The Montreal Victoire’s Bold Playoff Bet

Montreal enters the playoffs looking to rewrite its narrative, going bold by choosing the defending champions, Minnesota. This sets up a clear clash between Montreal’s elite defense and Minnesota’s lethal offense, and if the Victoire can replicate their regular-season success, this bet could pay off.

The Montreal Victoire has always been successful in the regular season, but the playoffs have not always worked in their favor. Unable to ever move past the first round and only ever winning one game in the post season, the team will look to rewrite its narrative after a more than impressive regular season.

The Depth Stepping Up in Poulin’s Absence

It's not new information that this Montreal Victoire roster is the deepest it's ever been, both offensively and defensively. With the injuries the team has dealt with, the depth pieces have had time, and no choice, to develop their game and showcase their skills. Nonetheless, the return of the veteran and legend Marie Philip Poulin will play a huge role in the series. “I think the team we have here, the players, everyone together, we’re all here for the same goal. Being in the stands halfway through the season… you don’t want to see that, but honestly, seeing from the outside how the girls pushed through everything, seeing how we finished the season, it’s incredible,” shared the Montreal captain, who missed 10 games due to a lower body injury she sustained shortly after the Olympics.

The Montreal Victoire’s Bold Pick

As we know, in the PWHL, clinching the first seed means you can choose, yes choose, the opponent you want to play in the first round (must be the 3rd or 4th seed). A rule I find to be unsportsmanlike and irrelevant, especially considering that the top seed of every first round matchup has never made it to the Walter Cup final. But all that said, Montreal went bold this year and chose the back-to-back Champions, the Minnesota Frost.

This decision, as crazy as it may sound, makes the most sense when you look at the stats on paper. The Victoire won every single game against them this season, with two of them being shutouts and the other two being overtime wins. But even with all that, Minnesota have always been the last team to clinch a playoff spot, and every year they've won the cup. So saying that they are another beast in the playoffs would be an understatement. But as Laura Stacey put it: “If you want to be the best, you got to take down the best,” and I believe this challenge will set the tone for this confident Montreal roster.

Minnesota finished third this year, and Ottawa finished fourth. You would think it simply would have been logic to choose the lowest seed, but Ottawa being the ones that Montreal had picked to face first round last year (and we all remember how that ended…) may have played a factor in this decision. When Desbiens and Stacey were asked if they maybe chose Minnesota as a way to start fresh, they shared that it wasn't necessarily about that. Desbiens mentioned she believed their style of play matched better with Minnesota’s, and Stacey shared how they’re prepared, confident, “really excited about the challenge.”

Best Defense vs Best Offense

Montreal fans should probably steer away from the player stats sheets, because what you see can be quite intimidating. The Frost have 5 players in the top 10 of points and dominate in points, offensively and defensively. It's therefore no surprise that their offense is absolutely lethal with players like Pannek, Heise, Curl and Coyne. But even with all this offensive power, Minnesota has 73 goals against them, whereas Montreal only has a league leading 41. So the key to shutting down this team starts defensively. The Victoire has known a lot of success defensively, with rookie Nicole Gosling stepping up alongside Erin Ambrose, Kati Tabin and Maggie Flaherty. But of course, a lot of credit needs to be given to Desbiens.“Sometimes we call her the conductor back there, because she just knows where everyone should be at all times,” shared defenseman Maggie Flaherty. “I think that helps because sometimes if you get a little scrambly, especially in bigger games, she'll basically tell you where to go,” she said jokingly. If the defensive core can play like they've been playing, the feat seems achievable.

The battle starts Saturday, May 2nd at 2 PM ET at Place Bell.