Montreal Gazette
Montreal, Quebec - With his team 2-0 on the road in the Eastern Conference Semi-Finals heading into a pivotal Game 6, from an outsiders perspective you'd think General Manager Evans would be pleased with how the series has gone through 5 games. Inside the Canadiens war room, it's quite the contrary.
After last night's 4-1 lopsided loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning, GM Evans and Head Coach Mike Keenan both spent a little over 5 minutes each blasting the officiating crew in the series. Especially GM Evans who went on a profanity laced tirade directed at the men in charge. The facts are on their side, as the Canadiens have not had more than 3 PP's in a single game thus far. Compared to the Lightning who have had less than 4 PP's only once, and that was in Game 1. TB have been handed 28 PP's through 5 games compared to the Canadiens at 10, an advantage at an almost 3:1 margin. The penalty killer's & Samu Perhonen have done an exceptional job only allowing 2 goals on those 28 chances, a 92.8 percent success rate. Montreal has scored 2 goals on their 10 man advantage opportunites as well.
"This has got to change, our group of guys are fighting their hearts out and you have two individuals in striped uniforms ruining these guys dreams at a Stanley Cup. It's bullsh*t. Joe [Pavelski] had what? 40 Penalty minutes in the entire season and you're whistling him four times for these ticky-tack garbage calls. You're giving him a roughing minor? The guy is one of the nicest pro's I've ever seen, he's like the recycling monster in those commercials you see on TV. He gets slewfooted by one of those goons on Tampa Bay and you call a dive on Joe. Give me a f*ckin break."
GM Evans went to walk away after that, and we all almost turned our mics off, but he came back and went even further.
"Game 2 they open the game with 3 straight calls against us for what I can only describe as equivalent to my 6 year old nephew tapping me on the arm while watching a sitcom on TV. Game 3, we go up 3-1 and they call SIX F*CKING straight penalties on our club. What the f*ck are they watching? Game 4, again, they call five straight penalties on our boys. Hooking, Tripping, Hooking, Tripping, it's like a 2 year old that only knows how to say two words. Now we get to Game 5, we're trailing 2-1 and AGAIN, they f*ckin call 5 straight penalties on us. When is this going to change? How long can this obvious favortism go on for? If it's a cheque they need I'll f*ckin write one. How much has Cote paid them? I'll double it, triple it whatever it takes for a fair game" as Evans storms off hucking his water bottle into a garbage can 10 feet away.
One can understand his frustration, but no doubt this will see a hefty fine from the league office. It doesn't sound as GM Evans cares as he offered up a blank cheque to the officiating crew to straighten out this series ahead of Game 6.
It's undetermined at this point if Head Coach Mike Keenan will be making any lineup changes prior to Game 6, as it's been a very tight checking series thus far. Veteran Alexander Frolov has been called upon numerous times to show up in this series as he's pointless thus far and his linemates Brenden Morrow & David Backes have had a lot of scoring success. One other key forward looking to punch Montreal's ticket to another Eastern Conference Final would be the emergence of Ales Hemsky. Only 6 points in 12 playoff games and he's pointless in the last 2.
Before Game 5, the Habs did a great job in limiting the damage done by Tyler Seguin, and that is part of the focus on the mind of captain Brenden Morrow, "I'm not going to comment on the position the refs have put us in but I do now we have to limit his [Seguin's] chances, he's a world-class player no doubt but it doesn't mean you have to give 10 feet of room when he has the puck."
Game 6 goes tomorrow night and the Canadiens know how important it is to close it out after the Carolina Hurricanes failed to do so in Round 1 and ultimately suffered a Game 7 loss. "Momentum is huge in the playoffs, you get feeling good and on a roll and it's tough for anybody to stop that. We struggled to open up these playoffs, we had a meeting after Game 3 in Carolina and really turned things on and so far haven't looked back. We need to dig deep here and make sure we come out of Florida victorious. You don't want to hand back momentum to your opposition," commented David Backes.