking on the Sens in Montreal on Saturday night. With the Sens tied with Montreal for points (50), wins (23), losses (21) overtime losses (4) and games played (48), this is another four-point, must-win game for the Habs. Saturday's game is the first of two back to back games, the other against the Rangers on Sunday.
