Oliver Kapanen: (once again) the least-used center last night

Charles-Alexis Brisebois
Oliver Kapanen: (once again) the least-used center last night
Credit: Cameron Bartlett/Getty Images

For the past two games, Nick Suzuki's absence hasn't been too noticeable. After all, the Canadiens have won twice.

We all know this isn't sustainable in the long run, but the Habs can't do anything about it. All they can do is control how they're playing right now.

And right now, things are going well.

By necessity, we're seeing Phillip Danault and Jake Evans take on more responsibility. Over the past two games, they've been the two forwards Martin St-Louis has relied on the most.

They're at the heart of the plan to replace Nick Suzuki. Evans had three points against Chicago, and Danault—as Arpon Basu pointed out—is just consistently solid. He does everything right across the entire 200 feet.

Danault saw 18:15 of ice time on Friday and 18:58 yesterday. Evans, for his part, logged 17:12 in Chicago and 18:06 in the Heritage Classic game.

Thanks to them, the Habs can win.

In the last two games, Cole Caufield and Juraj Slafkovsky—in that order—were the third and fourth most-used forwards. Alex Newhook ranks fifth.

This means that since being named the team's (temporary) first-line center, Oliver Kapanen has been the center least utilized by Martin St-Louis.

On Friday, he was the sixth-most-used forward with 15:04, eight seconds less than Newhook. Yesterday, he logged 14:18, 43 seconds less than Newhook—and 14 seconds less than Josh Anderson.

So yesterday, he was only the seventh-most-used forward.

You might say that Danault, Evans, and Newhook are all important on the penalty kill… and that's true. Yesterday, the Jets had four power plays and the Canadiens didn't have a single one.

But on Friday, the Habs had three power plays and five penalty kills. Yet their ice times were similar.

This isn't meant to be an attack on Kapanen, since everyone knows he's been handed an impossible task. The point is simply to show just how many guys it takes to replace the captain.

And it serves as a reminder of just how much the Canadiens need help. Because, with all due respect to Oliver Kapanen, if Dylan Larkin were here, he would have played more than 14 minutes last night.


In a nutshell

– Still.

– Wow.

– Phew.

– Oh, really?

– Read more.

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