Jose Theodore -- Making them forget about "St. Patrick"

It's Stanley Cup time and what would the Stanley Cup playoffs be without the Montreal Canadiens, one of the "original six" teams in the NHL?

Yet, for the last four years, the proud Canadiens have not even been in the mix. This year is something different.

Like 1971 and 1986, they are lead by a young goaltender who may take them all the way to the finals. In 1971, it was Ken Dryden, and in 1986, it was a young 21-year old goaltender from Quebec City named Patrick Roy.

In 1997, Jose Theodore, a young left handed goaltender from Montreal made his debut in the Montreal net.

At the time, goaltending on the Canadiens had fallen on hard times.

The man who Montreal fans still today fondly refer to as, "St. Patrick," had left Canada and had taken his act on the road to Colorado, where he's won two Stanley Cups.

While he caused hardly a ripple in those first years with the team, Theodore has gone from "who dat?" to goaltender of the future.

Jose, which is pronounced the French way, not Spanish way, as in Joe-Zay, is even being considered for MVP in the NHL, along with Goaltender of the Year.

At the end of the regular season, he led the league in save percentage and most saves, which means the Canadiens' opponents didn't do a whole lot of scoring while he was in the net.

He had a taste of the Stanley Cup playoffs in the Canadiens' last appearance, which was in 1997. At that time, he was backup to then Montreal goaltender, Jocelyn Thibault, who took his goaltending act to the Windy City.

Now Theodore is the man in the net for "Les Habs" and he just might make the extremely loyal Canadiens' fans forget all about "St. Patrick."