Carey Price
Makes 24 saves as the Habs beat the Sabres 2-0 for their third straight win.
The skinny: One night after going on the road and beating the best team in the Eastern Conference, the Canadiens were hard-pressed to beat the worst team in the National Hockey League. The Buffalo Sabres played the Canadiens to a standstill for 50 minutes before Max Pacioretty scored at 10:53 of the third period and Montreal went on to post a 2-0 win Tuesday at the Bell Centre. Carey Price needed only 24 saves to post his fifth shutout of the season. Milestone for Patch: Pacioretty’s goal was his 32nd of theseason—ateam-high— but it was also his 100th career goal. Pacioretty went hard to the net and redirected a pass from Thomas Vanek. Buffalo goaltender Matt Hackett, who was making only his second start of the season, got a piece of the puck but was unable to keep it out. Power outage: This was another one of those games in which the Canadiens struggled on the power play. They had three opportunities in the second period and generated only one shot on goal. In fact, they were outshot 2-1 after Drew Stafford went off in the first minute of the period. Former Canadien Matt D’Agostini received a double minor — two minutes for holding and two more for whining — but Montreal went four minutes without a shot. Daniel Brière scored a power play at 16:54 of the third period to give Montreal one goal on six opportunities. The Sabres were 0-for-2 on the power play. Shaking things up: Without Dale Wiese (out 2-3 weeks with hand injury) and Travis Moen (out at least a week with a concussion), coach Michel Therrien threw together a line with three centres — Lars Eller, Michael Bournival and Ryan White. Tomas Plekanec had a chance to play with the kids, Brendam Gallagher and Alex Galchenyuk while Brière was between Rene Bourque and Brian Gionta. Jarred Tinordi replaced Francis Bouillon on defence. Moving up: The win gave the Canadiens 89 points and they moved into second place in the Atlantic Division with a two-point edge over Tampa Bay. The idle Lightning have played two fewer games. The Canadiens also moved nine points ahead of Detroit and Toronto who are battling for fourth place in the division. What’s next: The Canadiens go back on the road for four games beginning Thursday in Detroit. They play the Florida Panthers Saturday, the Tampa Bay Lightning Tuesday and wrap up the trip next Friday in Ottawa.