Juraj Slafkovsky’s sense of play worries a scout present at yesterday’s game

For the past few games, Juraj Slafkovsky has been playing some very good hockey. It doesn’t necessarily show on the scoresheet, but he’s involved in every aspect and let’s just say he’s not being carried around by Cole Caufield and Nick Suzuki.

He does his own thing and doesn’t need help from his two trio mates.

Yesterday was a slightly tougher game for the team’s forwards, and the Slovak was no exception.

A scout on site noticed a few negative aspects of his game. Alexandre Gascon wrote about it on Radio-Canada Sports earlier in the evening.

The scout in question preferred to remain anonymous, but he’s certainly one of them.

List of scouts in Bell Centre press box for tonight’s game between Canadiens and Nashville Predators #Habs #HabsIO pic.twitter.com/ZOIpoHeZBg

– Stu Cowan (@StuCowan1) December 10, 2023

The scout admitted it: he doesn’t follow the Habs 24/7. He’s aware that he may have stumbled on the wrong game, but he admitted that Slaf’s playmaking worries him.

He collided with a Predators player after picking up the puck and got a little too excited…I think that’s indicative of a guy who doesn’t see the game very well. I find it frightening. – Anonymous recruiter

His vision has always been a problem. He’s not going to become perfect overnight, and from time to time, bad games are going to happen. And that’s normal.

Yesterday, the Slovak didn’t have a great match, but that’s no problem. After all, in recent weeks, he’s been one of the CH’s best forwards.

In fact, in his text, Gascon showed that since the November 4 duel in St. Louis, the team’s first-round pick in 2022 is the team’s second-best forward in terms of quality scoring chances per 60 minutes (5.01). Only Brendan Gallagher, who had plenty of chances yesterday, does better.

And before the Blues game, Slaf ranked 12th (out of 14 forwards) with 2.02 scoring chances per hour played. The progress is definitely there.

Let’s hope he carries the CH on his back in 2027 (preferably even earlier), as Réjean Tremblay predicted.

In gusto

– The Bell Centre is clearly not full every night.

As someone who’s gone to every game so far, I’m sure all the tickets are sold, but there are definitely not 21,000 fans in the building every night, especially in the reds. They gotta start publishing the actual numbers, because odds are some teams beat us in actual attendance. https://t.co/iG0zNQiUu7

– HFTV (@HFTVSports) December 12, 2023

– The Hurricanes continue to monitor the goaltending situation in Montreal.

Hurricanes exploring trade market https://t.co/diswcPshqd

– The Fourth Period (@TFP) December 11, 2023

– Legend.

SGA understood the assignment. https://t.co/ZKAG8nADj8

– Olivier Paradis-Lemieux (@OliParle) December 12, 2023

– Pictured.

“He’ll have a huge impact”: Junior Team Canada head coach Alan Letang expects Tristan Luneau to be an important part of his team(@KDubeJDQ )https://t.co/bbP2TdUofs

– Le Journal de Québec (@JdeQuebec) December 12, 2023

– Interesting.