In the Habs room: ‘Probably one of my worst games’

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A loss is a loss is a loss.

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Coach Dominique Ducharme tried to find some positives after the Canadiens’ 4-2 loss in Anaheim on Sunday, but the reality is that the not-so-Glorieux ended their West Coast tour with a 1-3 record and returned to Montreal. at the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings at 2-8.

The good news according to Ducharme is that the Canadiens didn’t fold like they did in the third period in Los Angeles on Saturday when they gave up three goals in the third period and lost 5-2 to the Kings.

“I thought we fought back tonight, we didn’t have those ups and downs besides having to kill penalties,” Ducharme said. “I thought we were more consistent and reacted better to ups and downs. We are all aware that we must be more consistent. We can’t be good one night, terrible the other night, okay, pretty good, and then bad again. You can’t go on like this, you won’t win enough games. I think the way we finished the game today was better and we have to build on that. “

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Now, a small dose of reality.

The game ended with Alexander Romanov out of position, allowing Troy Terry to show off his breakaway skills against Sam Montembeault, who gave the Canadiens a chance to win.

They didn’t because you can’t win many games with 18 shots on goal.

You can’t win many games when you give up two power play goals. The penalty survived a 5v3 through 1:32, but Montreal has given up a power play goal in nine of its 10 games.

And you can’t win a lot of games when you only win 28% of your matches. For the second game in a row, no center won more than 42 percent of their meetings, and that meant the Canadiens spent too much time chasing the puck.

While veteran sniper Mike Hoffman scored for the fourth time in the last five games, youngsters Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield are still looking for their first goals of the season.

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“I want to be a good go-to person, but today I wasn’t really doing much to be honest,” Suzuki said. “It was probably one of my worst games. I am very disappointed, especially with some of the centers out. … I thought I was playing a lot better lately on this road trip. I just need to simplify my game, skate more … make the game simple. “

Caufield couldn’t get a shot on goal, but could have struggled to find his rhythm. He played just three minutes in the first period when the Canadiens spent a lot of time at PK. He finished with a season low of 11:03 of ice time.

Center Mathieu Perreault entered injured reserve with an eye injury. He had double vision and doctors discovered that he had retinal detachment. He underwent a laser procedure to treat a condition called reticular retinal degeneration and will be reevaluated in a couple of weeks.

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Brendan Gallagher scratched himself after participating in the pregame warm-up. He looked uncomfortable while skating and is probably dealing with a groin or hip ailment.

“It might take a little time, but we hope he’s not out for long,” said Ducharme, who noted that Gallagher will be reevaluated in Montreal.

Ryan Getzlaf assisted in Terry’s winning goal and became the Ducks’ all-time leading scorer with 989 points, one more than Teemu Selanne. It should be noted that Getzlaf has played his entire career in Anaheim, while Selanne made a few other stops in the NHL and racked up 1,457 points in 1,451 games.

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