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Canadiens Notebook: Life without Shea Weber begins at training camp

No player will wear the 'C' this season and Nick Suzuki will be one of many players who will rotate wearing an 'A' as alternate captain.

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Life without Shea Weber officially started for the Canadiens Thursday when they hit the ice for the first time at training camp without their captain.

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Weber isn’t expected to play this season and his career could be over because of injuries to his thumb, ankle, foot and knee that he somehow managed to play through during the playoffs as the Canadiens advanced to the Stanley Cup final before losing to the Tampa Bay Lightning.

“The strength of our group was something that helped us a lot going through the playoffs and Shea’s influence on the group won’t go away like this,” head coach Dominique Ducharme said Thursday at the Bell Sports Complex in Brossard. “What he brought to our team, what he brought to his teammates, the way he handled himself, his presence … going through different situations. Those guys gained experience just being there, part of it with him, and I think everyone will take a little part of that and do a little more. And together that’s how we’re going to do it. Together we’re going to grow into that and not one guy will be just taking his spot.”

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Ducharme said no player will wear the “C” as captain in Weber’s absence and that a number of players will wear an “A” as alternate captains. Brendan Gallagher will have a permanent “A” on his sweater, while other players will take turns wearing an “A.” Paul Byron, who normally wears an “A”, is expected to be sidelined until January after hip surgery.

One of the players who will be wearing an “A” this season is 22-year-old Nick Suzuki.

“Being part of the leadership group, I’m not going to really change who I am,” Suzuki said. “Just leading by example and giving my all in practice and in games. Being a young guy, I got to pick my points when I want to speak up or not. Just trying to get comfortable and getting to know all the new guys as well.

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“I learned a lot from Shea,” Suzuki added. “He’s an amazing leader for us and for me personally. Just learning how much respect he gave to every single person, whether it’s the trainers, coaches, media, he always shows the same amount of respect to everyone. So just learned a lot from him and going to take that with me throughout my career.”

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Reunited and it feels so good

Suzuki was happy to start training camp back on a line with Tyler Toffoli and Cole Caufield as his wingers after they had success together in the playoffs.

“We have a lot of fun playing together, a lot of fun off the ice, too, just hanging around,” Suzuki said. “So we built a lot of great chemistry together and looking forward to staying together through camp and then for the season.”

Suzuki said he wants to expand his role on the ice this season after the departure of centres Phillip Danault (Los Angeles Kings) and Jesperi Kotkaniemi (Carolina Hurricanes), grow as a player and become more relied upon by the coaching staff and his teammates.

“Just kind of where Phil kind of left off,” Suzuki said. “I want to try and penalty-kill more. I feel like I can be a good piece there. Just playing against other teams top lines … I had some experience, but just being relied upon. Taking the next step in faceoffs is a big key for me, so I’ve been working on that aspect.”

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Suzuki won only 44 per cent of his faceoffs last season.

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Caufield still a rookie

Caufield is looking forward to his first full 82-game NHL season after playing 10 regular-season games and 20 playoff games with the Canadiens last season after completing his second season at the University of Wisconsin and winning the Hobey Baker Award as the top player in U.S. college hockey.

“I’m looking forward to playing more hockey,” said Caufield, who played 67 games combined during his two seasons at Wisconsin. “I think that’s everyone’s goal in life is to do this for a long time. It’s going to be a grind, it’s going to be a long season. But I’m just trying to find myself more consistent and kind of learn from the other guys and just kind of soak in what they tell me.”

Caufield also spoke about the impact Weber had on him last season.

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“Just how serious he took being a pro,” Caufield said. “Every day coming to the rink early, one of the last ones to leave. He’s always working on his body and, credit to him, that’s why he’s played so long. He’s a great guy to look up to. Everybody respects him for who he is. He doesn’t have to speak out much because people just listen to him. They just watch what he does and it’s enough for us.

“Nobody’s going to replace Shea,” Caufield added. “But we got guys that learned from his experience, learned from last year’s playoffs. We’re going to try to fill his role as much as we can. Obviously, it’s going to be pretty tough losing a guy like that this year. But we believe in the guys that we have in this room and we’re for sure going to be excited to get going.”

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De-fence! De-fence!

With Weber gone, it will be interesting to see how Ducharme decides to pair up his defencemen once the season starts.

“We’re going to look at different ways we can do it or different combinations we can have,” the coach said. “We’ll see. But with Shea leaving or not playing this year and (David) Savard coming in, we know they’re not the same and we know Shea’s leadership and presence not only in the locker room, but on the ice.

“Savard plays the same kind of game (as Weber),” Ducharme added. “Then we’ll see where he’ll be, what he can do, where he’s at, who can be playing with who. But we need to be using all our defencemen … our six defencemen. I think it’s important. Obviously, playing in the playoffs and having your back to the wall, you’re fighting to win the Stanley Cup, you’re going to press the lemon more and we did that with our Big 4 last year. But going through 82 games we need everyone. So that’s the way we want to build our combinations on defence.”

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The long and winding road

Ducharme made a good point when asked about the progress of Ryan Poehling, the Canadiens’ first-round pick at the 2017 NHL Draft who spent all of last season with the AHL’s Laval Rocket, posting 11-14-25 totals in 28 games.

Ducharme said you never hear about players taking too long to make it in the NHL, but you do hear about the ones who were rushed and failed.

“He’s the one with the answers,” Ducharme said when asked what his expectations are for Poehling this season. “I would like to tell you perfectly this is what he’s going to become and this is where he’s going to be good. But right now he needs to fight to get a spot and then get on the team, get a role, grow in that role, get a bigger role. So there’s a progression. We look and the answers are on the ice. We’re not the ones making the decisions. The players do tell us what’s going to happen. We just read right there what they’re giving us and we take those decisions. Because usually, the more it goes it becomes more clear.

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“Right now, I just want him to be efficient on both sides,” the coach added. “He showed some pretty good things offensively last year in Laval. We want him to be reliable and good defensively and be a hockey player — play on both sides and be efficient.”

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Lines and defence pairings

Here’s how the forward lines and defence pairings looked for Team A and Team B on Thursday after it was announced that forward Mike Hoffman is sidelined with a lower-body injury and is expected to miss all of training camp and that Gallagher won’t join the team until the weekend because of family reasons. Defenceman Joel Edmundson also didn’t skate Thursday and is listed as day-to-day.

TEAM A

Forwards

Jonathan Drouin – Christian Dvorak – Josh Anderson
Rafael Harvey-Pinard – Jake Evans – Joel Armia
Joshua Roy – Jean Sébastien Dea – Danick Martel
Michael Pezzetta – Jan Mysak – Lukas Vejdemo
Gabriel Bourque

Defence

Kaiden Guhle – David Savard
Mattias Norlinder – Ben Chiarot
Corey Schueneman – Chris Wideman
Terrance Amorosa – Charles-David Beaudoin

TEAM B

Forwards

Tyler Toffoli – Nick Suzuki – Cole Caufield
Artturi Lehkonen – Ryan Poehling – Laurent Dauphin
Mathieu Perreault – Cédric Paquette – Alex Belzile
Brandon Baddock – Jean-Christophe Beaudin – Alexandre Fortin

Defence

Alexander Romanov – Jeff Petry
Brett Kulak – Gianni Fairbrother
Xavier Ouellet – Cody Goloubef
Louie Belpedio – Arber Xhekaj

scowan@postmedia.com

twitter.com/StuCowan1

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