Carey Price is gone for six weeks minimum with what the Habs will only disclose as a lower body injury. 

I have had so many insiders whisper to me that it is a right knee injury that if it isn’t a right knee injury, the Habs should receive an Academy award for obfuscation. The Habs don’t want anyone targeting their star goalie when he returns, so the location mystery makes sense. If the league doesn’t require you to tell exactly what the injury is like the NFL does, then why not officially keep it a secret?

Let’s, for the sake of discussion, assume what we have seen and heard is true and it is, in fact, a right knee injury. We can then logically work from there that it is not a meniscus injury. The healing time is only four to six weeks for a normal adult and as little as three weeks for an athlete, so it’s then logically a ligament injury.  The ACL requires surgery, so it is a best guess of a partial tear of the MCL which can heal with sufficient rest – in this case minimum six weeks.

It’s also difficult to know with this injury if there will be a setback.  It’s important to note here that one should not look for someone to blame inside the organization for letting Price get back on the ice to play after only three weeks only to reinjure himself in the same spot. With a partial tear, when the athlete says he’s fine, then one can presume that he is fine. The pain tells you and when you feel good to go, there’s no idea if the injury can return. 

I asked Marc Bergevin just this question: When Price is finished his convalescence for this longer period of time, will he perhaps reinjure his lower body again? The answer was a comforting, ‘When he returns he will be 100 per cent.’  People don’t like to hear it, but Price got unlucky, and he may get unlucky again.

For the first time though, one has to wonder about the longevity of Price in the NHL.  He has a big contract coming the year after next and he will command maximum years and close to maximum money.  The Habs will have to know by then if this injury is going to always plague him. 

There is a chance that Price had the same injury many other times already, like in the Ottawa series, like in the Rangers series, like after the Olympics.  My feeling is we also have a groin injury somewhere in this mix, but most of the time sadly it may just be the same knee, and one has to wonder if surgery isn’t going to be needed eventually here.

That’s just me talking here. That’s not anyone else. In fact, on facing that question, Bergevin said that it’s true that goalies go up and down and work hard in the butterfly, but Henrik Lundqvist is getting older and he’s still playing well.  The Habs have to hope that Price can put this behind him long term and move forward to that Stanley Cup that they are so close to attaining. They’re the best team in hockey, but not without Price.

Cue the new number one netminder on the best team:  a 25-year-old rookie who in the calendar year 2014 was playing in Wheeling of the East Coast Hockey League.  Condon is why the word meteoric was created. We learned today that it was Rick Dudley who pointed out this kid toiling away in the minors and that the club should take a look at him for some depth in the goalie position. 

Now he’s not a depth guy. He’s THE GUY!

And I mean it. He’s the guy. They can say that they have confidence in Dustin Tokarski, but on the weekend they had back-to-back games against New Jersey and they used Condon for both halves which is rare. 

Price will be gone until mid-January and in that time the Canadiens will play 21 games. On four occasions they will play back-to-back. This means that Tokarski is likely to get four looks. If Tokarski is not good in the first two looks, Bergevin dropping Zach Fucale’s name into the conversation at his newser was likely not an accident.

It’s interesting because the Habs started the season with a bit of a chip on their shoulder as Tomas Plekanec said that the Habs are more than just their goalie and they want to prove it.  So far they have and now they really get the opportunity over an extended period.

 In his first Price injury stint, Condon was rolling right along with a .940 and all looked grand, but he tired and faltered with an .870 in the final stretch as fatigue, whether mental or physical, became a real issue.  The Habs are a fantastic hockey team. They don’t need Condon to be brilliant at .940. They just need about .910 from him. They get that, and they’ll win their share. They get .870 and the countdown to Carey’s return will be furious.

It’s a lot of pressure building for a Princeton grad who in Wheeling likely wondered what it is all for.  It is all for this. The physical training of reps and thrusts and lifts and sprints; the mental exercises you learn to quiet the mind, to visualize the execution of your skills.  This moment is why you gave all that you had in every way you could think to be dedicated, to keep moving forward with belief.

For this is THE DAY  that you became the number one goalie of the number one franchise in the National Hockey League – the storied Montreal Canadiens and add to that, you are replacing the best goalie in the entire world.

It’s your time, Mike Condon. It’s your torch now. Hold it high.