CANADIENS
Montreal

2-3

DEVILS
New Jersey

Lineup

Forward lines and defense pairings 

[one_half]Lehkonen – Galchenyuk – Gallagher
Carr – Desharnais – Andrighetto
Farnham – De La Rose – Terry
Scherbak – Audette – Eisenschmid[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Petry – Barberio
Alexandrov – Redmond
Hanley – Juulsen
[/one_half_last]

Goaltenders

Condon
Lindgren

Scratches

Jeremiah Addison, Guillaume Asselin, Nathan Beaulieu, William Bitten, Simon Bourque, Tim Bozon, Matthew Bradley, Paul Byron, Connor Crisp, Phillip Danault, Josiah Didier, Alexei Emelin, Jake Evans, Giovanni Fiore, Brian Flynn, Max Friberg, Zachary Fucale, Jeremy Grégoire, Hayden Hawkey, Arvid Henrikson, Charles Hudon, Ryan Johnston, Nikolas Koberstein, Konstantin Korneev, Andrei Kruchinin, Brett Lernout, Mark MacMillan, Andrei Markov, Stefan Matteau, Michael McCarron, Michael McNiven, Victor Mete, Torrey Mitchell, Al Montoya, Max Pacioretty, Tom Parisi, Greg Pateryn, Michael Pezzetta, Tomas Plekanec, Carey Price, Alexander Radulov, Martin Reway, Philip Samuelsson, Mikhail Sergachev, Andrew Shaw, Andrei Sidyakin, Casey Staum, Colin Sullivan, Dalton Thrower, Maxim Trunev, Lukas Vejdemo, Shea Weber

Game Report

NHL hockey has returned to the Bell Centre, albeit of the pre-season variety. And Kirk Muller was back behind the Montreal bench. After going 0-for-5 on the power-play, there’s still more work for Captain Kirk to do with his troops. But it was good to see him coaching in Montreal for the first time since the 2011-12 season.

A newcomer, Artturi Lehkonen looked great on the first line, finishing the game with nine shots on goal and four hits. Lehkonen’s performance drew praise from his linemates and coach. He’s following a strong showing in the Rookie Tournament in a bid to earn a roster spot on opening night.

Jeff Petry was steady on the back end leading the team in icetime at just under 25 minutes. Zach Redmond had a goal on four shots. Yury Alexandrov had a solid game playing 15:41. Noah Juulsen led the Canadiens with four blocked shots and added four hits in 18:25.

Charlie Lindgren was tagged with the loss but had a much stronger game, sharing the goal with Mike Condon. Lindgren allowed just one goal on 17 shots, making several outstanding stops. Condon had trouble with rebound control giving up two goals on 10 shots.

~~~

▲     Brendan Gallagher, Artturi Lehkonen, Yury Alexandrov, Zach Redmond, Jeff Petry, Charlie Lindgren

▼     Joel Hanley, Bobby Farnham, Chris Terry

1. Adam Henrique  NJD
2. Artturi Lehkonen MTL
3. Taylor Hall  NJD

• “We can all see that [Artturi Lehkonen] has the rhythm to play at this level. That’s what he showed us during practices and again in the game. He’s very involved in a lot of the aspects of the game. I really liked his performance.“

Brendan Gallagher

• “[Artturi Lehkonen] is a smart hockey player and he picks up on things pretty quickly. He’s a good kid. Hockey sense is something you can’t really teach.“

Artturi Lehkonen

• “They want to see what I can do with those type of guys. Take a hold of the moment and do what you do best.”
• “I had my chances. I had a couple of great opportunities to put the puck in the net. It didn’t go in tonight and of course that pisses me off.”

Quotes courtesy of NHL.com

This "Desharnais" line has looked absolutely terrible this evening… @AllHabs

— Matt Smith (@Snakebite350) September 27, 2016

I've never seen this many empty seats at the Bell Centre for a #Habs preseason game #HabsIO. Looks a little more than half-full at puck drop

— Stu Cowan (@StuCowan1) September 26, 2016

First period of first exhibition game of the year, Brendan Gallagher's been hit seven times.

— Eric Engels (@EricEngels) September 27, 2016

Follow @AllHabs on Twitter