Joe Veleno’s attention to detail earns him roster spot with Canadiens

Montreal – Joe is ordered He removed the wing and press the “Explosion Direct speed” button when he crossed the offensive blue line. The television broadcast forced its double folding from the second gear to the fourth, passing from 26 kilometers per hour to 34 to open a space that can allow him to do something special.

Instead, ordered just did what the situation was required for. He began the play one by two and only slightly improved his chances after the gas, so when he got into this space, he used it to just get a simple shot on the network.

This five second sequences were among several reputable, which were ordered in the final exhibition game of Montreal. It was a type of sequence that ensured his work in Canadian months after he signed an annual deal with them, the cost of extraction is greater than the minimum of the league.

This transaction for $ 900,000 occurred 15 days after the beginning of an unlimited free agency, and everything that it really imagined was a rescue circle for a former NHL career in the first round.

Velen came to the Canadiens camp to grab this rescue line and rise, and how he managed to do this, doing exactly what the game asked him every time he stepped on the ice.

“I thought he was excellent tonight,” said coach Martin Saint-Luis after Canadiens lost to 3-1 Senators Ottawa.

The gaming sheet says: Joe is ordered: zero goals, zero passes, even glasses, even glasses.

But the gaming sheet does not track the calculated solutions that increase the percentage of your line that won the shift.

This is what Saint -Louis emphasized by Canadiens for most of the year.

This is what he was talking about with reporters who were present on skating on Saturday, as well as that he repeated after the game on Saturday evening.

“I think they understand what we are looking for,” the coach said after he was asked in the morning about the endgopile for Fringe Players, still striving for lists with Canadiens. “I think we report that every day at the meetings that we have. We are making a video, we do not show the main coils; We are talking about the details of the game, about the usual things that you should do again and again. From time to time you get unusual things, but this is not one extraordinary thing that is going to enter the door. From time to time you are going to do an extraordinary thing.

The fact that the game always gives you, these are situations that make you quickly make calculations. And the fact that he makes you calculate is how much risk you can afford to take.

Velen constantly made these calculations correctly throughout the camp, pumping oxygen in his career in the NHL.

If he continues to do them correctly when the season swept, he will move from survival to flourish like Detroit Redi hoped that he would choose it 30^tour In general, in the 2018 project.

It may take 25-year-old 306 NHL games to truly understand what is needed to make your mark in this league, but at least he understood this.

“I think that experience is probably the biggest thing, you will need to study certain things in terms of details, knowing where you are going to be, knowing the trends of the guys you play and with whom you play,” said Velen. “This happens naturally, as soon as you get so many games under your belt, so I really grew out of my experience.”

But many of these young Canadians grew out of their experience.

If this was not obvious in this last pre -season game, which Brendan Gallagher qualified as the one in which the Canadiences did not have a “committing or an effirt”, this was clearly obvious through the rest of their camp.

And Camp was a continuation of what we saw from Canadiens until the end of 2024 and the first months of 2025, when the entire team covers a detailed “ordinary hockey” and ripening.

“You could say that since December it was switched, and it became really contagious,” Saint -Louis said. “You make an impetus, get into the play -off, go through this first round, you understand how important it is. When the camp began, we did not start all over again. There is continuity. The guys really took it to heart. We started a camp with such thinking. ”

Canadiens also end in a camp with him.

Even the guys do not end the camp with Canadiens, to what extent they accepted the thinking that Saint -Louis wants to want them to be.

The abbreviations will be announced on Sunday. They almost certainly include Florian XhekajOwen Bek and Adam EngstromThe field and although all three of these players would be justified in order to feel disappointed from the fact that their dreams are not realized, St. Louis noted that they should not feel as if they had failed.

Engstrom did something but unsuccessful. His only way to work on the blue line of Canadiens was a trauma of one of the players locked in one, but he did not allow this to prevent him from proved that he was ready for one right now.

“He is a gamer,” Saint -Louis said. “He is going to play hockey (NHL). He played a good game tonight, showed that he has everything he needs to play in this league. Not surprised if he has a long career. ”

No one should be surprised if it begins for the young Swede at some point this season.

Beck has already played 13 games at this level, and his 14^tour It will come soon.

The first Xhekaj may appear a little further along the road, but any doubt that he will play it before someone thought he would be called up – 101^st In general, in 2023 – was erased by his performance in this camp.

Nevertheless, the details should be pointed, and the calculations are made more accurately – and not only for unlawed stone, such as Xhekaj, but also for the most varnished Canadians.

The player likes it Patrick Lane He must ritually perform ordinary more than he did at the exhibition. He is a player capable of unusual things, but also a player who often complicates the usual ones.

And what is “ordinary?”

“This is F3 on Forecheck, how you arrive in our zone if they get deep goals, how you cope with the impulse as the first striker,” Saint -Louis said. “Each team has different ways to play in certain situations; Do you understand how we want to play it, and can you do these ordinary things again and again, this will allow us to kill more games, get more goals and now raise interest to be able to do unusual things? ”

Oliver Kapanen and Samuel Blays also made, and the first has already created this team.

Do not be surprised if the latter, which had five hits against senators, also remains after Sunday abbreviations.

Then the real fun begins, and this will not be ordinary.