CANADIENS
Montreal

ISLANDERS
New York

Lineup

Forward lines and defense pairings 

[one_half]Pacioretty – Byron – Hudon
Galchenyuk – Drouin – Carr
Lehkonen – Plekanec – Gallagher
Deslauriers – De La Rose – Shaw
[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Alzner – Petry
Benn – Jerabek
Mete – Schlemko
[/one_half_last]

Goaltenders

Price
Niemi

Scratches

Joe Morrow, Logan Shaw

Injuries

Ales Hemsky – concussion, Shea Weber – lower-body, Andrew Shaw – lower-body, Phillip Danault – concussion

Game Report 

It was an odd contest at the Bell Centre. The game featured two of the worst defensive teams in the NHL. The Islanders are dead last in the league in goals against (the Canadiens are 24th.)

But unlike Montreal, the Isles can score. They own the second-most potent offense in the league. The Habs are near the bottom of the league, ranked 29th in ‘goals for’.

So maybe it’s not a surprise that nine goals were scored by the two teams. But the two teams chose very different paths to find the back of the net with the Canadiens more than doubling New York’s shot count.

The Islanders were downright parsimonious in their shot selection but it felt like every one was from a dangerous area of the ice and led to a grade ‘A’ scoring chance. The Canadiens shots came from every bad position in the rink and only served to make starter Thomas Greiss look good. That proved to be a difficult task as Greiss made every save an adventure.

Greiss came into the game with the worst save percentage in the NHL (for goaltenders who have played 15 games or more.) Poor decision-making, and perhaps pure desperation led Montreal to ineffective shots on goal, more often than not finding the NYI crest on Greiss’ sweater (Tomas Plekanec and Jonathan Drouin come to mind although they were not alone.)

While the shot counter recorded 52 saves for Greiss, the Isles goaltender was not chosen as one of the night’s three stars. That should tell you something about the quality of the volleys from the home team.

And even though the Canadiens held a significant territorial advantage, one didn’t come away with the impression that they deserved to win this one. Montreal was always just one defensive mistake from losing the game against a deadly offence that didn’t need many chances.

It started early. Paul Byron didn’t look good on his first shift at centre and Jakub Jerabek slid over to the same side of the ice as David Schlemko. That left Anthony Beauvillier all alone and Mathew Barzal found him. Just 1:24 in and it was 1-0 for New York.

Byron and Jerabek were on the ice again when the Isles went up by two goals. Barzal blew by Jordie Benn to finish off this shift.

But the Canadiens managed to stay in the game courtesy of bad defensive coverage by the Isles and some shaky goaltending by Greiss. It also helped that, John Tavares, one of the league’s most dangerous centres, was held in check five-on-five by Tomas Plekanec.

Free of the stifling blanket of Plekanec, Tavares scored twice, his first short-handed and the second, the winning goal when Drouin was lax in coverage. It took Tavares three tries in overtime to score with Carey Price making spectacular saves on the first two attempts.

Six year in to the tenure of Marc Bergevin, the Habs have no one at centre anywhere near the talent of Tavares, nor Barzal, the rookie. The Canadiens from Max Pacioretty to Paul Byron were singing the praises of Barzal and his ability to make plays at high speed. Without a second Plekanec, Barzal had a goal and two assists to capture the game’s first star.

~~~

▲  Alex Galchenyuk, Artturi Lehkonen, Tomas Plekanec, Max Pacioretty

▼

1. Mathew Barzal  NYI
2. John Tavares  NYI
3. Alex Galchenyuk  MTL

• “The effort’s there and we’re going to keep working with this group because last game, against Boston, we did a really good job in our own end. Tonight, not so much. We’ve got to get back to the drawing board and see if we can’t tighten up in certain areas.”

Max Pacioretty

• “Our team shoots from bad angles often, and maybe against some teams more than others. Sometimes we get stuck in doing so instead of trying to make that extra play. It’s a fine line between wanting to make that extra play and passing up a shot, or just putting it on net. There’s a time and a place for everything, and we’ve got to balance that out.”
• “We’ve got to limit their chances in overtime — especially against skilled guys like that.”

Paul Byron

• “[Mathew Barzal] is an incredible player. It’s unbelievable to see a 20-year-old skate and handle the puck like he does. He’s probably the closest thing to (Connor) McDavid in terms of skill and speed. It was a big challenge for our line to match up against them and unfortunately, we came out on the wrong end.”

Quotes courtesy of NHL.com