Once-Mighty Montreal Canadiens Headed Toward a Historic Meltdown

DENVER — Not five minutes had passed since P.K. Subban had finished saying nobody with the Montreal Canadiens was pointing any fingers at anyone else over their monumental, ongoing meltdown. Then, Subban's coach, in two languages no less, pointed the finger solely at him over their latest loss, 3-2, to the Colorado Avalanche on Wednesday night.

"As a coach, I felt he could have had a better decision at the blue line," Montreal coach Michel Therrien said. "He moved the puck behind, and he put himself in a tough position."

In his native French tongue, Therrien's words cut sharper against his top defenseman, as longtime hockey writer Richard Labbe of La Presse translated, "A selfish play that cost us the game tonight."

In a 2-2 game with time running short in regulation, Subban did what Subban normally does. He tried to make an offensive play with the puck, cutting to his left after gaining the Colorado blue line.

Unfortunately for him, one of his skates did not take to the softer, late-game Pepsi Center ice, giving way and causing him to tumble into the boards without the puck. Seconds later, the puck was in the Montreal net, with 38-year-old Jarome Iginla tapping home Mikhail Grigorenko's crossing pass.

Trailing the play, along with Subban, was Canadiens captain Max Pacioretty. Subban stood and faced the media after the game. Pacioretty did not. Therrien talked with the media, but a few feet away, Canadiens' bearded general manager, Marc Bergevin, paced grimly back and forth, avoiding reporters' glances.

It has turned into one big muddled mess in Montreal. Everyone among the huge, passionate Canadiens fanbase has a blaming finger to point at someone over a season that started with nine wins in the first nine games. Only two other teams in NHL history have started seasons with records of 9-0 or better (Toronto in 1993-94 and Buffalo in 2006-07; both 10-0), and they each made it to the conference finals before losing.

Montreal would become the first to not make the playoffs at all after such a start, and the fans want someone to pay.

"I've never seen the fans of the Montreal Canadiens as upset as I have in the last couple of months," Tony Marinaro, a veteran radio talk-show host with TSN 690 in Montreal and host of the Montreal Forum, said. "A lot of fans thought this might really be the year that the Stanley Cup returned to Montreal, and instead, they probably are not going to make the playoffs. It's been stunning, really."

Who is to blame? Who should be held accountable for a team that was 9-0 and 13-2-1 after the first 16 games but has gone 14-25-3 since?

Blame the $8 million-a-year Subban and his league-leading 85 giveaways, some say. Blame captain Pacioretty for not showing enough leadership, including his ducking of the media in Denver.

Blame Therrien and his conservative coaching philosophy, others say. After Wednesday's loss, "#FireTherrien" was a top trending topic in Canada on Twitter, according to Trendsmap Canada. Blame GM Bergevin for not anticipating potential weaknesses should injuries strike and for giving Therrien an undeserved blanket vote of confidence for the rest of the season while speaking to the media prior to a Habs game on Dec. 28.

The one thing everyone in Montreal can agree on: The continued, lengthy absence of Hart and Vezina Trophy goalie Carey Price to injury has been catastrophic. He is not only the Canadiens' best player but their most calming presence on and off the ice.

Price has not played since Nov. 25, after a Habs win over the Rangers that improved their record to 17-4-2.

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Nobody expected the Canadiens to be as good once Price went down. Nobody expected everything to get this bad, either.

After the loss to Colorado, Bleacher Report asked Subban whether any chemistry problems had developed in the Canadiens dressing room.

"I don't think that's it, no," Subban said. "Obviously, there's going to be a lot of people dissecting everything in the room and on our team because we're losing, you know? But in this dressing room, we're not pointing fingers at each other. We know we all have to be better."

Irony came when Therrien singled Subban out minutes later. Not only did he call Subban's play "selfish" and the difference in the outcome, but he benched him for the final two minutes and three seconds after Iginla's goal.

Subban, mind you, is the Canadiens' leading scorer with 44 points. That set the fans flocking to Twitter and Internet message boards to vent their grievances at anyone and everyone associated with the Habs organization.

As Marinaro tweeted after the game:

Subban said he just flat-out "lost an edge" on the losing goal.

"Going down the wall, I had full possession and I crossed over and just lost an edge and went down. It doesn't happen to me too often, but it sucks that it's the winning goal," Subban said. "If I don't lose an edge, I take it down the wall and probably create something...but it doesn't really matter. You've got to get the puck in deep."

It was too late to get a follow-up reaction from Subban to Therrien's comments. One can be sure the large Montreal hockey media contingent will be camped out at his locker at the next availability, however.

As someone who watches every game, Marinaro said there is plenty of blame to go around, starting with Bergevin, who he said on the air recently "was a top-three GM in the National Hockey League last year but has been a bottom-three GM this year."

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"If you take a look at his body of work in the last calendar year, he's made some real bad moves," Marinaro said. "They've gotten terrible goaltending since Price went out, so he didn't address that.

"Mike Condon wasn't good enough, and by the time he decided to make a move for another goaltender, he got Ben Scrivens and he hasn't been earth-shattering, either. He got Alexander Semin as an unrestricted free agent and then bought him out very early on.

"He traded Brandon Prust for Zack Kassian, and Kassian never played a game for the Montreal Canadiens."

Marinaro said Therrien shouldn't get any passes, either, saying he didn't adjust his team's style enough to compensate for Price's absence.

"They really didn't have another system to fall back on. They played every game the same way, and that was 'Price stands on his head, we get a 1-0 lead and try to shut it down, and if we get another goal, the other team knows there's no way they can score three goals on Carey Price,'" Marinaro said.

"When they fell behind 1-0 or 2-0 without him, they didn't know how to adjust. They never modified their system, never tweaked anything. One of my biggest beefs about the Canadiens, even when they had Price, was that they played 82 games the same way every year."

Nick Kypreos, a former player who's now an analyst with Sportsnet, has been shocked at how far and how fast the Canadiens have fallen.

"Everything has gone south," Kypreos said during Wednesday's Hockey Central at Noon. "It hasn't just been losing Carey Price, but special teams, putting the puck in the net...they lack any type of gumption. They lost all their confidence. It was like the perfect storm [of] going south."

The storm may still be gathering.

Adrian Dater covers the NHL for Bleacher Report. Follow him, @Adater.