NHL : riding the play-offs rollercoaster. (1)

What a difference a week makes.

When the Habs traded Huet to the Washington Capitals, some Quebec journalists, who had, for the past two years, written -sometimes embarrassingly- glowing reviews about him, were suddenly very vocal about the goalie's "vraie valeur" (true value) : Huet had never been a true number 1, he had been responsible for the Habs' loss in the 2006 series against the Hurricanes, he was certainly not worth more than a second round pick.

Once again, Gainey had managed a great deal for the Habs.

When the regular season closed and the Capitals, against all odds, managed to sneak into the play offs, in no small part thanks to Huet's goalkeeping, one might have believed these journalists had been vocally wrong and Gainey had not managed such a great deal after all.

One week later, with the Capitals and Huet in the cables versus the Flyers and the Habs on their way to showing the Bruins the door on the back of Carey Price's faultless performance, one would have felt pressured to revise one's judgement and eventually agree that Gainey had indeed managed a great deal, Huet was a loser and Price the expected Messiah.

(PM)