CANADIENS
Montreal

LIGHTNING
Tampa Bay

Lineup

Forward lines and defense pairings: 

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

[one_half_last]Markov- Subban
Emelin – Gilbert
Barberio – Beaulieu[/one_half_last]

Goaltenders:

Scrivens
Condon

Scratches: Greg Pateryn, Jeff Petry
Injured reserve:  Carey Price, Paul Byron, Daniel Carr, Lucas Lessio

Game Report

There’s no debate that Lars Eller has been the Canadiens most effective center since his move back to the middle. In addition to being strong on the forecheck and being a rising shutdown center, one of Eller’s best qualities is making players around him better. The only issue is that those players around him have generally not been the cream of the crop.

A new contender to the title has stepped forward recently. Tomas Plekanec had two goals and an assist earning a first star on Tuesday night. In his last three games, Plekanec has three goals and four assists for seven points. After the Canadiens skipped awarding a Molson Cup winner for January, Plekanec is off to a good start in February.

The 33-year-old isn’t doing it all on his own. Plekanec has developed great chemistry with Brendan Gallagher and Alex Galchenyuk. Gallagher had a goal and an assist on five shots on goal. Galchenyuk had six shots picking up an assist.

Eller had another strong game in just 12:41 of even-strength ice-time. With the top line desperate for help, Sven Andrighetto was removed from Eller’s wing, replacing Dale Weise.  Devante Smith-Pelly filled in picking up just his second goal since November 25th.  Eller and P.K. Subban picked up the assists.

It’s all part of a coaching strategy developed by Michel Therrien which goes by the acronym ADD.  As you may have guessed it is titled Anything for David Desharnais.

Unfortunately it didn’t help. Desharnais received the most even-strength ice-time of any Montreal forward by far including an extended shift in the waning minutes of the game with a yawning cage at the opposite end of the ice. All to no avail, the Desharnais line was crushed all night. Desharnais finished the game with a dreadful even-strength Corsi for percentage of 20.69 being on the wrong side of 6-23 shot attempts.

In goal, Ben Scrivens continues to ride the confidence wave born out of the revenge game against the Oilers on Saturday. Scrivens made some solid saves but also benefited from a rather large helping of puck luck. Scrivens is the polar opposite of Carey Price: he makes his job look much more difficult than it is.

At some point, this bubble will burst but for now he is replicating the type of goaltending we saw from Dustin Tokarski against the Rangers in the 2014 playoffs. The technique leaves a little to be desired. Scrivens looks unconventional but is a battler.

The Canadiens now have put together three straight wins picking up enough points to provide a glimmer of hope, but realistically, does little to guarantee that hockey will be played at the Bell Centre at the end of April.

The next game on the schedule is a matchup with the Sabres in Buffalo on Friday.

~~~

▲     Tomas Plekanec, Brendan Gallagher, Alex Galchenyuk, Lars Eller, Ben Scrivens

▼      David Desharnais, Max Pacioretty, Dale Weise, Torrey Mitchell, Brian Flynn

1. Tomas Plekanec  MTL
2. Brendan Gallagher  MTL
3. Alex Galchenyuk  MTL

• “That line (Plekanec, Gallagher, Galchenyuk) was dominant again tonight. I like the way they’re playing, the way they go to the net and make good plays. They’ve got a lot of poise with the puck. They keep things simple and they don’t complicate things. They were rewarded again tonight.”

Tomas Plekanec

• “It’s all about confidence. It’s about finally getting some good, good bounces. I’m not a fan of using the bounces excuse, but if you look at the goals tonight – like the one where I slid it through [goaltender Ben Bishop’s] pads and it went in – you start playing with confidence. It was hard [during that period]. It was a little bit longer than it should have been.”
• “Playing with Gally and Chucky, they do such a great job. They’re so strong on the forecheck and making plays, and I’m trying to back them up. Things have worked well the last few nights, and hopefully we can keep that going. I think we complement each other really well. We all have a certain role on the line that we’re trying to do.”
• “Now, it’s the biggest road trip of the year coming up for us. We’ve got to come out really strong, get those games and put us back on the board.”

Ben Scrivens

• “[Tomas Plekanec is] playing extremely well for us. It seems like he’s either scoring every night or at least generating chances and making the guys on his line better, so that’s what we need from him and it’s great to see him step up and be a leader just by his actions on the ice. He’s not the loudest guy in the room, but the guys are definitely taking notice of what he’s doing on the ice.”

Lightning coach Jon Cooper

• “Ultimately the net was a little smaller for us and they shoot a puck wide, it deflects off a skate and goes in, and we seemed to hit the post all night. Their goalie played well, but we got scoring from one line. We scored three goals in two nights and one line got all three of them, so when your top guys aren’t scoring it makes it a little tougher for us.”

Quotes courtesy of NHL.com