Montreal and Tampa Bay renewed their division rivalry on Tuesday in a deciding matchup of old winners and hopeful newcomers. Montreal delivered an effort that likely deserved a better score than 6-1 based on their offensive play, but certainly deserved the six against due to their goaltending and defensive lapses. Multiple Tampa players were gifted open backdoors and side-to-side passes, and the rest were perimeter shots getting through traffic or Habs defencemen getting beat to the inside.
Plenty of the Canadiens players had moments of positivity, Kapanen scored, and Hutson and Demidov kept their legs throughout the game, but that is precisely their job description. Mike Matheson is usually the Canadiens best defenceman in coverage and blocks, but tonight at -3 and paired with Dobson at -2, Hutson eclipsed him simply by not being on the ice for the goals against. Montreal suffered another debilitating loss, again at home. Fans may be growing less excited and more dubious as to how they will continue to respond to these drops in focus and finish.
Habs Starting Lines
Caufield – Suzuki – Slafkovsky
Texier – Kapanen – Demidov
Anderson – Evans – Gallagher
Davidson – Veleno – Bolduc
Matheson – Dobson
Struble – Hutson
Xhekaj – Carrier
Dobes
Montembeault
Ten Thoughts
1) The Lightning and Canadiens both came out of the gate bursting with energy. Tampa Bay threw the body around early, and Montreal spent the first few minutes winning puck battles in Tampa’s zone and getting some scrambly shots in on Jonas Johansson. Unable to break through for a quick score, Montreal got caught deep in Tampa’s zone as the puck was transitioned up the ice quickly by Jake Guentzel. Kapanen had lost the battle with Oliver Bjorkstrand, allowing Guentzel to get possession and feed Brayden Point up at centre ice, whose skating beat Struble to the outside. Point sent his shot inside the post on the far side, beating Dobes and giving the Lightning the early lead.
2) A minute and a half later, Montreal drew their first power play of the evening and had an opportunity to equalize the contest and assert themselves at home. Pontus Homberg held up Jake Evans near the entry to the zone, resulting in an interference call and the Montreal man advantage. Although the top unit continued to sling the puck around with alarming speed and coordination, they kept missing the net, and had to switch out following whistle. The second unit also looked dangerous – albeit Cole Caufield and Nick Suzuki stayed on the ice with Ivan Demidov – but disaster struck as the penalty expired. Caufield had sent a pass to Oliver Kapanen in front of the net, and tried to get it to Suzuki on the opposite post, Kapanen sent his backhand pass in the same direction. The bouncing puck beat Suzuki through his legs, ricocheting off the corner boards right to Demidov, who then sent a pass of his own back to Dobson at the point precisely as Holmberg stepped back onto the ice. The puck seemed to roll over or barely slide under the toe of Dobson’s stick, slowing down perfectly for Holmberg to spring him on the breakaway. The forward beat Dobes through the legs with a quick back-and-forth deke, but Dobes was not the primary Canadien who looked flat-footed on the play. Once more, the footspeed of Dobson while pursuing another player was in the spotlight.
3) Tampa Bay continued to finish on almost each of their chances, as Nikita Kucherov added to the deficit with 2:48 remaining in the first. Tampa Bay took a dominant 3-0 lead late in the first period following a several minutes of sustained pressure by the visitors and another defensive breakdown from a disheartened Montreal team. Tampa Bay sent a point shot in on Dobes, and the entire line collapsed to the front, all five players in the square between the posts and inside hash marks. As the loose puck bounced out to Crozier cruising into the slot, nobody picked up Kucherov on top of the circle who had a wide-open net after taking the faked-shot pass from his defenceman.
4) As the period expired, Charle-Edouard D’Astous was called for cross-checking Caufield, giving the home team a idea of hope and the idea of plenty of time to work with in the middle frame. Montreal worked the zone during that power play to start the second and their top unit was able to get a few shots into Johansson’s body, but nothing came up for the scoreboard.
5) Samuel Montembeault was injected into the game, and gave up the fourth goal on the first shot of the second period. Another back-door goal, the goaltender was not left with much of a chance when D’Astous broke free of his coverage and found the soft spot in coverage behind Brendan Gallagher. The Canadiens forwards watched the puck get sent across the centre of the slot and banked in. Evans and Anderson both spun to the outside as the puck was passed, and Gallagher was never threatening pressure during the entire play. Mike Matheson and Montembeault were both left stranded, and the game continued to get ugly for Montreal at home.
6) Nikita Kucherov was rung up for tripping after skating totally-not-on-purpose through the back of Matheson’s leg, sending him tumbling on the ice. Again, Montreal spent the power play with plenty of possession time and seemed to execute on the vision of the advantage, but also continued to miss the net. This time it was Caufield, missing twice above the net but still shooting from tight angles near to the goal line. In case you were wondering, there still wasn’t anybody screening the goalie or near to the front of the net.
7) After his first aggressive-offensive play that I have actually noticed this season (making a move around a forward without a stick and shooting on-stride), Arber Xhekaj interfered with Brandon Hagel as he entered the Canadiens zone. On the penalty kill for the first time in the game, Montreal held their formation and gave very little in the way of quality chances Kucherov and Point did their best to shrink the box, but were unable to thread any seam passes through to the slot. Matheson was everywhere with his long, waving stick, getting into lanes and breaking up dump-ins. A positive note in the game for Montreal, at least.
8) Montreal was able to renew their offence in the late stages of the second period, the pressure and offensive zone draws piling up and culminating in Demidov drawing a tripping call from the goal-scorer D’Astous. The Russian winger tried to spin around the defender, whose stick was between his legs. Montreal cut into the lead with about 30 seconds remaining in the period, just as Demidov cut into the zone with the puck and took his time along the blue line. As his linemates caught up, Demidov sent the puck across the zone to Suzuki, whose one-timer hit both posts. Thankfully, gloriously, finally, there was a Canadiens player crashing the net and was there to bat the rebound out of the air and into the net. Oliver Kapanen earned his 9th goal of the season, Montreal scored on the power play again, and both teams headed to the dressing room with the score 4-1.
9) Spectacularly, the Canadiens found each and every way to give up goals. A minute and a half into the third, Darren Raddysh shot the puck off of Montembeault’s mask and into that open corner of the net which has become so popular to aim for. The Tampa Bay defender was held to the edge by Matheson throughout his dash, but it is the goaltenders’ responsibility to be aware of that opportunity and players’ willingness to try for it. Now down 5-1, effort and mistakes became muddled in a morass of choppy and chippy play. Montreal was able to kill off a penalty taken by Zach Bolduc, called for tripping when he got beaten by his man in the faceoff circle but it didn’t muster up any positive momentum.
10) Raddysh doubled down a few minutes later on the power play, Arber Xhekaj sitting again after a phantom high-sticking call in his own zone. Tampa Bay won the faceoff and Raddysh immediately hammered the puck from the point. The tone of the game was eerily familiar to the two losses against Dallas and Los Angeles, the veteran players looking on or getting into scrums for the crowd. Anderson and Sabourin collided in a wrestling match, Montembeault got Bronx cheers for saves, and the Bell Centre slowly emptied in a whimpering finish to a disastrous game for the Canadiens.
HW Habs 3 Stars
For the second time in a month, Montreal has achieved “No-Star” status. Professional athletes shouldn’t get stars for performing their job athletically.