MONTREAL — Jaroslav Halak, the former Canadiens goalie who reached cult-hero status during an unlikely playoff run, carried the ceremonial torch into Montreal's Bell Centre to a raucous ovation Wednesday.
Halak walked into the boisterous arena’s lower bowl holding a stop sign with “DOBES” written across it, a nod to current Canadiens netminder Jakub Dobes and a callback to his own memorable spring in 2010.
The 41-year-old Slovak, who most fans did not immediately recognize until the camera flipped to the name on his back, then raised the torch to the crowd as flames shot up before Game 4 of the Eastern Conference final against the Carolina Hurricanes.
Halak joined Canadiens alumni Yvan Cournoyer, Serge Savard, Chris Nilan, Kirk Muller, Guy Carbonneau, Larry Robinson and Claude Lemieux as torchbearers so far this post-season, but Halak was the first not to win a Stanley Cup with the franchise.
Halak famously led the Canadiens to the third round in 2010 when eighth-seeded Montreal toppled Washington and Pittsburgh. Getting “Halak’d” — instead of “goalie’d” — was a common expression in the city at that time.
The current run by Dobes has drawn several parallels to what came to be known as the “Halak Spring.”
Czechia's Dobes, who turned 25 on Wednesday, was instrumental in leading the Canadiens past the Tampa Bay Lightning and Buffalo Sabres this spring, and became the overwhelming fan favourite in Montreal.
Dobes is the third goalie in franchise history to post multiple Game 7 wins in a single post-season, joining Halak and Ken Dryden (1971).
The Canadiens trailed the Hurricanes 2-1 in their best-of-seven matchup entering Game 4. Dobes kept Montreal in games despite his team totalling 25 shots combined in Games 2 and 3.
The torch-carrying continues a tradition that began during the Canadiens' last game at the Montreal Forum on March 11, 1996, when each living captain in the club’s history passed it from one to the next. Pierre Turgeon skated it into the newly built Bell Centre — then the Molson Centre — five nights later.
The symbolism stems from a line in John McCrae’s “In Flanders Fields,” with the poem’s words “To you from failing hands we throw the torch, be yours to hold it high,” embedded in both official languages inside the Canadiens’ dressing room since 1952.
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