Samuel Montembeault is still one of the NHL’s worst goaltenders

Dose
Crédit: (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)

The Canadiens may have won 4-3 in overtime on Saturday night against the Senators, but let’s just say it wasn’t Samuel Montembeault who saved the day. His outing yesterday was unconvincing, and MoneyPuck’s numbers back up what many fans saw with their own eyes.

According to the specialized site, Montembeault currently ranks second among the NHL’s worst goaltenders in Goals Saved Above Expected, a statistic that measures how many goals a goaltender prevents (or allows) based on the quality of shots. As a result, he has let in 7.6 more goals than expected so far this season. Only Linus Ullmark of the Ottawa Senators does worse. Not ideal for a guy who’s supposed to be establishing himself as a number one in Montreal.

Here’s the chart in question.

And yesterday was another perfect summary of his start to the season: good saves here and there, but also some worrying sequences. On Ottawa’s first goal, the Québécois goalie went the wrong way, sliding to his left while the puck stayed on his right. The result was an open cage and a headache-inducing goal. It’s not an unstoppable shot, it’s a reading error, pure and simple.

This kind of sequence, when it happens once, you quickly move on. But when it’s repeated week after week, it starts to create a buzz. And in Montreal, we know how quickly patience runs out with a doubtful goalkeeper.

The rest of his game wasn’t disastrous, but he never seemed in complete control either. Dangerous puck returns, a little hesitation in his movements, and that little lack of confidence we’ve noticed since the start of the season. Fortunately, the forwards were up to the task again, otherwise we’d be talking about an entirely different result today.

Meanwhile, Jakub Dobes continues to impress. The young Czech, who has shared the net with Montembeault since the start of the season, is showing consistency and composure in goal, as he is still unbeaten. He doesn’t work miracles, but he doesn’t give away a lot of free goals. And that, for a coach, is worth its weight in gold.

In short, Montembeault needed to take advantage of the start of the season to establish his number-one status. Right now, he’s mostly giving Dobes a chance to steal the job. And in Montreal, when the net starts slipping out of your hands, it doesn’t come back easily.

overtime

– Charles Coste dies aged 101.

– Jean-Gabriel Pageau avenges his teammate with a hard-hitting check.

– The Lightning win their fifth in a row against the Utah mammoth.

– Matthew Scheafer scores his fourth goal of the season.

– The Islanders score two goals late in the third period to escape with the win, having trailed by one goal.