@Doc Holliday
Sure, your observations are spot on but, the Habs were way better and structured in the first 10-12 games. Of course their opponents have since, adjusted and perfected their games, which is what professional teams do. But I don’t see such progress with Montreal, and that’s exactly where I am pointing at: management and coaching.
Watching the last 8-10 games revealed a lot of weaknesses in major aspects of their game: no more grit in the battles along the boards so the dump and chase became useless, even worse is the fact that they are always late for loose pucks which leads to taking a lot of penalties. No forechecking, no hits also makes it easier for the opponent to defend and transition to attacking. While pressured in their zone the amount of turnovers is ridiculous, you can see 4-5 of them happening in a single sequence, I really feel for their goalies, they never get any breaks.
And as I said, injuries don’t explain everything, we can still see some good flashes, even against top teams but too often, the momentum is killed by a bad play that end up getting scored and then they start taking more risks and everything spirals down.