If the Bell Centre was pretty tame for the first game of the Prospect Showdown with a low attendance for the Toronto Maple Leafs and Ottawa Senators game, it was absolutely electric for the evening game featuring the Montreal Canadiens and the Winnipeg Jets. Straight from the moment the starting lineup was announced, it felt like a regular-season night in the Mecca of hockey.
While the Canadiens had a talented roster on the ice, the players still came out ready for a physical game, throwing hits whenever they had the opportunity. Even Ivan Demidov joined in; he leaned into a hit he saw coming and stayed up after impact. The hit of the night, however, belonged to Owen Protz, who ran Kieron Walton over like a train would have.
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Much like in Brossard, Demidov’s talent was once again apparent; his stickhandling is second to none, and he was the source of the first goal of the game when he brought the puck to the net, and Florian Xhekaj reaped the reward of his hard work. Oliver Kapanen also had an assist on the play.
Like any player of that caliber, though, Demidov must be careful not to try to do too much. On the Canadiens’ first power play, he tried to be too cute, attempting to fool two Jets and losing possession; that wasn’t a regular occurrence, however.
The first power play unit featuring the top line of Xhekaj, Kapanen, and Demidov, joined by Owen Beck and David Reinbacher, had fantastic puck movement, moving the Winnipeg penalty killers from side to side, and twice they nearly realized a perfect play. Still, it ended up being a tic-tac-stop with Domenic Divincentiis denying them. After 20 minutes, it was 1-0 Montreal, and shots were 14-7 for Pascal Vincent’s men.
The Jets’ goaltender was powerless when Montreal got back on the power play in the second frame, and Kapanen completed the tic-tac-toe started by Demidov and Reinbacher with a powerful one-timer. The Austrian played a solid game and didn’t pass on a single opportunity to join the attack.
While the Canadiens’ defensemen struggled to get out of their zone at times, it wasn’t when the Reinbacher and Adam Engstrom pairing was on the ice. The former fifth-overall pick had a great game offensively, although at times defensively, he did look a bit rusty, but that’s to be expected from someone who missed so many games last season.
After Vincent sent Mikus Vecvanags in goal in relief of Jacob Fowler, who had not given up a single goal, the Jets quickly struck twice through Danny Zhilkin on the power play and then Chase Yoder on a breakaway to tie up the score at 2-2 even though the Canadiens had a 22-12 edge in shots at the time.
The second frame ended in a 2-2 tie, and Tyler Thorpe tried to start something up with a rival after the whistle, but he only managed to buy himself a front row seat to the first two minutes of the third frame.
Winnipeg seemed to have more energy in the third frame and battled hard to take a 3-2 lead with less than four minutes left in the game, but Demidov was not about to let his team lose in that manner. In his next shift, he got a nice feed from Oliver Kapanen and took off on a breakaway. Even with the kind of night Divincentiis was having, he was powerless against the Russian’s silky hands, and the Bell Centre erupted in a deafening cheer when he tied it up at 3-3.
The Jets weren’t done, though, and Zhilkin found a way to score his second of the game to steal the win despite the Canadiens dominating 41-25 in shots. In the end, the result matters very little at this stage, but what does matter is just how dominant Demidov was. After the game, Vincent raved about him:
The goal he scored, as well as his overall offensive contributions on the ice…I’ve seen it in practice for two days, but to see what he can do on the ice at such high speed is truly impressive. But I spoke about it earlier, it’s his passion, his desire to be the difference maker. […] Every time you send him on the ice, you have the feeling something’s going to happen, and it does. We had a lot of scoring chances tonight, and he’s part of that in the vast majority. What he can do on the ice isn’t luck; it’s a guy who has worked on his game. He’s still very young, and he’ll get even better, but you get an idea of the kind of difference maker you can have on each of his shifts. For a coach, it’s fun to have. – Vincent on Demidov
The Bell Centre crowd also shone brightly tonight, on September 13, for a meaningless game in a prospect tournament, the building was absolutely rocking. In the last period, the wave went around the arena many times, and it got so loud that it actually reminded me of the atmosphere from last year’s playoffs race, which is quite something given the circumstances. Asked to comment on that, Vincent explained:
It’s amazing, it’s hard to describe…I’m 53 years old, I’m an older man, and I feel the energy from those people, and I can only imagine, and I’ve been in the NHL for years, in the playoffs. I feel, and for some guys, unfortunately, it’s the only time they’re going to wear an NHL jersey, just to experience that is a story you’re going to tell your kids and grandkids. At the same time, for us, I feel like we can evaluate players on how they react when they are on the big stage. So there are a lot of components to it. – Vincent on the Bell Centre atmosphere
The Canadiens’ prospects will be back in action tomorrow afternoon when they’ll take on the Maple Leafs at 3:00 PM and if the game is as spectacular as tonight’s the fans will be going home happy.
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