Can Carey Price Ride Out the Lightning?

It took five games for Carey Price to take the throne as the world's best goalie, 66 to secure it, and it may end up taking less than five for him to lose the title altogether.

This is generous hyperbole, sure, considering there was doubt in the lead up to the 2014 Sochi Olympics about whether Price should have been given the starter's role for Team Canada. He silenced all doubters with an astonishing 0.59 Goals Against Average through five games en route to the Gold Medal and the end of the debate. For the time being: Carey Price was the best goalie on the planet.

But ah, the constant conundrum of goalies: white hot, able to carry a team on their back one day, vanishing the next. We saw it with the Andrew "The Hamburglar" Hammond, who was lights out down the stretch for the Ottawa Senators in the regular season before eventually going cold in the playoffs and giving up the starter's role after two games. 2014-15 Vezina Trophy nominee Pekka Rinne was largely consistent all season long but became erratic in the first round against the Chicago Blackhawks, bowing out after six games. And fellow Vezina nominee Devan Dubnyk was one of three goalies to allow six goals in one game during this post-season.

Which brings us to the final Vezina nominee, Price, who in facing the only team that were able to beat him thoroughly in the regular season, the Tampa Bay Lightning, has not looked like himself in the second round of the playoffs.

Which is to say, he has looked human.

Price was torn apart by the Lightning offense in Game 2 of their series, giving up an unseemly six goals. Before that outburst against the Canadiens, the Lightning had scored a paltry 2.37 goals per game through their first eight playoff games, looking nothing like the team that lead the NHL in regular season scoring.

They are now reminding the hockey world why they were Price's only kryptonite this season.

Since the NHL began awarding the Vezina Trophy to the NHL's best goalie in the 1981-82 season, only four winners have gone on to hoist the Stanley Cup that same season. Leaning on one strong goalie may now be a thing of the past as the Habs have run the risk of putting all their eggs in one basket: their defensive-minded approach (Montreal averaged the 6th lowest shots per game total in the regular season) meant Price had no choice but to be absurdly strong. And he was. But Price alone cannot steer an overachieving team who cannot score to a Stanley Cup.

The Canadiens were swept 5-0 by the Lightning in the regular season, and outscored 21-8. Price posted a bloated 3.47 Goals Against Average in the process. But he was so compelling against nearly everyone else (Leading the league in wins, GAA and save percentage) that his shortcomings against the Lightning were easy to overlook until now as a fluke, or statistical aberration. But now Price needs to be his very best, and the Lightning stand before him.

And as the Canadiens continue to struggle to score goals, Price may be standing alone. His team did little to patch up its sputtering offense this season. Although they've been here before. In 2014, they acquired Thomas Vanek at the trade deadline to no effect in the postseason.

So the Habs have continued to ride Price. But goalies, standing alone at one end of the rink, are only one piece of the bigger puzzle. Drafting and development has taken over as the de facto way to win in the NHL. Not even Roy and Brodeur could do it alone. That notion begets the importance of depth, which the Canadiens lack.

The series moves to Florida this afternoon. If the stoic Price is exhausted, we won't know it. Showing emotion has never been something Price has done well, which is to say, done at all. But the Canadiens are at risk of falling down 0 games to 3. And the line between a hot goalie and one burnt out from overuse during the regular season is getting thinner and thinner.