CANADIENS
Montreal

DEVILS
New Jersey

Lineup

Forward lines and defense pairings: 

[one_half]Pacioretty – Plekanec – Smith-Pelly
Eller – Galchenyuk – Andrighetto
Fleischmann – Desharnais – Weise
Byron – Flynn – Thomas[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Markov – Subban
Pateryn – Petry
Beaulieu – Gilbert[/one_half_last]

Goaltenders:

Condon
Tokarski

Scratches:  Bud Holloway
Injured reserve:  Brendan Gallagher, Torrey Mitchell (lower-body), Carey Price, Alex Semin
Suspended: Zack Kassian

Game Report

The good news is that the Canadiens earned three of a possible four points in the home-and-home series against the Devils. But from their perspective, the New Jersey hockey club was rather pleased to take home three points themselves having stood toe-to-toe with one of the best teams in the NHL.

This was a game that Montreal let get away. As Max Pacioretty said post-game, there is no excuse for a loss given that his team had a two-goal lead in the third period.

John Moore was the overtime hero for the Devils after Adam Henrique had led an odd-man rush with Sven Andrighetto desperately skating to get back. Moore recognized that had he not put the rebound past Mike Condon, the Canadiens would have had their own odd-man rush. That is simply the volatile dynamics of 3-on-3 hockey.

While many mistakenly focused on pointing the finger of blame during overtime, the Canadiens simply should have not given up the tying goal. And the captain knew it. Pacioretty was still steamed about the Devils second goal when interviewed post-game claiming that it was “unacceptable.”

Condon said that he misread the shot. Some fans wanted to blame coach Therrien for the timeout, time that New Jersey used to draw up a play. But it was Pacioretty who failed to tie up his man off the faceoff after Tomas Plekanec had won the draw.  Therrien echoed the disappointment saying that his crew did not jump on the loose puck.

It is attention to detail and a commitment  to winning battles particularly when given a chance to close out a game that is required to stay at the top of the standings.

The Canadiens play next on Tuesday when they host the Columbus Blue Jackets at the Bell Centre.

▲     Alex Galchenyuk, Lars Eller, Sven Andrighetto

▼     Devante Smith-Pelly, P.K. Subban, Nathan Beaulieu

1. Alex Galchenyuk   MTL
2. Kyle Palmieri   NJD
3. John Moore  NJD

• “[Alex Galchenyuk] is playing well. He’s really dynamic. He’s certainly deserved success because he has worked so hard.”
• “We were not alert to jump on the loose puck (on the tying goal.)”
• “It was a good experience for (Bud Holloway). He deserved to get called up.”

Max Pacioretty

• “It’s a terrible way to lose. It’s unacceptable. We have to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
• “They play the right way and it’s tough to get scoring opportunities and shots against a team like that. They defend really well, you’ve got to give them a lot of credit, but we had a chance to close up that game and there’s no excuse for that.”
• “Those things happen, but they shouldn’t happen to us. We don’t exactly know why. We felt like we had them in a good place, up a goal with 22 seconds left and their goalie pulled. It falls on everyone on the team, not just one guy. Now we have to bounce back from it and learn to be better.”

Alex Galchenyuk

• “I think it hit my stick, to be honest.  It was a pretty high shot; I was just trying to get away from it and it hit me. I was still trying to tip it, but it just went in a completely different direction and I was happy to see that one go in.”

Mike Condon

• “A 2-0 lead with about 10 minutes left… you never want to lose a game like that. They’re a skilled and talented team and they worked really hard to even things up. They had most of their chances in overtime.”
• “I tried to come out to the top of the crease to take away that shot, but I didn’t track the puck very well off of [Mike] Cammalleri’s stick. It was knuckling a bit, but that’s a save I need to make for my team. I’ll put that one on me.”

Devils defenceman John Moore

• “It was one of those things when he made the initial stop, with this 3-on-3 overtime, I was thinking, ‘Oh man, I better find a way to put this in,’ because if you don’t, of course it’s a 3-on-1, 3-on-0, the other way. So luckily enough, it found its way in.”

Devils goalie Cory Schneider

• “They’re obviously one of the best teams in the League for a reason. They’re tough, they play well, they play smart, but we just went toe-to-toe for them back-to-back nights and I think it says a lot about our team and the way we can play.”

Quotes courtesy of NHL.com