VANCOUVER – Just before the Montreal Canadiens faced off against the Calgary Flames on Saturday evening, the Laval Rocket were facing the Rochester Americans in an AHL matchup at home.

There were several similarities between the two games. They both involved teams fighting for positioning in the standings. They were both low-scoring, tight-checking affairs.

The Canadiens lost their game 1-0. The Rocket won theirs 2-1 on a last-minute goal by Joshua Roy to take over first place overall in the AHL by sweeping the Americans on a weekend back-to-back. It was Roy’s seventh game-winning goal of the season (second-most in the league), his team-leading 20th goal of the season and his fifth goal in seven games.

What made the goal special was the little extra move to tuck the puck around Devon Levi and in, especially considering the situation and the pressure that came with it.

“He has that above-average talent, because 90 percent of players would have shot the puck quickly,” Rocket coach Pascal Vincent said after the game, according to La Presse Canadienne’s Simon Servant. “It’s a reflection of his attitude and work ethic that we’re seeing with more and more consistency.”

The Canadiens are in western Canada with one extra forward and no extra defencemen. They really could have used someone who could put the puck in the net to plug in the lineup Saturday against the Flames when Patrik Laine got sick; someone like Roy, but he was in Laval.

Michael Pezzetta was in the lineup instead and played less than five minutes, with three shifts total after the first intermission.

There is no more roster limit in the NHL. The Canadiens used up two of the four permitted post-deadline call-ups when they papered Owen Beck and Jakub Dobeš on Friday to make them eligible for the AHL playoffs, but they have two recalls remaining, in addition to emergency recalls in case of, well, emergency. And yet, there was Pezzetta on the ice in Calgary, and there was Roy on the ice in Laval.

“It’s hard because with Laval and what they’re doing, you don’t want to deplete them either,” St. Louis said. “I think we’re going to manage the situation as we go.”

(Editor’s note: The Canadiens recalled Roy and sent Beck back to Laval shortly after this story was published.)

Les Canadiens ont cédé l'attaquant Owen Beck au Rocket de Laval et ont rappelé l'attaquant Joshua Roy (rappel d'urgence).

The thing is, this is not St. Louis’ decision. He coaches the players he’s given by management, and management has placed a high priority on Laval’s success this season, to get a long playoff run down there to allow optimal development for David Reinbacher, Owen Beck, Logan Mailloux, Roy and others that may have a future in Montreal.

The Canadiens don’t want to sabotage the Rocket’s season, and there are several injuries in Laval as well. But the Rocket have the best record in the entire AHL, while the Canadiens are fighting for their playoff lives.

What are we doing here?

Considering how the Canadiens approached the NHL trade deadline, by resisting the urge to sell off players for assets and giving the team a chance to make a push for the playoffs, this doesn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense. If you want to give the team a chance to make the playoffs, give them the best chance. You don’t need to completely gut the Laval roster to give the Canadiens a better chance to win. They couldn’t gut the roster even if they wanted to because they’re limited to two call-ups.

But every Canadiens game is of utmost importance right now. They have no margin for error. And if someone like Roy, who has legitimately earned a call-up, could help for one or two games — say, the next two games against the Vancouver Canucks on Tuesday and the Seattle Kraken on Wednesday — then he should help for one or two games. It would be good for Roy’s development to be rewarded for his recent play, St. Louis is familiar with him and he is familiar with St. Louis, and it could very well help the Canadiens.

But more so as an overriding principle, while there are extremely valid reasons to want to give Laval every chance to hit the Calder Cup playoffs on a high and go on a long run, to put every single egg in that basket seems like a case of missing the forest for the trees. There are young players on the Canadiens right now whose development would also be greatly helped by reaching the playoffs, by navigating this final quarter of the season and coming out the other side with an unlikely playoff berth.

And this group making the playoffs might give other players around the league the sense that the Canadiens are tangibly a team on the rise, especially with Ivan Demidov arriving next season, which could help with any summer shopping they might want to do.

The decision was already made at the trade deadline to give them an opportunity to make a push for the playoffs by hanging on to their unrestricted free agents. But that seems like a bit of a half-measure if the farm team remains a bigger priority than the big club.

For example, Juraj Slafkovský…

Prior to the NHL’s return from the 4 Nations Face-Off break, Slafkovský was asked if he wanted to play more like Brady Tkachuk, who was an absolute beast for Team USA in the tournament. He replied in the affirmative. Slafkovský’s priority coming out of the break was to play angry, which means increased physicality, more aggressiveness on the forecheck, a bigger net-front presence.

The consistency is not perfect, but Slafkovský has largely done those things since the return from the break, and it has not gone unnoticed.

“I think there’s some consistency in his intentions and how he wants to play,” St. Louis said after practice in Edmonton on Wednesday. “There’s definitely more physicality, there’s definitely more urgency, and it allows his line to possess pucks more and win pucks back. And when you do that, you get more touches. And when you get more touches, you get more confident. And when you get more confident, usually you produce more.

“It’s a big domino effect of the kind of game he’s willing to play right now.”

The following day, Slafkovský was exposed to a better example of what he wants to be when he got a pretty steady dose of Draisaitl. More specifically, the hockey version of a stiff arm Draisaitl uses regularly, and did twice on the following sequence, once on Mike Matheson early in the clip and again on Brendan Gallagher at the end, drawing a penalty in the process.

After practice in Calgary on Friday, Slafkovský was impressed.

“I need to play more like Draisaitl,” he said. “Did you see that move he was doing?”

Then threw his arm out and swept an imaginary opponent aside to demonstrate the Draisaitl stiff arm.

“I can do that,” he said.

We weren’t around to witness it because the trade deadline had just passed and interviews had begun, but Slafkovský said he was working on that stiff arm after practice. And at one point against Calgary, we even saw Slafkovský try to pull it off briefly.

Perhaps getting more video of Draisaitl in front of Slafkovský’s eyes would be a good thing for the Canadiens.

For example, Owen Beck…

St. Louis was in a tricky situation in the third period of the Canadiens’ game against the Edmonton Oilers on Thursday, with Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch sending out Connor McDavid and Draisaitl essentially on a loop.

As a result, Patrik Laine sat on the bench for the second half of the third. And he was joined by Beck, a rookie.

The result was Beck’s third straight game with less than 10 minutes of ice time, though he did get back over that mark with 11:56 against the Flames on Saturday.

But even sitting on the bench, watching players like Jake Evans and Christian Dvorak do the job against those big guns that Beck hopes to one day do himself, up close and not on a television screen has value for his development.

“I try to learn from watching,” Beck said Saturday morning. “If I’ve got a specific question, I won’t hesitate to ask. But as far as learning details of the game, I think it’s more beneficial to just watch as opposed to asking because I find the game can be so grey at times, there’s not one answer for any situation. It’s kind of just making reads and learning about how Devo and Jaker make their reads, I think that’s where the benefit is for me.

“I think there’s a lot of different situations where you can pick up little pieces and put together a little puzzle of how they play. I think that’s an incredible experience to have as a young guy in the league.”

Since he was papered on Friday, Beck will be bringing that experience back to Laval at some point and applying those lessons learned in the Calder Cup playoffs while also accelerating his preparation to play that role in the NHL.

For example, Martin St. Louis…

After practice in Edmonton on Wednesday, with a couple of days to think about it, St. Louis identified what went wrong in the second and third period against the Buffalo Sabres at home last Monday.

“In the second and third against Buffalo, we lost our forecheck. I felt like when we played Los Angeles, our forecheck got beat often,” St. Louis said. “And when that happens, you have to deal with what’s coming on the rush, and (the Oilers) is not a team you want to be missing your forecheck (against) because you can’t give them space with the speed they have. We need to be surgical on the forecheck.”

That practice just before St. Louis said those words seemed to be dealing with what happens when that forecheck gets lost.

There was a long drill where three forwards took off from their own blue line, two defencemen were back defending the rush and one forward was chasing from behind. If the puck went to the wing and he carries it down deep into the offensive zone, the defenceman on that side of the ice would take him. But if that winger posted up at the offensive blue line and hung around there with the puck, waiting for the second wave, the forward coming back had to eliminate him.

At one point in the drill, St. Louis slipped a little word to Beck, telling him to cheat up ice a bit and post up at the blue line so they could work on that. And after everyone was instructed as to what that chasing forward needs to do with that posted-up forward at the offensive blue line, when Slafkovský properly identified the situation and eliminated that forward, the entire team — coaches included — cheered.

“We’re trying to put them in situations that are as real as possible,” St. Louis said.

The forecheck and rush coverage was decidedly improved against the Oilers and Flames. In an environment like the one the Canadiens find themselves in, identifying problems quickly and addressing them even more quickly becomes incredibly important.

This final quarter of the season will be a good exercise for St. Louis as well.

Managing the goalies

It was mildly surprising to Jakub Dobeš get the start against the Flames on Saturday because, with a back-to-back against the Canucks and Kraken coming up, it meant in all likelihood Dobeš would play two of the next three games.

In a win-at-all-costs environment, riding Sam Montembeault as much as reasonably possible would make some sense, and with a practice day that preceded it and a day off and another practice day following it, that Flames game seemed like almost a guaranteed Montembeault start.

Dobeš rewarded his coach with 23 saves on 24 shots against Calgary.

Had Dobeš not started in Calgary and instead started in Vancouver, it would have meant him going 10 days between starts, and that’s what motivated the decision more than anything else. But it also sent a message to Dobeš that he will be an important part of this playoff push.

“We know we’re going to need him down the stretch, so we have to be careful just going with Monty and keeping Dobes out of the net for so long,” St. Louis said Saturday morning. “So we have to be calculated.”