Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Schneider's out, Price is in, Tanguay?

Mathieu Schneider skated for about 15 minutes with his teammates Wednesday morning but has been ruled out for Game 4. But even though Alex Tanguay didn't skate this morning, he remains a game time decision, Bob Gainey said.

The Habs also announced that Patrice Brisebois did not play in Game 3 due to a lower body injury and he is still not available to play tonight, so Gainey will use the same six defencemen he did in Game 3.

Carey Price will be Gainey's man in goal, even though giving Jaroslav Halak a shot in nets appears to be the only way the Canadiens could possibly pull off the impossible and win the next four straight. It's almost as though Gainey is admitting his team can't win the season, so why shatter his franchise goalie's confidence by pulling him now. Better to let him get through this exprience as a whole.

Yes, Game 3 was the time to give Halak a shot, but I still feel Halak has proven before that he can steal four straight games and he should be given an opportunity. It's yet another example of why a GM should not be behind the bench.

No clear evidence of line changes for tonight's game, with Koivu, Kovalev and Andrei Kostitsyn practising with the first power play unit and Tomas Plekanec, Matt D'Agostini and Christopher Higgins on the second. Yannick Weber will be on both units, paired with Roman Hamrlik and Josh Gorges.

"You won't be seeing any Knute Rockne coming out of me," Gainey said. "Let's play. We want to play. We earned a chance to play when we earned our playoff spot."

4 comments:

Schrick said...

"I've found that prayers work best when you have big players."
Knute Rockne

Ted said...

Your eyes are moist, you scream and shout
As though you were a man possessed
From deep inside comes rushing forth
All the anguish you suppressed
Up on your wall hangs your degree
Your parents craved so much for you
And though you're trained to make your mark
You still don't quite know what to do

It's never too late to start all over again
To love the people you caused the pain
And help them learn your name
Oh, no, not too late
It's never too late to start all over again

JOHN KAY - Steppenwolf

Anonymous said...

Price is in because he is our starter and the better goalie.

Halak plays when Price is out or in back-to-back situations. Neither of these apply so Price plays... I don't think it has much to do with Gainey being a GM.

TK said...

Anon,
I don't see what Price has done to deserve to be considered the better goalie. His numbers this season, not to mention the playoffs, demonstrate the ambiguity of that position on this team.
I agree that Gainey is sticking to his guns more out of professional pride rather than foresight.