3 games to go..

The Montreal Canadiens roll into Ottawa tonight for a 7:30 tilt against the struggling Senators with the division title on the line. As you probably know the Canadiens have already clinched their playoff spot, though they only need to pick up one point in their final three games to clinch the northeast division. It's pretty unbelievable that the Habs are in this position given the fact that they started the season with fairly low expectations. What's even more unbelievable is that the Senators have squandered the massive lead they built up over the entire Eastern conference and at this point they could even miss the playoffs. Quite a fall from grace considering that the Sens came flying out of the gate posting a ridiculous record which lead everyone to assume they would be the cup favorite come this time of year. The Habs are not without their own set of issues right now either. There are plenty of questions marks heading into the playoffs, namely injuries to Saku Koivu(foot), Mike Komisarek(hip), Mark Streit(foot), and Guillaume Latendresse(neck). While the other big question mark is whether or not Carey Price is ready to rise to occasion and play like a champ in nets. I don't care what our regular season stats look like, all I know is that for the Canadiens to have success in the playoffs Carey Price will have to play like a beast.

Quick Hits:

Do the Habs have enough size to compete in the playoffs? A lot of people don't realize that the entire game changes in the playoffs. What worries me is that the Habs are mainly a speed and skill team with very few physical players. Typically, teams like this do very well during the regular season though often fail to live up to expectations in the playoffs. We're lucky that we're in the Eastern conference where there is less hard-nosed physical play, though guys like Komisarek, Bouillon, Lapierre and Begin are all going to have to play like warriors.

How about Josh Gorges! This guy impresses me more every game. Gorges deserves a ton of credit for they way he has stepped up this season and he only continues to get better. Without Gorges, we would be stuck putting the Breezer in the lineup! Nobody wants that... ha

O Bryan, where art thou? In any given season there's always a player or two that really piss me off. For much of this season it was a dead heat between Ryder and Latendresse, both of whom have significantly inproved their game in recent months. Brian Smolinski on the other hand is killing me right now. The guy looks old, and unwilling to get his hands dirty. Smolinski has been the king of the copp out. The only time he will ever go for the puck is when nobody else is around. The rest of the time he spends giving half asked efforts all over the ice and never wins a one on one battle. If he wanted to retire while still playing he should have gone to L.A. or Nashville. My apologies for the negativity at this time of year, but he's been playing like a real Woman for too long now. Pick it up Smokes!

GO HABS GO!