Canadiens lose another heartbreaker that shows their future is in fact bright

EDMONTON — Montreal Canadiens assistant coach Trevor Letowski was saying Tuesday morning before facing the Edmonton Oilers how difficult it was to plan matchups on the road against this team because of how often the Oilers will randomly throw Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl out on the ice together, somewhat out of nowhere. As a result, Matheson and Guhle hardly ever played with the Suzuki line at five-on-five, because the matchup the Canadiens wanted was Matheson and the local kid Guhle — playing in front of so many friends and family he couldn’t even remember how many tickets he bought for the game — against the best player in the world, McDavid. “There’s a lot of positives, I’m not going to sit here and be negative about it.” On aurait mérité 2 points, mais on repart avec 1 Deserved 2, leaving with 1#GoHabsGo pic.twitter.com/w5McbroAiw — Canadiens Montréal March 20, 2024 But sometimes, it is difficult for players to see those positives when they are dealing with yet another loss against a league power where you probably deserved better. “At the end of the day, you’ve got to know when you look around, there’s so much talent in this league, but for the Canadiens, they have young guys who are bound to have long careers, and I think that’s something we had to realize when we were going through those tough stretches.” Because amid the losing, that perspective can be difficult. “It’s tough to go through losing and everything that comes along with it, but I think we can always look on the bright side.” The bright side in this case was that Suzuki’s usage helped determine McDavid’s usage, and that predictability allowed the Canadiens to get Guhle out against McDavid as often as they did.