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So a guy who just lost a debate with a rutabaga wrote because he wanted to know if I still consider Marc Bergevin a genius.

No, I don’t. I never did. In the entire history of hockey, there has been exactly one general manager with a genius rating: Fella named Sam Pollock, worked out of an office at the Montreal Forum, won some games along with his genius coach, Scotty Bowman.

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The rest? Nary a genius among them. But even if Bergevin was a card-carrying member of the Mensa Society, his IQ Saturday morning would have been the same as it was at puck drop Friday evening. And he has still done a fine job assembling this young Canadiens team, no matter what the final score in Anaheim.

Photo by Allen McInnis / Montreal Gazette

Contrary to popular opinion, coaches and GMs don’t get smarter or dumber with every win or loss. The truth, although fans rarely want to hear it, is much more prosaic. Teams are built with dull, slogging hard work in chilly arenas from Minsk to Medicine Hat. They’re held together with miles of tape and long, painful hours of physical therapy and rehab. They’re assembled, one piece at a time, with care and patience and more than a little luck. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.