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PHILADELPHIA — Montreal Canadiens coach Guy Carbonneau admitted his young goaltender Carey Price has been shaken and stirred by his past two outings against the Philadelphia Flyers.
Carbonneau was queried if his goaltender was rattled after Price surrendered three goals on seven shots in the second period of a 3-2 loss to the Flyers last night.
"Right now, he is definitely," said Carbonneau, whose team had more chances than the Flyers for the second game in a row and has outshot the Flyers 70-37 in the past two games.
But the Canadiens find themselves behind in the second-round series 2-1, a disadvantage they avoided in the first round.
Montreal Canadiens captain Saku Koivu has his shot blocked by Philadelphia Flyers' goalie Martin Biron in the first period of Game 3. (Tom Mihalek/Associated Press)
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"He's 20 years old and we can't forget that," Carbonneau said. "We're asking a lot of him. This is a team game. We had a 5-on-3 [power-play] for a full two minutes [in the first period] and we didn't score. We had our five best players on the ice. I'll take some blame, the players will take some blame. But we have played two really good games and lost both of the games."
Translation: Price hasn't done his job. He has allowed seven goals on 35 shots in the back-to-back losses. After his dreadful second period, Carbonneau sent backup goalie Jaroslav Halak into the crease for the final 20 minutes, but he faced only two shots.
Carbonneau would not commit to which goaltender will start the fourth game tomorrow. He wanted to speak with Price today and get the opinion of his coaching staff. The Canadiens' bench boss also stressed that Price has a history of bouncing back.
In the first round against the Boston Bruins, Price surrendered 10 goals in the fifth and sixth games after giving up just five in the first four games. He responded with a 5-0 shutout in the deciding match.
"It's going to be a long series," Carbonneau said. "If we keep putting 30 shots on goal and hold them to 14, we're going to win."
The Canadiens did not make their fragile young goaltender from Anahim Lake, B.C., available to reporters after his disappointing performance.
Montreal outshot Philadelphia 34-14 before a loud and proud crowd of 19,849 at the Wachovia Center.
Down 3-0 heading into the final 20 minutes, the game became tight when Montreal put its regular-season league-leading power play back on track. Tomas Plekanec and Saku Koivu scored power-play goals, when Flyers veteran defenceman Derian Hatcher was whistled for a five-minute major penalty and game misconduct for boarding after slamming Canadiens defenceman Francis Bouillon face-first into the end boards early in the third period.
Hatcher, who played with Carbonneau with the Dallas Stars, said he initially was told he would receive a two-minute penalty, but then it was detected that Bouillon was bleeding.
"He has a speck of blood and it's five minutes," Hatcher said. "It was a horrible feeling watching. The 15 minutes I wasn't playing was more exhausting than when I was playing."
After no scoring in the first period, the Flyers beat Price on goals by Scottie Upshall, Mike Richards, while shorthanded, and R.J. Umberger. The Canadiens had a 5-on-3 advantage for two minutes midway through the opening period after Steve Downie and Sami Kapanen simultaneously went off for slashing and hooking, respectively.
But the Canadiens mustered only one shot on goal during the two-man advantage, although defenceman Andrei Markov hit the post and Christopher Higgins whiffed trying to knock a bouncing pass from Alex Kovalev into an empty net off a rush.
Montreal's Maxim Lapierre also hit the post in the opening 10 minutes of the game.
The unpleasantness between the two teams hit a fever pitch with 2 minutes 1 second remaining in the first period. Downie tripped Price while in on the fore-check. Montreal's Lapierre and Mike Komisarek pummelled Downie, prompting Hatcher to fly into the melee, only to be tackled by Canadiens forward Steve Begin. Downie received an extra two minutes for his part, giving Montreal another power play that they failed to score on.
