MONTREAL — On the day in November that Mike Matheson signed the five-year contract extension that would keep him in a Montreal Canadiens uniform for the foreseeable future, the uniform he grew up cheering for growing up in the city’s West Island, he helped set up the goal that sealed a win over the Vegas Golden Knights with a strong defensive play.
Matheson stripped former Toronto Maple Leafs forward Mitch Marner of the puck in the slot and sent it up to Alexandre Texier, who fed Jake Evans with a breakaway pass that he buried to make the score 3-0 with 3:36 left in regulation time.
The first opportunity Matheson had to demonstrate why the $30 million committed to him by the Canadiens would be worth it was done with a defensive play.
Prior to the Canadiens 3-1 win over the Maple Leafs on Tuesday, Matheson was asked about all the defensive zone starts and difficult matchups he had been getting of late playing with Kaiden Guhle on his right, and if that might change with him going back to his most frequent partner this season, Noah Dobson, in the game.
“I don’t think that’s been any different for me,” Matheson said. “I think that’s the role that I’ve had pretty much all year. Just been continuing to do my best with it.”
He was right. Nothing changed for Matheson.
No one on the Canadiens was on the ice for more defensive zone faceoffs at five-on-five than Matheson. No one on the Canadiens spent more time killing penalties than Matheson. No defenceman on the Canadiens spent more time on the ice with Maple Leafs captain Auston Matthews at five-on-five than Matheson.
And when the Maple Leafs pulled their goalie late in the third period trailing 2-1, the player who has played the most minutes in the entire league with the opposing goalie pulled, the player who is the Canadiens’ rock defensively, was there when it counted.
The Canadiens have been struggling defending at five-on-six. It had been a massive point of emphasis over their three-game road trip through California prior to Tuesday night, and the structure of how they needed to play was in a state of evolution.
“Honestly, it’s pretty simple, when you think about it,” Alexandre Carrier explained afterwards. “They’re trying to get the most shots they can and trying to crash the net, so if we’ve got everyone in the house, we should be fine.”
Except this is what happened with the Maple Leafs goalie pulled, because that structure of everyone being in the house loosened a tiny bit for a moment, allowing Matthews to saucer a puck to John Tavares in the heart of the slot.
Matheson, forming the foundation of the house with Guhle, recognized the situation, put himself in position to block the shot and did so by kicking his right leg out, absorbing it in an area where there is not much protection. Then, after Matheson threw the puck out of danger toward the boards, he laid out to make sure it got out of the zone, getting squashed by Oliver Ekman-Larsson in the process.
That desperate defensive lunge gave Evans an opportunity to ice the game — similar to the night Matheson signed his extension in Las Vegas. Evans outbattled Maple Leafs rookie Easton Cowen for the puck and deposited it in the empty net to complete the scoring in the Canadiens win.
“He was awesome all night, blocked a lot of shots on the penalty kill, obviously he has some tough matchups,” Evans said of Matheson. “That goal doesn’t happen without him.”
Matheson was not made available to speak after the game, presumably because the collateral damage of that game-icing play was being tended to by the Canadiens’ trainers.
But prior to the game, he was asked about the notion that the Canadiens were well-slotted to make the playoffs and how they should respond to that new situation. Matheson immediately took issue with that characterization of where the team finds itself at this late stage of the season.
“I think the simple idea of thinking that we’re well-slotted is wrong,” Matheson replied. “I think the second you start feeling like that, you’re laying off the gas pedal. Whether it’s being slotted in the playoffs or starting the playoffs the right way, you want to be going up. And so, that’s the goal, each game get better at what we need to get better at and keep building and see where we end up.”
What the Canadiens needed to get better at was evident over that California trip. They were not managing the puck properly, they were not managing the neutral zone properly, they were not managing games properly, they were not handling empty-net situations properly, they were not doing a whole lot properly.
They entered the game against the Maple Leafs with a 6-1-3 record in their previous 10 games, but as coach Martin St. Louis pointed out Tuesday morning, they were not playing like a team on a 6-1-3 run.
They did play that way against the Maple Leafs, who lost their eighth straight game and therefore may not be the best barometer for playoff readiness. But Matheson continues to be that barometer for the Canadiens, willing and able to take all the difficult minutes and allow Lane Hutson to shine the rest of the time.
According to PuckIQ, which measures quality of competition minutes, there is no player in the league with a higher disparity between his minutes at five-on-five against “elite” competition compared to bottom-of-the-lineup competition than Matheson. He has sacrificed everything that once defined him as a player — the elite feet, the offensive instincts — to provide the Canadiens with what they need, especially since the retirement of David Savard as the team’s defensive conscience.
Savard’s replacement as that defensive conscience is quite clearly Matheson. Yet again, when it mattered most against the Maple Leafs, he was there making a difference.
“To win,” St. Louis said, “that’s what you need.”
This is what the Canadiens secured when they signed Matheson for five more years back in November: His ability to play a role he’d never played before last season, a role that was once counterintuitive to him. Matheson never wanted to sacrifice his offensive gifts to focus on how he can apply them to his defensive game, but he has reached that point.
And as the Canadiens ramp up for a second straight playoff appearance, the fact their defensive conscience refuses to take it for granted will only help them get there.
