Forward Andrew Shaw denied a report on Thursday that he had been humiliated in the dressing room during a game by former Montreal Canadiens coach Michel Therrien.
The report said Therrien dressed down Shaw in front of his teammates during the second period intermission of a 3-1 loss in Philadelphia on Feb. 2. It said a teammate, possibly goalie Carey Price, intervened to try to stop the incident. Shaw had taken an interference penalty that led to a Flyers’ power play goal and was benched for the rest of the game.
Shaw looked surprised when told of the report.
“It wasn’t a feud,” he said. “I got a penalty in the second period. I got sat.
‘No, it didn’t happen’
“That’s happened before in my career. It’s him being a coach. Where do you guys get this stuff? No, it didn’t happen.”
There was speculation the alleged incident played a part in the decision by the slumping Canadiens management to fire Therrien and hire Claude Julien on Feb. 14.
The Canadiens acquired Shaw from the Chicago Blackhawks in the off-season for a pair of draft picks in part for his leadership qualities. They signed the 25-year-old to a six-year US$ 23.4 million contract.
Shaw, who won Stanley Cups with the Blackhawks in 2013 and 2015, said dealing with the media is different in Montreal.
“In Chicago, it was a very popular team,” he said. “Media was big, but here you’ve got English media, French media, so there’s more of it.
“But when you hear something like that, in the locker-room we all know that never happened. The way the media feeds off that kind of stuff is a lot different, that’s for sure.”
Andrew Shaw, right, shares a laugh with new Canadiens coach Claude Julien at a recent practice. (Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
