If Kent Hughes doesn’t find a buyer for Casey DeSmith before the end of training camp, the Canadian will have no choice but to start the season with three goaltenders on his 23-man roster.
• Also read: Canadiens goaltender: Is Kent Hughes staying with Casey DeSmith?
It’s been a while since this was seen in the Ticolore dressing room. And two of the last goalkeepers to experience it don’t have too rosy memories of the experience.
“It’s not the coolest thing. It shouldn’t even exist.
At the turn of the 1970s and early 1980s, Richard Sévigny played five seasons in the Canadian jersey. In three of them he experienced a menage a trois. First with Michel Larocque and Denis Herron. Then with Herron and Rick Wamsley.
“This can’t work. There is no positive point. It creates unhealthy competition internally, the man who engraved his name on the Vézina Trophy at the end of the 1980-1981 season said in an interview with the Journal. Playing for the Canadian is already a lot of pressure. It’s even worse there. You can’t afford to lose or the other person will take your place.”
And we’re not just talking about playing second fiddle here. “The Other” is also the one waiting to move up to second place in the goalkeeping hierarchy.
Steve Penney knows it well. After holding goal for 54 games in 1984–1985, he had to wait behind Patrick Roy and Doug Soetaert the following season.
“In this situation there is always someone who is unhappy. “Even if you have the best people in the world, it sure doesn’t work,” said the man who finished his career in a Jets uniform. There is no goalkeeper who is satisfied with third place.”
friction
At Sévigny’s time, it was Larocque who had a lot on his mind.
“He said he waited six years for Ken Dryden to get the job. I told him that it wasn’t my fault, but that Claude Ruel made the decision. And Claude got me playing. He asked to be traded,” he said.
To avoid disputes, Penney, Roy and Soetaert had drawn up a precise plan. Whoever was selected to play in the next game had the freedom to stay in front of the net as long as they wanted during practice. The other two masked men shared the second. The agreement was apparently difficult to maintain.
“Everyone will think it was Patrick who had the strong head this year, but we got along well. It was more Doug who had problems. Despite the agreement the three of us had made, he still wanted to be in goal.
That may explain why he changed his tune at the end of the season. As did Penney when he was traded for Brian Hayward, Roy’s partner for four winters.
“There was often little friction,” Penney continued. When things weren’t going well in games, I wanted to stay at the net as long as possible in training to get my game back. And then I had to get out of the net to make room for the other guy. It was’nt easy.”
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The Primeau case
Luckily, this time the threesome was only supposed to be temporary. All the better for the three athletes affected. And for Cayden Primeau, I would like to remember Sévigny.
“If there are three goalkeepers in Montreal and he ends up in Laval, I am convinced he will want to go. If I were in his position, I would definitely do that, hammered the original Montrealer. Because with three goalkeepers in front of him, he will never have other options.
In this case, however, the 24-year-old will have to bear some of the blame. His progress has been inconsistent since the Habs selected him in the seventh round (199th overall) in 2017.