I doubt Guillaume Latendresse, nor Max Lapierre felt at peace as they set their heads down on the pillow on Saturday night.
They both had to keep replaying that the head coach thought more of Ryan White and to a lesser extent Tom Pyatt than them.
Latendresse and Lapierre were benched for the entire third period. Not even a sniff. Only around two minutes of ice for each in the second period. Overall, Latendresse finished with 5:28 and Lapierre with 6:22.
What was even more noteworthy than the benching was Jacques Martin's direct assessment of the player's efforts saying he wanted to go with players instead who were ready to go to war.
It has been interesting to watch this experienced, professional coach not hesitate to get his hard message across, even if it has meant some embarrassment for players. But that's okay really. If you have to answer to comments like that from your head coach, you might be less inclined to dog it.
It has always seemed to work for me when Martin calls out his guys. Maybe I just like that a coach with a lot of years behind him is in town. I just feel inclined to believe him. I believe the players give him the same benefit.
Meanwhile back at the mill, Andrei Kostitsyn got over sixteen minutes of ice time. Martin said he liked that he was using his body more and felt he deserved the extra time.
If you feel like putting two and two together, the Oilers' Kevin Lowe was in for the game. Prendergast watched again last Tuesday from the press box. That's four for Prendergast out of five but he says it's just ease of travel from Montreal to the farm team. By the way, Lowe and Gainey had a nice chat before the game.
Did I mention AK-46 had over 16 minutes of ice time? Only four other forwards had more.
