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In the Habs' Room: Could be worse — Western road swing coming next

“I didn’t wake up this morning hoping to get pulled,” Carey Price said in post-game scrum

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It would be an understatement to say the Canadiens have trouble playing against teams from the Western Conference.

A 6-2 loss to the Edmonton Oilers at the Bell Centre on Saturday night left the Canadiens with a pathetic 3-11-2 against Western teams and that doesn’t bode well for the Canadiens as they prepare for a three-game swing through Western Canada next week.  

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Edmonton arrived here with the second-worst record in the Western Conference and No. 1 goaltender Cam Talbot on the injured reserve list. But none of that mattered because Edmonton dominated from the opening faceoff.

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The biggest problem was Montreal goaltender Carey Price looked like the Carey Price of old ad we’re not talking about the Carey Price who won the Vezina and Hart Trophies in 2015. We’re talking about the Carey Price who went 3-6-1 to start this season. He gave up four goals on 13 shots and was sitting on the bench before the second period was three minutes old.

“I didn’t wake up this morning hoping to get pulled,” Price said at the end of a post-game scrum that was short if not sweet.

When asked about the most disappointing part of the night, he replied: “The potential of the game. A big game for us … Saturday night. Fell flat.”

Price said he was unable to explain the team’s streakiness  — the Canadiens have followed a five-game win streak with three losses — and he couldn’t explain why the the team came out flat. 
But flat they were. 

Canadiens goaltender Carey Price makes a glove save against the Edmonton Oilers in Montreal on Saturday, Dec. 9, 2017.
Canadiens goaltender Carey Price makes a glove save against the Edmonton Oilers in Montreal on Saturday, Dec. 9, 2017. Photo by Graham Hughes /THE CANADIAN PRESS

“We started back on our heels and it looked as if we were worrying about playing defence against some of their players who came through the neutral zone with speed,” Max Pacioretty said. “The way to counteract that is by playing offence. We can’t get away from our game because of players on the other team who blow the zone. We had to make them defend and that wasn’t there.”

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Antti Niemi replaced Price and was both lucky and good as he stopped all 13 shots he faced in the second period. He kept the game from getting out of hand by sticking his right foot out for a save on Connor McDavid.  

“He gave us a chance to get back into the game,” Pacioretty said. “We were hoping to come out strong in the third, but there were two penalties against (Brendan) Gallagher that I thought were a little soft.” 

Oscar Klefbom scored a power-play goal on one of those penalties and a goal by Yohann Auvitu made it 6-1. 

“We started the third period and we were hoping to get a quick goal to make it 4-2 and get some momentum, but we took two penalties in the first five minutes and instead of getting what we wanted, it got worse.”

“It was tough night,’ Shea Weber said. “We didn’t have the start we wanted. Nothing we can do to take it back now. We got to make our corrections, put our work in this week and get ready for (New Jersey on Thursday).”

Weber came to Price’s defence, asking:  “Why would you ever blame him? It’s a team game no matter what. I don’t know why anyone would point the finger at one person. It’s everybody no matter what.”

Jonathan Drouin returned to action after missing four games with a lower-body injury and the flu.  He failed to get a shot on goal and won only three of 12 faceoffs. Tomas Plekanec won only four of 16 and Byron Froese won three of 10.

And we should mention Daniel Carr picked up an assist and has points in all five games he has played since being recalled from Laval.

phickey@postmedia.com

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