King Henrik winning battle of the goalies to give Rangers edge
NEW YORK The narrative at the start of the Canadiens-Rangers series was goaltending would be key and Montreal was the favourite because Carey Price is Carey Price and Henrik Lundqvist isn’t.
Lundqvist is a fine goaltender, but there was something about playing the Canadiens that brought out the worst in him. He has a career record of 14-17-3 against Montreal in the regular season with a 2.87 goals-against average and an .898 save percentage, and he’s been terrible at the Bell Centre. He was 0-2-1 against Montreal this season with a goals-against average of 4.04 and an .871 save percentage.
But the Rangers lead the bestof-seven Eastern Conference quarter-final series 3-2 and have a chance to wrap it up at home Saturday (8 p.m., CBC, NBC, TVA Sports, TSN Radio 690). And it’s mostly because Lundqvist has exceeded expectations. Or has he?
While Lundqvist has struggled against the Canadiens in the regular season, he has a 7-3 record in playoff games with a 1.99 GAA and .934 save percentage. In this series, he’s 3-2 with a 1.83 GAA and a .942 save percentage, while Price has a 1.83 GAA and .936 save percentage.
“You have to give him credit, he’s played pretty well,” said Canadiens coach Claude Julien. “Can we do more? I think so. We have to do more in order to win. Our team can probably be a little better to make it tough on him.”
The Canadiens are averaging 35.6 shots a game while allowing 31.6 shots, but the numbers don’t reflect the quality of the shots.
“He’s made a lot of the saves he’s supposed to and some big ones where maybe we thought we had good opportunities,” said defenceman Shea Weber. “They’re doing a good job of cleaning out the second opportunities, as well, and we have to hunt those pucks down. We have get even more traffic in front of him because he’s playing so well.”
There was a lot of talk Friday about how the Canadiens have handled adversity this season. They led the league in third period comebacks, but their third period and overtime performance in Thursday’s 3-2 loss at the Bell Centre was pitiful. But Julien said the Canadiens are focused on Game 6.
“We have a pretty good road record and I don’t think their home record is the best, so I would have to say the pressure is on them, too,” Julien said.
“You have to win four games to win the series and winning that fourth game is always the toughest.”
And that brings us to a final set of numbers for Lundqvist, who knows a thing or two about wrapping up series. Since 2012, he’s been involved in seven games in which the Rangers had a chance to close out a series. In those games he’s 6-1 with a 0.96 GAA, a .964 save percentage and a 1-0 shutout win over the Canadiens in Game 6 three years ago.