Montreal Canadiens Forward Lines A Good And Bad News Situation

While injuries and roster changes have reduced the consistency among defensive pairings, the Montreal Canadiens have more or less maintained the same forward lines in the first six games of the year. This allows us to take a look at how the trios put together by head coach Martin St-Louis have performed in the early stages of the 2024-25 season.

As we discussed earlier in the week, the Habs are getting trounced from a statistical standpoint. No other team has had a lower share of the 5v5 shots (39.9 percent) or expected goals (37.5 percent), though the Habs did a much better job carrying the play against the New York Islanders on Saturday night.

Top Six Woes

The top line of Juraj Slafkovsky, Nick Suzuki, and Cole Caufield has managed to outscore their opponents (6-3), but their underlying numbers have crashed faster than a drunken octopus operating a drone. The team’s top line has controlled less than 40 percent of the shots and 30 percent of the high-danger scoring chances.

It’s an alarming situation, but it’s not quite as bad as what’s going on with the second line. We all knew it would take Kirby Dach a while to get up to speed, and it’s quite clear he has not yet found his rhythm. Dach is usually a possession cheat code for St-Louis, but with multiple layers of rust still in place, the results have been awful. Dach, Joel Armia, and Alex Newhook have controlled fewer shots and have a lower expected goals percentage than the team’s top line. What’s more, they’ve been outscored 0-5 at 5v5.

Bottom Six Value

The good news is that the bottom six has pulled its weight, a rather surprising situation when you consider we’re discussing aging veterans and rookies.

The third line of Brendan Gallagher, Jake Evans, and Josh Anderson currently owns an even shot share (50 percent), but more importantly, they’ve done a great job controlling the high-danger scoring chances, to the tune of 65 percent. I don’t want to remove any credit from Evans or Anderson, but much of the high-danger success has come from Gallagher’s resurgence.

And finally, the fourth line of Emil Heineman, Christian Dvorak, and Oliver Kapanen has been excellent. They have controlled more shots than any other trio (58.1 percent). Of course, they also play against weaker opponents, which makes their assignments easier, but when a team is getting outshot significantly in almost every game, you can’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

Heineman, in particular, has provided the best underlying numbers from an individual perspective. If the Habs are looking to give one of their young players an opportunity to play in the top six, Heineman is the best candidate.

SNIPE by Heineman in the shootout: pic.twitter.com/5hibiP0cCI

— Marc Dumont (@MarcPDumont) October 20, 2024

Bottom Heavy Montreal Canadiens

I tossed the four lines into one of my famously ugly tables for ease of viewing, while also including the raw totals so that we can add a little more context to the mix. For example, the fourth line has controlled 57 percent of the high-danger scoring chances, but it’s also true that we’re discussing just seven total chances.

(CF= shot share, HDCF = high-danger scoring chances, xGF = expected goals)

As you can see, there’s a clear separation between the team’s top and bottom six, and it’s far from the ideal split for a rebuilding team. The Habs are usually a team that is being dragged along by the top two lines, while the third and fourth lines desperately attempt to tread water.

In that respect, the early-season results are certainly bad news, but there’s a silver lining in place, since we know lines anchored by Suzuki and Dach can produce solid underlying numbers. If the top line puts together another solid performance, as they did on Saturday, their numbers would skyrocket. Don’t forget, we’re dealing with a very limited sample size.

The second line, on the other hand, has shown very few signs of life, and judging by Dach’s timing since the start of the year, it will likely take them a little while longer to find their rhythm.

#NHL GameScore Impact Card for Montreal Canadiens on 2024-10-19:#GoHabsGo pic.twitter.com/Jx1imDIED6

— HockeyStatCards (@hockeystatcards) October 20, 2024

All Montreal Canadiens statistics are 5v5, via Natural Stat Trick.