CANADIENS
Montreal

1-4

FLAMES
Calgary

Lineup

Forward lines and defense pairings: 

[one_half]Pacioretty- Galchenyuk – Byron
Eller – Plekanec – Mitchell
Danault – McCarron – Lessio
Matteau – De la Rose – Brown[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Markov- Emelin
Beaulieu – Pateryn
Hanley – Dietz
[/one_half_last]

Goaltenders:

Condon
Scrivens

Scratches:  Sven Andrighetto, Mark Barberio, Victor Bartley, Brendan Gallagher (lower-body), P.K. Subban (upper-body)
Injured reserve:  Carey Price, Daniel Carr, Brian Flynn, Jeff Petry, David Desharnais, Tom Gilbert

Game Report

The Canadiens have become the team you play your backup goalie against. And after Sunday night, the Habs are also the team you play a 38-year-old goaltender who is playing his first game in 14 months against.

With a rather routine, 21-save effort, Flames netminder Niklas Backstrom picked up his first win since December 13, 2014. Just twenty seconds into the game, Alexei Emelin drifted a 47-foot wrister which Backstrom stopped easily. It would be almost 11 minutes until the Canadiens would register their second shot on goal.

So much for testing a rusty goaltender.

And it’s not as if Backstrom had a stalwart group in front of him. The Flames have given up 223 goals this season, tied for the most in the league.

Mike McCarron scored a shutout buster with 7:03 remaining for his first NHL goal.

McCarron’s goal was a brief bright spot in a weekend that saw the Canadiens on the wrong side of a 9-1 combined score.The Canadiens host the Anaheim Ducks on Tuesday at the Bell Centre.

~~~

▲     Greg Pateryn, Andrei Markov, Mike McCarron, Jacob De la Rose, Alexei Emelin

▼     Stefan Matteau, Phillip Danault, Joel Hanley, Nathan Beaulieu, Max Pacioretty

1. Sean Monahan  CGY
2. Dougie Hamilton  CGY
3. Johnny Gaudreau  CGY

• “Lately we’ve seen [Mike McCarron] putting a lot of pucks on net and he’s been a tough and physical presence in front of the crease. Tonight, he was finally rewarded for his efforts. We’ve seen some great things from such a young player; he is great at protecting the puck and uses his size to be an imposing net-front presence. That’s exactly how he scored his first career goal.”

Mike McCarron

• “It was pretty exciting, for sure. Everybody was super-excited for me. It was a one-of-a-kind moment and it only happens once so it’s exciting, but at the same time, it’s not the outcome we wanted, but it’s my first NHL goal and I was pretty excited.”
• “It was really exciting. I’ve dreamt of that moment since I was kid. It was also a special feeling just to see how excited the guys on the bench were.
• “Moving forward I’ll just try to stick to the same game plan; crash the net and grab those greasy pucks. The front of the net is where I am going to score most of my goals, I’m just happy that one finally went in for me. The fans gave me a very memorable salute, so I have to thank them for that. They were awesome.”

Nathan Beaulieu

• “Kudos to [Niklas Backstrom], who hasn’t played a game in a year-and-a-half. He played a great game. I thought we made him look pretty good at some points, but there were definitely opportunities for us to jump on him.“

Flames head coach Bob Hartley

• “There was not too much rust in [Backstrom’s] system … To get a big win, that sets the stage really well for Minnesota.”
• “We played a pretty strong … Tonight was a team win.”

Quotes courtesy of NHL.com

Former Hab Devante Smith-Pelly stays hot today as he scored the game winning goal against Columbus @AllHabs pic.twitter.com/5DqQRVjCJU

— Matt Smith (@Snakebite350) March 21, 2016

Congratulations to @MacAttackUSA93 on his first career @NHL goal #GoHabsGo @AllHabs pic.twitter.com/HVFQhLUyt9

— Matt Smith (@Snakebite350) March 21, 2016

Joel Hanley from Saturday night's game in Syracuse against the Crunch. He'll be making his NHL debut tonight. #Habs pic.twitter.com/T6qH6rpmJb

— AHL Report (@TheAHLReport) March 20, 2016

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