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The memorable season is now over for both the Habs and
Bulldogs as they both lost their respective conference finals this past week. 
With it being such a great season, the Final Thought looks at the top moments,
while hits, a staple of playoff hockey, is the focus looking inside the numbers. 
This, plus the power rankings, in the final Recap for 2009-10.

 Power
Rankings

The PPR’s are on a cumulative basis with
some bias towards the current week.  The prev. column represents the last
ranking for the player; players not on last week’s list will be slotted back
where they were when returning from injury/benching/recall (italicized numbers). 
Thus, multiple players may have the same previous ranking.  These power
rankings are carried forward from the regular season, no new ones will be started.


Rk

Player

Prev.

Comments

1

Brian Gionta

2 One of the few who found
another gear to take it to in Game 5.
2 Jaroslav Halak 1 Didn’t have
his best game Monday but had a stellar overall postseason.

3
Mike Cammalleri 3 Was neutralized in Round 3,
just couldn’t get to his sweet spots.
4 Tomas Plekanec 4 How much (if
any) will his contract drop after a so-so playoff?

5
Scott Gomez 6 Arguably his best game of the
playoffs, came at the right time too.
6 Dominic Moore 5 It’ll be
interesting to see if he overprices himself again this year.

7
Josh Gorges 7 Being overused during the
first two rounds took its toll on him vs Philly.
8 Roman Hamrlik 9 Is the fact
he plays best with Markov out a reason in itself to keep him?
9 P.K. Subban 10 Struggled early in Game 5 but
had a stellar second half in that contest.

10
Maxim Lapierre 8 Quietly had
the most hits in the final 2 games…who’d have guessed that?
11 Jaroslav Spacek
15
A strong playoffs after a less
than quality regular season.

12
Hal Gill 12 Wasn’t able
to be as effective this round, in part due to his leg injury.
13 Travis Moen 13 Didn’t bring the physical play
needed to be a factor against the Flyers.

14
Andrei Kostitsyn 14 He was more
of a factor this round which sadly says very little.
15 Marc-Andre Bergeron 16 Showed why he’s most effective
when he sees limited minutes.

16
Ryan O’Byrne 15 Didn’t play
all that bad but the problem is, he barely played at all.
17 Benoit Pouliot 17 Played better this series but
like Kostitsyn, that didn’t take much.
18 Mathieu Darche 19 Complemented
the Gomez/Gionta line well…because he didn’t mess up.
19 Glen Metropolit 18 His late season injury
derailed his chances of staying with the Habs.

Dropped from the rankings: Tom Pyatt (11 –
injured) and Sergei Kostitsyn (21 – DNP).

 The Dog
Pound

Despite having lost only one home playoff game
so far, home ice advantage wasn’t enough to lift the Bulldogs to a series
victory in either of their two games this week ending their season.

 Results:

May 24
1
2 3 OT
Tot

PP

SOG
Texas 0 1 1 1 3 1/1 38
Hamilton 1 1 0 0 2 1/2 53

Attendance:  2,613
3 Stars:
  1) Gagnon – TEX  2) Belle – HAM  3)
Climie – TEX

May 26
1
2 3
Tot

PP

SOG
Texas 0 1 3 4 0/0 20
Hamilton 1 1 0 2 0/3 43

Attendance:  5,121
3 Stars:
  1) Lindgren – TEX  2) Subban – HAM  3) Climie – TEX

Stats:

The one positive that came from the Game 7 loss
was the return of Mathieu Carle, a player originally thought to be out for the
season.  Unfortunately, he along with the additions from the Habs weren’t
able to lift them into the finals.

SKATERS

# Player GP G A +/- SH PIMS
4 Michael Vernace 2 0 0 -1 3 0
5 Alex Henry 2 0 0 +1 0 0
6 Chad Anderson 1 0 0 E 0 2
10 J.T. Wyman 2 0 1 -2 6 0
12 Andrew Conboy 2 0 0 -2 3 0
15 Mike Glumac 2 0 0 E 12 0
19 Brock Trotter 2 0 2 -1 6 0
20 Ryan Russell 2 0 0 -1 8 0
23 Max Pacioretty 2 1 0 +1 8 0
25 Ryan White 2 0 0 -1 7 0
26 Grant Stevenson 2 0 0 E 4 0
28 Aaron Palushaj 2 0 1 E 9 0
32 Frederic St. Denis 2 0 0 -1 4 0
42 Hunter Bishop 1 0 1 E 1 0
44 Shawn Belle 2 1 0 -4 7 0
51 David Desharnais 2 1 1 -2 5 0
61 Andre Benoit 2 0 0 -1 4 0
72 Mathieu Carle 1 0 0 E 2 0
76 P.K. Subban 1 0 1 E 5 0
82 Gabriel Dumont 1 1 0 E 1 0
91 Ben Maxwell 1 0 0 -1 1 0

GOALIES

# Player Record SV% GAA
1 Curtis Sanford 0-2-0 .879 3.06

Leaders:

Goals: Mike Glumac (11)
Assists: David Desharnais (13)
Points: David Desharnais (23) (franchise record)
+/-: Shawn Belle (+6)
PIMS: Ryan White (47)
Shots: Mike Glumac (68)

Next
Year:

The
signing
of free agent D Kyle Klubertanz marked the beginning of what will likely be a
very busy offseason for Hamilton.  Follow their moves with HW’s Bulldogs
Offseason

Tracker
.

Inside
the Numbers

One of the staples of playoff hockey is
stepping up the physical side of the game.  For some Habs, I think people
would settle for simply having one let alone stepping it up.  Here’s
how each Hab fared in terms of hits per game (HPG) in both the regular season
and playoffs; the final column (+/-) shows the improvement or decline in the
postseason relative to regular season play.

Hit Comparisons  Regular Season Playoffs  
Player GP Hits HPG GP Hits HPG +/-
Brian Gionta 61 36 0.590 19 26 1.368 0.778
Roman Hamrlik 75 59 0.787 19 28 1.474 0.687
Benoit Pouliot 53 61 1.151 18 29 1.611 0.460
Scott Gomez 78 30 0.385 19 16 0.842 0.457
Maxim Lapierre 76 164 2.158 19 49 2.579 0.421
Dominic Moore 69 57 0.826 19 23 1.211 0.384
Jaroslav Spacek 74 54 0.730 10 11 1.100 0.370
P.K. Subban 2 1 0.500 14 12 0.857 0.357
Travis Moen 81 161 1.988 19 44 2.316 0.328
Ryan O’Byrne 55 119 2.164 13 32 2.462 0.298
Josh Gorges 82 85 1.037 19 25 1.316 0.279
Mike Cammalleri 65 18 0.277 19 8 0.421 0.144
Marc-Andre Bergeron 60 57 0.950 19 19 1.000 0.050
Tomas Plekanec 82 51 0.622 19 12 0.632 0.010
Glen Metropolit 69 32 0.464 16 6 0.375 -0.089
Tom Pyatt 40 27 0.675 18 10 0.556 -0.119
Sergei Kostitsyn 47 26 0.553 5 2 0.400 -0.153
Andrei Markov 45 47 1.044 8 6 0.750 -0.294
Ben Maxwell 13 4 0.308 1 0 0.000 -0.308
Andrei Kostitsyn 59 102 1.729 19 25 1.316 -0.413
Hal Gill 68 82 1.206 18 12 0.667 -0.539
Mathieu Darche 29 39 1.345 11 6 0.545 -0.799

The comparison I find most interesting is that
of the two struggling wingers, Andrei Kostitsyn and Benoit Pouliot. 
Kostitsyn was in the top-5 in team hits during the season but saw his physical
play decrease in the postseason.  Pouliot on the other hand moved into the
top-5 in hitting in the postseason which was one of the lone bright spots of his
playoffs.  Aside from that, it was nice to see that the majority (14/22 –
63.6%) of the players saw increases in their per game physical play.  Of
course, this does not factor in ice time per game which could skew the above
results but this gives the overall picture in general.

Final
Thought

What a year it was for the Habs, there’s no way
that can be denied.  The team that some thought would miss the playoffs
wound up making the final 3.  They’ve given us plenty of memories, mostly
of the good variety.  With that in mind, here are my top-3 storylines from
the 2009-10 campaign:

1) Upset city: We all thought the Habs matched up reasonably well vs
Washington but realistically, how many expected that they could beat them in a 7
game series?  Then came the Pens, a team Montreal didn’t match up as well
against and yet the same result happened.  Forget the 3rd round and just
think about what the Habs accomplished knocking off the top team in the NHL
during the regular season and the defending champions.  Something tells me
both the Blackhawks and Flyers are quite appreciative of this as well…

2) A new era: 2009-10 ushered in a new era for the Habs (and a new
century too).  The offseason spending spree brought forth new proven
players such as Mike Cammalleri, Brian Gionta, and Scott Gomez that helped
reshape this roster from top to bottom.  Better still (if you like this
core), the aforementioned trio are all signed for 4 more years giving the
playing roster a sense of stability not seen for several years now.

3) The emergence: All year, the goaltending controversy continued but by
the end, a leader emerged in Jaroslav Halak.  His heroics stole the series
vs Washington and he was a key reason the Habs eliminated the Penguins as well. 
Despite this, the controversy will continue into the offseason, largely for
financial reasons.  I’ll give an honourable mention to Tomas Plekanec for
his bounce back season, thrusting him towards the top of a fairly shallow UFA
class.

And with that, this concludes ‘Season 5’ of the HW Recap.  Keep checking
HabsWorld in the coming days and weeks for final grades for the Habs and
Bulldogs, a closer look at the cap situation and free agents, and of course our
annual draft coverage.  Be sure to follow HW’s
Twitter feed
for any breaking news and tidbits as well.

If you have a question regarding
this article or are interested in joining our writing team,
please feel free to drop me a line at
[email protected]
.