Are The Montreal Canadiens In Trouble for the 2008-09 Season?

The Montreal Canadiens hockey team of 2008/09 has become a team that Habs fans have loved to hate this year. The season started off with a bang, that seemed to fulfilling the predictions that the Canadiens would win the East and make a run at their twenty fifth Stanley Cup.

The first half of their season was going well, but the Bruins were disappearing off into the sunset. And the Canadiens where sinking from second ,to forth, to fifth, and now in the month of March they have sunk to eighth and are tied for the time being with the Florida Panthers.

The second half of the Habs season began well with a boat load of Canadiens in the all-star game. Carey Price's season was going very well a return from an high ankle sprain and then the all-star game and  it began to unravel.

Enter Jaroslav Halak and neither he nor Price seemed to be able to win any games, a trip west proves fatal coming back with one win an a tie. They return home to meet the Ottawa Senators and are out shot but win the game, thanks in large part to Halak.

Guy Carbonneau keeps Halak in the net for a few more starts and its proving a good idea as his goalie of choice is stopping every puck shot at him. But because Carey Price is supposed to be the Canadiens future in goal they put him back in, only to find out he cannot stop a beach ball.

Don Cherry has said over and over on coaches corner that Price  being out scored 9-1, in the young guns game at the all-star match made him lose his confidence. I don't know if that's the truth, but I do know he certainly hasn't been the same since then, and its not getting any better. 

Why I've said all of this I'm not sure, but what I have in mind is that this 2008/09 Canadiens team hasn't jelled as a team. Carey had sixteen wins in the first half of the season only to fall apart, their top scorer Robert Lang was lost for the season with a severed tendon.

The injury bug continued to bite many of the teams top players Mathieu Dandineau broken arm, Alex Tanguay shoulder injury and on and on it goes. Everyone kept saying that Guy Carbonneau would be on the chopping block next, but he seemed to be hanging in there.

The Canadiens where winning and had a five and two record, and low and behold the coach is fired, and is replaced by the general manager Bob Gainey. Teams that are cellar dwellers the Canadiens couldn't beat with a stick, their season has come down to ten games remaining  eighth place, and possibly out of the playoffs.

It is my desire for the Montreal Canadiens to have a successful 1ooth anniversary and show their fans that they capable. last Saturday against the Toronto Maple Leafs the Habs were booed off the ice after a 5-2 drupping. Everyone who is anyone in the sports world says the Canadiens have lost all their confidence and are not playing with any grit or desire.

As a fan of the Canadiens since I was a kid, I do not want to admit that my Bleu, Blanc, Rouge is in this kind of shape, but as I'm writing this article reality is begining to set in. I guess I have answered my own question are the Montreal Canadiens in trouble in season 2008/09? 

YES!

And the Atlanta Trashers are in town, let's hope it is a win, GO HABS GO!