Canadiens Lineup

Cole Caufield – Nick Suzuki – Jesse Ylonen

Mike Hoffman – Kirby Dach – Josh Anderson

Michael Pezzetta – Christian Dvorak – Evgenii Dadonov

Harvey-Pinard – Pitlick 

Joel Edmundson – Justin Barron

Mike Matheson – David Savard

Jordan Harris – Johnathan Kovacevic

Arber Xhekaj

Sam Montembeault – Cayden Primeau

Chris Wideman

Carey Price (knee), Paul Byron (hip), Sean Monahan (lower-body), Kaiden Guhle (lower-body), Brendan Gallagher (lower-body), Jake Allen (upper-body), Jake Evans (lower-body), Joel Armia (upper-body), Jonathan Drouin (undisclosed), Juraj Slafkovsky (lower-body)

Game Report

The Canadiens and the Florida Panthers are the two most penalized teams in the NHL. In that respect they did not disappoint. The two teams combined for 90 minutes in penalties tonight with Montreal accumulating the lion’s share of the total.

With the Canadiens spending far too much time in the box, the Panthers scored four times with the man advantage. The Habs went 0-for-5 on the power-play.

After Sam Reinhart scored the opening goal 6-on-5, Marty St. Louis made a poorly-conceived challenge. Sam Montembeault had overplayed the initial shot and could not get back into position to save the rebound. After the lost coach’s challenge, the Panthers were back on the power-play and went up 2-0 after a goal from Sam Bennett.

In addition to a two-minute penalty for the failed challenge, the Canadiens were assessed two bench minors for too many men on the ice. Post-game, the head coach said that he was just taking a chance by challenging the goal. It was a tough night for St. Louis and his staff.

With Sergei Bobrovsky exiting the game after playing just 2:01, it became a battle of AHL caliber goaltenders with Alex Lyon facing Montembeault. It was Lyon who won this matchup as he made outstanding saves on Cole Caufield and Josh Anderson.

The game took a few nasty turns: Mike Matheson with a dirty reverse hit on Eric Staal (he did not return to the game) and Sam Bennett’s knee on Jordan Harris. In addition to several fights, Givani Smith, David Savard and Arber Xhekaj each earned 10-minute misconducts.

The Canadiens are now 0-5 when wearing the powder blue Reverse Retro 2.0 jerseys. They will don them three more times this season.

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