The Montreal Canadiens came to town on a two-game losing streak to face a Pittsburgh Penguins team struggling this season and sitting in last place in the Metropolitan division.
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Martin St-Louis’ patience ran out after Thursday’s debacle in Washington, and for the first time of his young coaching career, the bench boss submitted his charges to a punitive practice on Friday. The kind of training session that includes a lot of skating and very little pucks.
Just like Thursday, the Canadiens played a prudent game in the first frame, only allowing five pucks to reach Samuel Montembeault’s net. The visitors blocked 10 shots, sacrificing the body for the good of the team, showing they heard their coach’s message, at least to an extent.
Unfortunately for Montreal, the one big mistake they made came to bite them right back. Mike Matheson turned the puck over to Rickard Rakell who found Sidney Crosby in acres of space. The Pens captain doesn’t need that much space or time to pick a spot, and just like that it was 1-0 Pittsburgh.
Crosby’s crew dominated the second frame, adding 16 shots to their total, including five in the first five minutes (as many as they got in the first 20 minutes of play). The host looked very confident and comfortable in the Canadiens’ zone, setting up shop as if they were on the power play every other attack.
Montreal got its first two power plays of the game in the middle frame, but couldn’t convert. Rushing their play oftentimes and making obvious passes which were easy to cut for the experienced Penguins.
Unfortunately for Montreal, their penalty kill wasn’t as effective as the Pens’ one and when David Savard took a delay of game penalty, Crosby took a quick shot from far out to beat an unsuspecting Montembeault and double the locals’ lead. Once again, the goal came shortly after a faceoff was lost, and it was far from the only one. 40 minutes in, the Canadiens had lost 62.1% of the draws, Dach being the most efficient up to that point with a 40% success rate.
It’s easy to understand why St-Louis decided to give Josh Anderson another go on the top line, with Alex Newhook and Kirby Dach struggling to find their game, Juraj Slafkovsky’s talent was needed on the second line.
Emil Heineman didn’t raise any eyebrows in his short lived first line audition, so rewarding Anderson who’s been working like a horse alongside Jake Evans and Brendan Gallagher made sense, but unfortunately, the power forward wasn’t the answer to the first line conundrum a couple of years ago and he still isn’t.
Montreal looked much better in the third period, it’s fair to say that this time, they didn’t “throw up all over themselves” as St-Louis so eloquently put it on Thursday. In those last 20 minutes, they put 12 shots on net while limiting the Pens to only three, but it wasn’t enough.
Still, it’s worth mentioning that Christian Dvorak finally found the back of the net with helpers from Heineman and Slafkovsky, but it was the only time the Canadiens got to celebrate. With two minutes and a half left in the game, St-Louis pulled Montembeault but the move backfired. It took near two minutes before Blake Lizotte scored in an empty netter to seal the deal, but the improvised man-advantage was derailed when Caufield was hit in the offensive zone.
Instead of focusing on tying the game, the diminutive player started running around for anyone to hit. Now, it can be frustrating to be hit, but his role on the team is not that of a headhunter and no matter how hard he hits, a goal from him would be more painful than a physical retaliation. Since he failed to find the back of the net tonight, Caufield’s goal scoring streak came to a halt after four games.
At the other end of the spectrum, you had Crosby on the ice when the Penguins were in possession in the offensive zone with the Canadiens’ net empty and he wasn’t even looking to complete his hat trick. What matter to him is to win the game, not to pad up his stats, as St-Louis would say, that’s a hockey player and not just someone playing hockey. He’s chasing 600 career goals, but he doesn’t care.
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There was a bit of pushing and shoving after the whistle was blown on Pittsburgh’s 3-1 win since Noel Acciari, true to his style of play, managed to lay four big hits over the course of the game. One of which really shook up Dvorak, but the most important one and potentially devastating one, was the one on Slafkovsky. Somehow, the center managed to clip the big Slovak in the jaw with his arm as he laid the boom on him, sending him to the dressing room with less than four minutes left to the game.
It could have been an idea for Mike Sullivan to keep Acciari out of arm’s way for the rest of the game, but he sent him over the boards for the last sequence. Of course, Xhekaj had a word with the 5-foot-10 little ball of hate, but the referees and linesmen stepped in.
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In the loss, Montembeault had a solid outing, keeping the Canadiens afloat while the Penguins were driving the play in the middle frame. In the end, he allowed two goals on 23 shots which is good for a .913 save percentage. Unfortunately for the started though, Alex Nedeljkovic stood on his head in the final frame and stopped all but one of the 27 shots he faced, giving him a .962 SP.
Even in the defeat, St-Louis looked pleased with his team’s effort adding it was a step in the right direction and they just had to keep going now. The Canadiens will now fly back to Montreal where they’ll host the Calgary Flames at the Bell Centre on Tuesday night.
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