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Five questions: Montreal’s relative deadline inactivity, Olympic hangover

March 7, 2010 02:06 PM | Posted by   Guy Carbonneau  

Here's how it works. You submit a question and Guy will provide the answer to five of them every week. It's that simple. That means your question may not make the final list, but there is nothing stopping you from submitting more than one! You can send your questions to CBCHockeyOnline@cbc.ca or post a comment in the field below.

Here are today's questions:

1. Montreal didn't do much in the trade deadline. Is that because the new GM is inexperienced? - Wilson
Not at all, Pierre Gauthier has been involved in hockey and around the NHL for a long time. He was the general manager in Anaheim and Ottawa before coming to Montreal as an assistant to Bob Gainey. I just think he didn’t feel comfortable with the offers he got from other teams. You want to make a trade to improve your team or to change its identity, not just to make a trade.

2. Guy, I was looking at one of your columns and you were one of the people who suggested it would be Canada against Russia for gold. A lot of people thought that would be the case. What happened? - Jenni

One word comes to my mind: chemistry. I think it’s a huge part of those competitions. Teams usually get there a day in advance and have no time to practise together. I was one who thought the Russian team was going to be one of the teams to beat because of the skills they had in offense and were strong in front of the net with [Evgeni] Nabokov and [Ilya] Bryzgalov, but seems like they never got the fire started under them. Plus, I was disappointed in some of their players, I didn’t think that [Alex] Ovechkin, [Evgeni] Malkin and [Ilya] Kovalchuck were at the top of their game and they needed to be to have a chance to win.

3. It looked to me like Ryan Kessler was a complete jerk in that championship game. I know he likes to chirp, but he seemed to go overboard and bordered on being nasty. How does that have an impact on his teammates, especially the team captain, Roberto Luongo? - Brian F

I just think that at the Olympics or any other competition, teams look to find an edge in their game. The US team knew that in order to win against Canada, they would have to find a way to get under their skin, therefore try to get them off their game. If you remember before the first game they played, in which the US won by the way, the only word that came out of pretty much every player from the US was “ we hate them”. So there’s no surprise that in the final game for the ultimate prize, players gave a little extra to find that edge, and Kessler was one of the more involved. As for the Luongo and Kessler rivalry, I don’t think it got any impact during the games they were playing AGAINST each other. Kessler did what he had to do on the ice to help his team win and Luongo did the same for Canada. Once they both get back as teammates they will do the same to help the Canucks win.

4. I watched the Olympics and then tried to watch the Leafs last week and that game was a complete bore. It was so pedestrian compared to any of the Olympic Games I watched. Even the women's game was more interesting. Do players and coaches know how bad the game looks when it is compared to the very best? - Sandra Billing

I agree with you, but we have to remember that an NHL team is build to play a complete season and has to deal with a salary cap system. In the Olympics you don’t have those restrictions. Teams are built on speed and skill and the players are the best in the world. So everything they do is at a higher level than what we see during the regular season; passes are better, receptions are better, speed is better. So let’s be patient, the playoffs are coming quickly and I’m sure that the level of our game will increase also.

5. Guy, nice to be able to send you this question. Now that the Coyotes have spent so much time trading players, do you think anyone else will show up at the rink? I can't believe that franchise can survive after what it has gone through recently. - Rhett W Wiley

Well, I think everybody was surprised of the amount of players traded in Phoenix. Up to that date, they had been one of the best surprises in the NHL. The arrival of Dave Tippett had a wonderful effect on a team that spent the whole summer wondering if they would stay in Arizona. They were allowed to make those trades because they felt that it will improve their team and hopefully give them a better chance to participate in the playoffs. Making the playoffs means more games and therefore more revenue and the interest usually brings bigger crowds. I remember in Dallas, we didn’t have a lot of sell-outs before winning a couple rounds in the playoffs, and then we won the cup in 1999 and it’s exactly what happened. Hopefully they can have the same ending in Phoenix.

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