CAPITALS AT CANADIENS

Five things you should know about the Canadiens Capitals game at the Bell Centre on Monday (7:30 p.m., TSN2, RDS, TSN690 Radio), writes Pat Hickey

The matchup: The Canadiens are coming off a successful Western Canada road trip as they rebounded from a one-sided loss in Edmonton with wins in Calgary and Vancouver. They were the first back-to-back wins for the Canadiens since they won three straight from Oct. 13 to 17. Montreal defeated Washington 6-4 in their previous meeting Nov. 1 at Bell Centre. The Canadiens hold the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference with a four-point edge over the Capitals. Washington has had some time off following a 3-2 overtime victory over the Colorado Avalanche Friday in Denver. The goalies: The best news from Western Canada was the outstanding play of Carey Price, who appears to have figured out whatever was going wrong in his head. Price stopped 79 of the 83 shots he faced in the two victories and that works out to a save percentage of .952. Washington’s Braden Holtby has an 11-2-2 record against the Canadiens with a 1.79 goals-against average and a .938 save percentage. He missed the last two games with an upper-body injury, but practised Sunday. If Holtby isn’t ready, Pheonix Copley will start. Offensive punch: Max Domi picked up an assist in Saturday’s 3-2 win in Vancouver and has points in all nine games the Canadiens have played in November. He has four goals and eight assists in that run and he leads Montreal in goals (10) and points (24). Tomas Tatar opened the scoring Saturday and he has scored nine goals, including five in the past five games. And Jonathan Drouin has found his form since being paired with Domi. Drouin scored the game-winner to run his points streak to five games with three goals and three assists. Eller playing bigger role: Former Canadien Lars Eller found his niche last season as the Capitals’ third-line centre. He scored 18 goals in the regular season and added seven goals and 11 assists in the Capitals’ Stanley Cup run. Eller, who scored twice in Washington’s Nov. 1 loss, will be asked to play a larger role because Evgeny Kuznetsov is injured. That means Eller will be on the No. 1 line with Alex Ovechkin and Tom Wilson. Ovechkin also scored two goals in the earlier loss to Montreal and leads the Capitals with 13 goals. Injury updates: Defenceman Shea Weber is skating and has been involved in some contract drills, but it might be too much to expect the Canadiens’ captain to be back in the lineup by the weekend. The original prognosis had Weber returning from knee surgery in early to mid-December. While Holtby is likely to return, the Capitals will be without Kuznetsov and winger T.J. Oshie. Both took hits to the head in Wednesday’s loss in Winnipeg. They are listed as having upper-body injuries, but it’s a good bet they are going through concussion protocol.