Canadiens Maintain Advantage in Wild-Card Race with Win over Bruins

In a parallel universe, Montreal Canadiens goalie Sam Montembeault would have shut out the visiting Boston Bruins instead of settling for a 4-1 win on Thursday night. By all rational mindsets, head coach Martin St. Louis could have successfully challenged Elias Lindholm’s third-period marker to make it 3-1. After all, David Pastrnak was all over Montembeault, preventing him from getting over to the other side of the net to make the save.

However, seeing as St. Louis hasn’t had much luck challenging for goalie interference recently, it wasn’t worth the risk of sending the Bruins to the power play in a game the Canadiens very much had in hand at the time. So, whether that was his own mindset or not, the Habs wisely left well enough alone and continued to cruise to victory in a game in which they held a decisive 32-19 advantage in shots on goal.

Game Recap

Truth be told, there was a point at which the outcome of the game was in relative doubt. That moment of doubt came to an end early in the second period when, en route to outshooting the Bruins 17-2 in the frame, the Canadiens opened the scoring. The loose puck found Christian Dvorak in the slot. He proceeded to fire it home, giving him five goals and 10 points in his last 10 games.

With five minutes to go in the second, Nick Suzuki, who also sealed the victory with an empty-net goal, fed Cole Caufield on a two-on-one rush to make it 2-0. Brendan Gallagher scored the 3-0 marker exactly three minutes into the third period (that’s just how it happened), when Michael Pezzetta and Jake Evans forced a turnover behind the Bruins’ net. A wide-open Gallagher made no mistake, beating a helpless Jeremy Swayman, who made 28 saves in the contest, his first-ever regulation loss to the rival Canadiens.

Montembeault made 18 saves on the night for a relatively easy night of work, obviously just missing out on his shutout bid. Regardless, the win was much more important overall. It put the wild-card Canadiens two points up on the ninth-place New York Rangers (same amount of games played) and four points up on the 10th-place Columbus Blue Jackets who were still facing the Colorado Avalanche at the time this contest ended.

The now-36-30-9 Canadiens next play the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday at the Bell Centre. The last-place (in the Eastern Conference) Boston Bruins, now having lost 10 in a row, are now 30-37-9. They host the Carolina Hurricanes next, also on Saturday.