Canadiens' Gallagher enjoying renaissance after undergoing game-altering process

NEW YORK — By now you’ve seen it eight times through 22 games this season: Brendan Gallagher, with his hands raised in celebration, smiling as he makes his way to lead the high-five line at the bench after scoring a goal for the Montreal Canadiens.

It’s a markedly different image than the one he regularly projected through most of the last three seasons.

Too often over that time, you’d see Gallagher doubled over on his way back to the bench, with lungs obviously burning and the frustration of watching his best efforts go unrewarded clearly showing on his nicked-up face.

It made it look like Gallagher’s years of being a productive NHL player were behind him.

Watching the five-foot-nine, 185-pound winger play like a six-foot-four, 220-pound power forward through the first nine seasons of his career only reinforced the notion, practically making it a foregone conclusion the heavy physical toll he’d paid would never be refunded.

But at 32, and in his 13^th season with the team that drafted him 147^th overall in 2010, Gallagher not only appears rejuvenated; he looks like he might be more efficient than he’s ever been at this level.

It’s a suggestion Gallagher didn’t entirely disagree with when we sat down with him earlier this week to discuss his renaissance.

“I feel like it’s different now,” he said. “I definitely feel like I’m more comfortable in that the game seems to move a lot slower in my mind. Confidence-wise, I feel as good as I’ve ever felt. It’s hard to say if I’m better now than I was then, though, because I do feel like I’m a bit of a different player. I had a way of having an impact back then, and it’s a little bit different now just based on a lot of different variables.

“But I feel as comfortable as I’ve ever been.”

That much seems obvious.

What Gallagher has been is the most productive version of himself since he posted 14 goals and 23 points in the 35 games he played in the injury-plagued, COVID-affected 2020-21 season.

It’s no fluke, according to Martin St. Louis.

St. Louis, who took over as coach of the Canadiens in February of 2022, convinced Gallagher to re-program his game, and he said last Friday that what we’re seeing now is the fruit of that commitment.

“I think Gally, since I’ve been here, he’s improved his software. Like the iPhone,” St. Louis said. “I think it’s never too late to improve the software. And when you improve the software, you have more options.”

It took a year-and-a-half for the update to process, for the adjustments Gallagher was making to become second nature to him in gameplay.

There were many of them, and they were all made with the aim of conserving an aging and banged-up body while expanding a mind that had been conditioned to play the game as hard and fast as possible almost exclusively in the most punishing areas of the ice — the corners and in front of the net.

That’s where Gallagher made his name from Day 1 with the Canadiens, and it’s how he eventually buttered his bread with them. He followed up consecutive 30-plus goal campaigns with 22 goals in 59 games of the 2019-20 season, and then his output en route to helping the Canadiens get to the 2021 Stanley Cup Final the next season helped earn him the six-year, $39-million contract he’s currently a little more than halfway through.

But as the injuries continued to pile up for Gallagher — and as the shots stopped going in as regularly for him — the need to alter his approach was becoming less and less deniable.

“For me, at the stage I was at in my career, I realized the changes would be very beneficial to take care of myself, protect my body and find ways to have success without necessarily wasting energy,” Gallagher said.

It was a feeling-out process at first. A slow burn of learning to allow someone else to be the first forechecker from time to time, of looking for uncovered space in the offensive zone rather than constantly charging into traffic, and of occasionally pulling up on the rush to make second-wave plays rather than attempting to barrel straight through checks, right past the crease and into opposing goaltenders.

Then the optimization appeared to really start kicking in last season.

It’s running at full capacity now.

“I haven’t lost sight of who I am and what I need to do as a player,” Gallagher said, “but there’s multiple areas of the game where I come off the ice and think that’s something I wouldn’t have done five years ago. It’s little things — and maybe they happen one night and won’t happen again for a month — but they build up and add up, and I’m at a stage now where I’m really comfortable with it. It’s become instinctual, and now I’m getting rewarded with it.”

And it’s not just in the goals department, with Gallagher tied with Nick Suzuki for the second-most tucks on the Canadiens.

He’s put up four assists, he’s been highly efficient on the power play, he’s been the momentum-shifting engine when the Canadiens have needed one, and he’s found a way to contribute in other ways when he hasn’t scored.

This week was a great example of that, with Gallagher registering 10 hits in Tuesday’s overtime loss to the Utah Hockey Club and with him taking Zach Werenski off the ice for seven minutes after exchanging slashes and fighting with him in Montreal’s overtime win over Columbus on Wednesday.

“I think he’s doing everything he can to help this team win games,” said frequent linemate Josh Anderson before those games were played. “He’s not trying to do too much. He’s keeping it simple, he’s working as hard as he can, like he’s been doing his whole career, and I think that’s what’s been noticeable.

“I think what a lot of guys can learn in this room, too, is sometimes, when you don’t have your A-game that night, can you do other things to help the team win? He’s one of the guys that’s been doing that consistently, whether that’s blocking shots, getting on the forecheck, getting to the net, scrumming it up. He’s just been doing the little things that help our team and give our team momentum, and it's been paying off for him this year.”

And, as St. Louis noted, Gallagher is enjoying it.

The love of the game appears as strong as it did when he came into the league a fresh-faced 20-year-old in 2013, and his love for the Canadiens hasn’t waned at all despite difficult results for the team through the first quarter of the season.

They’re trending towards a fourth straight absence from the post-season, leaving Gallagher further away from accomplishing his lifelong dream of winning a Cup.

Still, the Edmonton native has no intention of asking out of Montreal.

“Some years it works out, some years it doesn’t, but I’ve always come in with a feeling of responsibility to do my job, and I’m never looking for a way out. Don’t get me wrong, having a chance to win is why we play the game, and that’s what everyone wants. But I’m just not in a position where I’m looking for solutions elsewhere," Gallagher said. "I want to do what I can to help this group and, until they ask me not to be a part of that, it’s not going to come from me. It means so much to be a part of this team and you just want to do whatever you’re being asked to do, and I think you always feel like the solutions are within you.

“It hasn’t been a positive start, results-wise, by any means, but we still feel we’re a group that can compete against anyone on any given night and I love coming to the rink and love being a part of this. Finding solutions is part of the challenge you have to embrace.”

That’s exactly what Gallagher has done on the personal front, too, after scoring just 15 goals combined over the 2021-22 and 2022-23 seasons.

How far he’s come in his process has been evident to everyone watching.

Former Canadien Tomas Plekanec, who was recently in Montreal scouting for Czechia’s national team, caught a glimpse of Gallagher 2.0 and came away impressed.

“He’s playing well. He’s skating well, he looks like the Gallagher I knew from my days here, and he’s evolved," Plekanec said. "It’s key, and it comes with experience. He knows where to be, where to skate to be most efficient.

“And the players here are very fortunate to have a guy like Gally because what he’s had to go through as a smaller player and how he’s had to fight off age is a great example for the guys around him.”

Gallagher aims to continue to be one and believes the changes he’s made to his game will help him do it.

“I still feel like I can be a contributor, I can have an impact, and when I’m asked to do my job I feel like I can go out and do it,” Gallagher said. “When the time comes that I don’t feel that I can do it, that’ll be my time to say goodbye. But I don’t feel like it’s anytime soon. I feel healthy, I feel good, I’m able to do my job, and I’m going to continue to push and hold on to that spot as long as I can.”