Habs Claim Eastern Conference

The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Pittsburgh Penguins 2-0 this afternoon, the Flyers win enabled the Montreal Canadiens to capture the Eastern Conference crown to finish off a great regular season.

The Montreal Canadiens are the Eastern Conference champions. The Habs finish the regular season, first in the Northeast division, and Eastern Conference, as well as having the #1 power-play in the league. The Habs also managed to climb from twenty-fourth in the league in penalty killing, to a mid pack rating of 15th. The Canadiens finished no.1 in the league for goals scored, and third in the league in points. The Habs scored 40 more goals than they allowed.

Mark Streit finished the year being ranked third in the league amongst defenseman scoring, and Andrei Markov finished sixth. Alex Kovalev finished the season in eleventh place in league scoring. Not to mention the fact that many youngsters came into their own this year, Andrei Kostitsyn, his brother Sergei Kostitsyn, Tomas Plekanec, Carey Price, Jaroslav Halak, just to mention a few.

The Canadiens were predicted to finish between ninth, and 14th, not a bad season considering. Many of the players took that as an insult and turned their play up a notch. As for the absent Michael Ryder, well everyone has a bad year, but I wouldn’t be surprised not to see him return for the next season. Over-all, the Habs had an amazing season, not too many injuries until the end of the season, and they still managed to win the games they had to, pretty impressive.

After the team celebrates winning the conference, it will be back to work as the Habs first round starts on Thursday against the Boston Bruins. Thankfully, starting on Thursday gives the team time to heal little injuries, and provides more time for players to be 100% ready for the play-offs.

Mike Komisarek, Francis Bouillon, and Mark Streit should be fully healed by Thursday, Streit has been playing with a lightly bruised ankle, which should be healed in time to start the play-offs, Komisarek started skating with the team on Friday, Bouillon should be healed in time also. As for Saku Koivu, the team will try to make his skate accommodate his swollen left foot due to a broken bone, if Patrice Brisebois was able to play with a broken bone in his foot earlier this season, I don’t think that it will be a problem for Koivu, the only thing is will playing further damage Koivu’s foot?

The Canadiens start on Thursday against the Bruins, a team which the Habs defeated all eight times that they played them this year, but that means nothing in the play-offs. The Bruins will come out with something to prove against the Habs, hopefully the Canadiens will not let the fact that they owned the Bruins this year, inflate their heads too much. The real season starts in a couple of days, let’s hope the Habs keep playing the way they have all season.