Carnac the Guru: The Modern-Day Cinderella Men

By Hockey Guru


Outscored 9-0 in two games – down two games to zero – the “Cinderella story” Montreal Canadiens return home for Game 3.

“A team is never in trouble [in a series] until they lose a game on home ice.”

Assuming that cliché rings true, it is surely being tested in this series. Needing to win four of the next five games is no small task whatsoever for Montreal, and that fact has created a line-up to jump off the bandwagon.

As the Guru was one of the last ones on, he was one of the first ones off, as demonstrated by his change of prediction after Game 1.

If the series is to end in 5 games, Montreal would have to win one of them, and if they can win one, they can win four.

The Guru continues to shake his crystal ball, hoping for greater clarity. Will this actually become a sweep or will Montreal prevail in 6?

Tonight will prove one of those is not a possibility, and the Guru is standing by his predictions from Tuesday.

Or as they are fast becoming known, Guru's Two-4-Tuesday predictions. The near perfect predictions from Tuesday still have the hockey world all abuzz. The Guru's prognostications have led to increased traffic to the Sports Talk Pool blog, reaching record levels of readership in anticipation of the latest installment of Carnac the Guru, and nearly causing a crash to the server!

With the NHL schedule switching up to alternating nights for each Conference, the Guru must put all his eggs into one basket tonight - or more fittingly, all his pucks into one net. And it is extremely difficult to put a single puck into the net - just ask the Montreal Canadiens. After being shut-out so far in the series, the Canadiens are on a mission to find some answers to Michael Leighton and the Flyers' defence.

Rather than employ the same coaching strategies as Claude Julien from last year's playoffs - calling out players and giving them the day off - Jacques Martin spent considerable time constructing and explaining an offensive game plan, including new powerplay approaches, with his players.

That new game plan will surely include similar plans that both Pittsburgh and Washington attempted against Montreal - throw everything at the net. Shoot, shoot, shoot - from everywhere - bad angles, behind the net, the corner - then crash hard to the net. Hope for a bounce, a rebound. Pray for a goal.

That approach back-fired for Pittsburgh and Washington and will back-fire on Montreal. This year in the playoffs - the formula for beating Montreal is DO NOT PUT MORE THAN 35 SHOTS ON HALAK. More importantly, do not out-shoot Montreal. When being out-shot, Montreal is 8-3. When Montreal out-shoots its opponent, however, they are 0-5.

The crystal ball shows Montreal putting together a great effort tonight, out-playing Philadelphia for stretches, definitely out-shooting and out-chancing the Flyers, but not out-scoring them. As the Canadiens pour on the pressure, the Flyers will generate some opportunities on the counter-attack and be opportunistic enough to prevail 3-1 in Game 3.

The Flyers match up very well with Montreal (or conversely, the Canadiens don't match up well with Philly) and to expect a different result tonight doesn't compute according to the Hockey Guru and his enormous crystal ball.

Bonus prediction: Jeff Carter returns to the Flyers tonight.

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