Team Identity: Who's the Focal Point in Montreal?
The Canadiens' biggest weakness
August 2020
May 2021
Domi gone.
Mete gone.
Claude Julien gone.
The Montreal Canadiens limp into the playoffs, like every year, it seems.
Why?
Simply put, MTL is a team without a focal point off the rush, the most important phase of play when it comes to scoring goals.
Early in the 2021 season MTL shoots to the top of the league by creating wide speed in transition and burning through the porous defense of the Vancouver Canucks, among others.
Then the team hits a rough patch, the coach is canned (?), the neutral-zone forecheck is changed (?) and the team’s underlying and actual results stagnate.
Energetic deck chair-moving as the Titanic slowly takes on water.
MTL is locked into fourth place in the North division and may even push the Toronto Maple Leafs in the first round of the playoffs, but beyond the potential of a Cinderella Run in the short-term (as in 2002, 2004, 2010 and even last year for five games), long-term roster construction problems persist.
What Makes an Elite Offensive Player?
Above all, when I scout for top-line skaters, I look for players who are dynamic off the rush, players who can create a high volume of entries with good success rate.
I’m looking for a player like Connor McDavid, Nik Ehlers or Mat Barzal.
Since the admittedly imperfect Domi’s departure, MTL no longer has such a player.
Forwards: Entries
According to NHL analyst Corey Sznajder’s tracking project, the best NHLers at combining high volume (Entries/60) and efficiency (Carry-in%) are:
Connor McDavid (EDM)
Jack Hughes (NJD)
Brayden Point (TBL)
Mat Barzal (NYI)
Leon Draisaitl (EDM)
Nik Ehlers (WPG)
(Honorary mention to rookie Kirill Kaprisov of MIN)
This is a murderer’s row of top-end offensive threats.
On Corey’s chart MTL has no piece of the very top-right corner.
Its most influential rush player is veteran Brendan Gallagher, whose absence due to injury is intensely felt.
Future cornerstones Nick Suzuki and Jesperi Kotkaniemi show well, but the two centers are simply above-average rather than elite. (Note that Corey’s chart presents rate stats, which eliminate the issue of both playing less than the McDavids and Hughes of the world)
MTL defensemen, by virtue of their position, unsurprisingly congregate in the bottom left of the chart. But the immense gap between them and their forwards suggests that MTL’s Ds are either unable or unwilling to make up for the team’s lack of a gamebreaker up-front.
Defensemen: Exits
For Suzuki, Kotkaniemi and Cole Caufield (more of a shooter than a carrier) to consistenly reach the offensive zone with enough gas left in the tank, then, they’ll need some help from their Ds.
Again MTL lacks a focal point.
Ben Chiarot is Montreal’s most active D on breakouts. But the defense-first player lacks the requisite skill to turn those frequent puck touches into controlled exits.
Jeff Petry, whose ability to break the puck out unassisted used to be his bread-and-butter, has slowed down and is now only average by NHL standards (he’s smack dab in the middle of the chart).
Shea Weber and Alexander Romanov don’t like to get involved, but efficiency favors the rookie.
Joel Edmundson and Brett Kulak are poor on exits. Kulak compensates by playing a tight gap and by positively influencing the run of play elsewhere on the ice. Edmundson has few redeeming qualities as a player.
Meanwhile, the best NHL D-men on exits:
Quinn Hughes (VAN) - high volume with good efficiency
Matt Grzelcyk (BOS) and Cale Makar (COL) - low volume but with elite efficiency
All three can either beat F1 with a dynamic carry or sprint the weak side to catch a change-of-side pass and jump-start the rush. (AKA Improving the Condition of the Puck)
Who’s Coming?
Prolific entry and exit creators are easy to scout. At junior and minor pro levels they have the puck all game long. But not all of them retain that ability against NHL competition.
Suzuki was an elite transition player in the OHL but his lack of outstanding speed has prevented him from exerting the same influence on an NHL game thus far.
Caufield relied on Hughes to transport the puck with the USNTDP. He’s improved that aspect of his game in Wisconsin, but he’ll always be at his best off the puck, hunting for space and one-timer opportunities rather than creating entries himself.
Kotkaniemi and Romanov, thrust into Liiga and KHL early in their development, never had the chance to take over a game. They may remain low-volume, decent efficiency players their entire careers.
The best hope for change is perhaps defenseman Mattias Norlinder, a truly enigmatic player still rounding out his game in the SHL. (Read about my Norlinder interview at the 2019 NHL combine)
But aside from the Swede, who else does MTL have coming?
I’m not sure.
Are we in for another generation of offense-by-commitee and mediocre results in Montreal?
I think so.
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