HabsCast Hockey Blog

If Thursday night wasn’t enough for you then get ready for Saturday, when the Montreal Canadiens will play host to the Buffalo Sabres. Like the Senators, the Sabres are packed with offensive skill albeit losing Daniel Briere and Chris Drury to free agency. The Sabres are off to a decent start going 3-2, which in those 5 games they have accumulated 24 goals. The Canadiens, on the other hand, are on a three game losing streak and will need to play with the same intensity that they did against Florida and Ottawa if they want a good chance at winning this contest.

The Canadiens’ play wasn’t terrible by all means on Thursday night. They were matched up against a much better team and mounted a solid comeback in the third. There were some costly mistakes that were made but they happen and the only thing the Canadiens can do is move forward. The stat that should be most alarming for the Canadiens is the 14 goals for in 6 games played. It is clear that the offense needs to step it up to help their defense and goalie. There’s a saying that your best defense is good offense and the Canadiens should try to follow through on that. In order to win against Buffalo, goals must be scored and in large quantities. Buffalo is practically averaging 5 goals a game and the Canadiens haven’t even scored 4 goals in a game yet this season.

It should be interesting to see what Carbonneau will do for Saturday night’s lineup. The official lineups aren’t available so I’ve decided to have some fun. These are my ideal lines that I believe can really work for this team. (Be free to share your ideal lineup in the comments section)

Forwards
Kostitsyn – Koivu – Ryder
Plekanec – Higgins – Kovalev
Latendresse – Smolinski – Kostopolous
Begin – Chipchura – Dandenault

Defense
Markov – Komisarek
Gorges – Hamrlik
Bouillon – Streit

Goalie
Huet

I’m not going to go into large detail to why these lines are the most desirable by my point of view, however, I think it’s time that Carbonneau breakup the first line. Obviously, the Canadiens are having a tough time scoring goals and some shuffling is definitely worth a shot. Higgins on the second line between Plekanec and Kovalev seems most logical. Higgins’ hard work mentality and puckhandling skills will get a better effort out of Kovalev and bring the best out of him. Plekanec is showing that he’s a gifted offensive player and deserves a shot on a scoring line.

Enough about these “dream lines”. The bottom line is if the Canadiens want to win tomorrow night’s game they must find a way to score goals. Simply relying on a one goal lead will not cut it in today’s NHL. It is not the fault of the Canadiens’ defense that they’re in the position that they’re in now, but the offense’s lack of goal scoring. They need to stop with the abundance of passes and take more shots on goal. The more shots they have on net than the more likely they are to score. It’s that simple.

Prediction: Montreal 5, Buffalo 3

I think the Canadiens had enough with the scoring drought and have yet to win on home ice. So I’m going to go ahead and predict that the Montreal Canadiens will defeat the Buffalo Sabres.

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