MONTREAL — The sound is unmistakable because it is native to these parts, even if it has been largely absent for years.
It is unique to the Bell Centre, to this fan base and the brand of hockey they love and have been craving for a long time.
It is the sound of anticipation, of that innate sense you are about to be lifted from your seats, that something special is on the verge of happening.
Over the vast majority of the past four decades, the Montreal Canadiens’ best player was a goaltender, a position that can also produce great reactions from the Bell Centre crowd, but not one of anticipation.
There have been a few players in that time to produce that sound — a growing rumbling from the fans that builds incrementally as the play develops. P.K. Subban produced that sound. Alex Kovalev did as well before him. But it has been few and far between over those four decades.
As the Canadiens played the first game of their preseason schedule against the Philadelphia Flyers on Monday, a 5-0 win, we heard that distinct sound again.
It came early, on Patrik Laine’s second shift in a Canadiens uniform, before he had done anything to warrant it, because just the idea of a player of Laine’s talent — and the time that has elapsed since the idea of a player like that was playing on this ice in a home uniform — was enough to generate it.
Laine regrouped back into the Canadiens’ zone, picked up the puck, began skating up ice and it began.
Unfortunately for those fans, and Laine, the play didn’t amount to much, though he did make a couple of Flyers miss.
“It was great. But it was like, ‘Aaaah, uhhhh,’” Laine said, mimicking that sound of anticipation followed by a sound of disappointment. “I just couldn’t do anything with it. But it was fun to hear. Hopefully, next time, try to do something with the puck after.”
That sound is very familiar to coach Martin St. Louis, who grew up watching the Canadiens play in The Forum. But at first it was foreign to him as well, probably because he hadn’t heard it much in his two-plus years as coach.
“I didn’t know what was happening, to be honest,” he said. “I wasn’t focusing on the puck. I always look away from the puck, and then I turned back and realized what was happening.
“I grew up watching Guy Lafleur, and it was a little bit of that.”
What makes this version of the Canadiens exceptional is that Laine is not alone in being able to generate that sound of anticipation. Rookie defenceman Lane Hutson can do it as well, and though he and Laine are in completely different places in their NHL careers, they are in a somewhat similar spot right now.
“It’s the first time I’ve been nervous in years,” Laine said. “It’s not just a new season and coming back from a long break, but it’s a completely new environment, new teammates, new everything. So, I was quite nervous before because I wasn’t sure how I would be able to perform, how the game would go. But I think it went pretty quickly. I got some touches in, got some good plays in.
“I felt like it was my first game in the league again. It totally wasn’t, but it felt like that.”
Hutson is not solely relying on his resume to generate that sound. The fans have seen the highlights from his first two NHL games at the end of last season, they’ve seen the highlights from rookie camp, from the scrimmages to start training camp. Just before Hutson makes someone miss with a head fake, that sound appears. As Hutson navigates the neutral zone with his head up, it appears again. Or when he handles the puck like this to set up a chance for Laine, it appears again.
un mot pour décrire cette séquence
one word to describe this shift#GoHabsGo pic.twitter.com/ubeQY7gHhi
— Canadiens Montréal (@CanadiensMTL) September 23, 2024
And he hears it. He does more than hear it.
“I feel it, for sure,” Hutson said. “But it’s exciting. It’s just part of being a part of this organization and being a part of the fan base. It’s pretty special what we have here.”
And for St. Louis, it is more than Hutson’s spectacular plays that have left him impressed.
“A lot of consistency,” St. Louis said. “It’s pretty much the same thing from him every time.”
That’s very high praise.
Just as St. Louis was inspired as a child watching Lafleur many generations ago, this fan base has long wished to be inspired by a similar talent who creates a similar sense of anticipation whenever he touches the puck.
Nothing is saying Laine will be that player, but the mere fact he has the potential to be a player like that — and, frankly, watching him roam the ice somewhat like a great white shark looking for prey is reminiscent of how Kovalev played the game — has already created a sense of excitement among fans.
And perhaps no one is better placed to understand that excitement than St. Louis, because he was once one of those excited Canadiens fans and he knows how long it’s been since a player generated that type of reaction.
But he also knows this was just one preseason game, and unless that reaction is consistently earned, this one night won’t mean a whole lot a few months from now.
“I can understand the excitement they have; obviously, you look at his resume. I know his career was trending (upward), and sometimes you hit some bumps along the way, and for us, we’re trying to get that thing going back up again,” St. Louis said. “I think the fans are definitely behind him right now.
“I feel like the respect is always earned; it’s something you have to do each and every day. I’m sure Patty’s going to try to do that each and every day, and I’m going to try to help him to make sure he has that each and every day.”
As for Laine, his standards for himself are considerable. He was lamenting the fact he couldn’t bury one of the numerous scoring chances he had in the game, not being able to reward that sound he heard from the Bell Centre fans.
He was robbed by Flyers goaltender Cal Petersen at the buzzer to end the second period after one-timing a saucer pass from Alex Newhook that was a bit in his feet but that he still labeled inside the near post before Petersen got his glove on it as the period ended. Laine called that shot “awful” even though most mortals would not have gotten nearly as much zip on it.
“I had a lot of scoring chances, that’s for sure. I just couldn’t finish,” Laine said. “Good thing you don’t win the Rocket in preseason, so that’s a good thing.”
The “Rocket” of course is the Maurice “Rocket” Richard Trophy, awarded to the league’s top goal scorer. No one on the team has thought in those terms for decades, probably since Lafleur, but that is where Laine’s head is at.
He is not in game shape. He knows it. But he has high hopes.
And the fans do as well. They made that clear Monday night by producing a sound we have not heard at the Bell Centre in years, but one the Canadiens are now better equipped to trigger more often.
(Photo: Minas Panagiotakis / Getty Images)
