Who knew turning 100 would be so painful?
The Montreal Canadiens' season-long party has turned ugly.
The big story Friday was supposed to be Alexei Kovalev's return to practice. Well, that was still the big hockey story. But the big Habs story, of course, was the front-page stunner from French newspaper La Presse that connected the Kostitsyn brothers, Andrei and Sergei, to an alleged member of an organized crime ring who recently was arrested on drug-trafficking and illegal weapons charges. No charges were filed against the Habs players, and the report indicated they are not suspected of any criminal activity.
Still, while fraternizing with a guy from the wrong side of the tracks is hardly the worst thing ever done, it remains embarrassing to a franchise that prides itself on class and dignity and honor.
Imagine Jean Beliveau's reaction Friday morning when he saw the La Presse report. The man has worked so hard for five decades to stand up for all that is good and proper with the NHL's most decorated franchise.
Earlier this week, in another French media bombshell that didn't really translate into the rest of English-speaking North America, Beliveau no doubt held his nose when former Canadiens coach Jean Perron (from the 1986 Stanley Cup-winning team) came out on radio and singled out Sergei Kostitsyn, Christopher Higgins and star goalie Carey Price (gulp) as being guilty of enjoying the bars a little too much in Montreal and alleged that it was affecting their play.
The Habs' front office was livid with Perron, and coach Guy Carbonneau didn't hide his feelings about it.
Still, it was another PR rocket inflicting damage on the Habs' mother ship.
Nationally, the story that grabbed everyone's attention this week was Kovalev being sent home Tuesday morning by GM Bob Gainey. That made for sensational headlines and innuendo.
Oh, and the team hasn't been very good on the ice since the All-Star break, but who has time for that nonsense? There's a soap opera to be covered here. Who cares about hockey!
It's important, especially for our American readers, to sit back and realize the backdrop here. The Canadiens get media coverage unlike any other team in the NHL. Not so much that they get more than places like Toronto or Vancouver or New York, but it's the kind of coverage they attract.
There's a kind of religious underlining to the way Habs fans follow their team. Last spring, on many a night, TV ratings on French sports network RDS in Quebec beat out what English sister station TSN did for Montreal games in the rest of Canada and equaled, on some nights, what CBC's venerable "Hockey Night in Canada" was doing in the rest of the country.
In Quebec, fans are that crazy and passionate about the Habs. It fuels a 24/7, no-stone-unturned kind of media coverage, with radio shows going nonstop. It creates an atmosphere in which every little move will get documented. You are fooling yourself, too, if you don't think there are players in other NHL markets hanging out in bars until 4 a.m. or fraternizing with the odd Tony Soprano. But does anyone pay as much attention?
I am in no way blaming the media in Montreal. It is simply reacting to what the paying customer wants.
"People breathe and live their Canadiens," Hall of Famer Denis Savard told ESPN.com from Chicago on Friday.
Savard played three seasons for the Habs, winning his only Stanley Cup championship with Montreal in 1993. "A dream come true," said Savard.
He lived through the good part of that passion and attention in Quebec, but he understands the flip side, as well.
"When things don't go as well as things are supposed to, it gets really negative there," Savard said. "The players need to stay away from the radio and the papers. They have to support each other as a group, as a team and as an organization."
The current head coach should know all about controversy. There was a famous photo of Carbonneau, circa 1994, flipping the finger to a nosy photographer one day.
"I was there that day," former Habs captain Vincent Damphousse told ESPN.com Friday, chuckling at the memory. "Carbo and I and Patrick Roy were playing golf. We had agreed to talk to the media on the sixth hole. We got to the 18th hole and there's a guy with a big zoom on his camera, he's 200 yards away but he's shooting us. Carbo flipped the finger for one second, he just wanted us to be left alone. The next day it's front page."
Carbonneau was shipped off to St. Louis and don't even question why.
"That's definitely why he was traded. The image of the team and all that," said Damphousse.
Damphousse was at home in Montreal on Thursday night watching TV when the talk shows began to hint at a big story coming the next day.
"Last night on TV they were saying this was going to be the biggest story in the history of the Canadiens," said Damphousse, who played seven seasons in Montreal. "I buy the paper this morning and I have to say honestly, sure you've got two kids who made bad decisions, but they're not accused of anything.
"It shows you that the kind of hype this had generated last night, you heard rumors that the police would pick up players at the airport. In the end, you've got two kids who hung with the wrong guy but you see how big of a story it became."
Perron's accusations regarding the three Canadiens players and their off-ice habits had both Savard and Damphousse in agreement that it's harder to be a player in that town today.
"I had some great years in Montreal that I would never trade," said Damphousse, a Cup winner in '93. "But today, with the camera phones and all that, you could be in a restaurant and something is photographing you without even knowing. It wasn't like that even 10 years ago. You're always exposed as a player."
"It's a different era, a different time now," added Savard. "With everything available today, if you have one beer, they'll say you had 15. That's the problem. But you have to be careful, no question."
Whether or not Higgins and other teammates have been out partying too much or not, Damphousse said today's Canadiens need to be mindful of their actions.
"If the team isn't going well, you're probably better off staying home," said Damphousse. "But if the team is doing well, there's no problem with going out. Just use good judgment. You don't have a choice, that's a responsibility of being a Montreal Canadiens player."
Where does this all go from here? We're betting on a very painful ending to the Canadiens' season. And the exit of a few players.
Somewhere in Tampa, Fla., is Montreal native Vincent Lecavalier and he's probably thinking to himself, "You know what? Maybe life here in Florida ain't so bad after all."
Pierre LeBrun
